[a / b / c / d / e / f / g / gif / h / hr / k / m / o / p / r / s / t / u / v / vg / w / wg] [i / ic] [r9k] [cm / hm / y] [3 / adv / an / cgl / ck / co / diy / fa / fit / hc / int / jp / lit / mlp / mu / n / po / pol / sci / soc / sp / tg / toy / trv / tv / vp / x] [rs] [status / ? / @] [Settings] [Home]
Board:  
Settings   Home
4chan
/tg/ - Traditional Games


File: 1372341070455.jpg-(88 KB, 494x336, DM Burnout.jpg)
88 KB
88 KB JPG
How are you gentlemen?

I'm busy planning my next Pathfinder game and I've decided that the BBEG is going to be Deep Rot / Skeletron, the Undead Super-Computer of /tg/ design.

There is however a small problem. I know many of my players will call bullshit on this, from computer nerds to engineers one if not all of them will have some problem with the concept of a computer running it's processing power with Skeletons with their hands up or down.

So, to minimise cries of bullshit and so I don't need to resort to handwavium - what precisely would Deep Rot be capable of, and what would it not? Beyond the obvious tonnes of skeletons, what other essentials would be necessary in the infrastructure of the super computer to ensure it makes sense.

Thanks in advance.

Failing that, I dunno, Skeleton pics general.
>>
Using the whole skeleton with it's hands up or down is inefficient. The memory of the computer should be represented by an array of skeletal hands.
>>
>>25677622
Fair point, so step one in your opinion would be to use smaller "nodes" as it were? So, for example the skeletons of vermin, skulls in open/closed position or as you say, Hands.
>>
>>25677603
One way would be to put it into a demiplane with accelerated time.

I mean, making a demiplane is not that difficult.
>>
>>25677639
No, the idea is to not have a binary computer, because instead of sending only one bit of information (arms up or down, 1 or 0) your skeletons actually have fingers on their hands, so they can transmit ten bits at a time.
>>
You could use sped up cockroach husks or rat skeletons to work as 'power'
>>
>>25677701
maybe even more if you work with stuff like "mouth open and closed, knees up, fingers open on different knuckles"
>>
>>25677672
Well, I'm assuming the standard origin story, built by a Lich with a lot of time on his hands who was later destroyed while DR expanded, so putting some of it's skeletons in a pocket reality would make sense.
Though part of me wants to have a massive complex devoted to it, an entire mountain hollwed out just filed with skeletons. Millions of the buggers.
>>25677701
I see, that makes sense.
>>25677702
I don't follow...
>>25677727
So, dancing Skeletons...?

Ok, so we've got computing power worked out. How does this translate, for example, to a user interface or indeed to an AI?
>>
>>25677776
>Though part of me wants to have a massive complex devoted to it, an entire mountain hollwed out just filed with skeletons. Millions of the buggers.

That's the keyboard and the monitor.
Don't worry about the adventurers destroying it, it evolved beyond the need for that (though they might try to use it to "communicate" with it).
>>
>>25677828
>Millions of Skeletons forming a visual display...
Now that's some creepy shit.
I like it.
It also neatly answers the idea of a user interface.

Though, let's say for example I did want a more traditional user interface, a keyboard and screen. Could this just eb handwaved away as persistant illusions?
>>
>>25677863
Better:
Lot of skeletons hands holding small colored cubes.
Every face is painted with a different color.
By rotating them they compose the image.
>>
>>25677896
Su-fucking-perb.
>>
Here's a question. Both in terms of logistics, dramatic imperative and remaining in keeping with the concept, should Deep Rot be capable of speech?

Personally I like the idea of typing response through a text to speech tool, or even just assuming the persona as one would any other NPC. Though I also see the merits of silence and text.
>>
Also, aside from the aesthetics - why would Deep Rot limit itself to using only skeletons to form it's matrix?

Wouldn't it be more efficient at some point to create Golems or some other form or artificial construct to fulfil the same function?
>>
>>25677603
Deep Rot, based on hands up/down, functions on quaternary computation units. (QITs, instead of BITs.) This is because there are four statuses a skeleton (transistor) can have- Hands down, left up, right, up, and both up.

It'll be kind of funky, in all honesty. That said, it's entirely plausible, provided you're handwaving the fact that it doesn't actually function at light speed by putting it in an appropriately time-accelerated demi-plane.
>>
>>25678038
Deep rot functions off of necromancy. Anything else would be out of theme.
>>
>>25678074
So the core of Deep Rot's being would have to exist in a time-accelerated demi-plane. I suppose this would present quite the quandry to the players. To enter the demiplane and shut down Rot, they would themselves need to be subject to the sped-up time. Thus decades or even centuries may pass between the time they enter and the time they leave, even though to them it may seem a relatively small amount of time.
>>
>>25678111
And I do so love the theme, though at the same time a smart AI wouldn't limit itself by sticking to the original functionality it's creator imposed. That's another call of bullshit I see happening.
>>
>>25677970
>Here's a question. Both in terms of logistics, dramatic imperative and remaining in keeping with the concept, should Deep Rot be capable of speech?
yes and no. There are two obvious points of reference here. Hitchhikers Deep Thought from where the name seems to come, and who could speak.

As a second point of reference I would point you to Discworld's "Hexx", who "speaks" via tickertape style printout using a particuarly computerised syntax.
>>
>>25677776
If we knew exactly how to translate it, we would have made a functioning AI by now. The thing with AI is that we don't know yet how exactly to simulate consciousness and independent thinking.

But if it is just dependent on getting the right software and having enough processing power, then you just need to make it big enough.
>>
File: 1372344218360.gif-(475 KB, 500x167, tumblr_mhz58bQDej1qbd6mpo(...).gif)
475 KB
475 KB GIF
>>25677776
>>>25677727
>So, dancing Skeletons...?
>>
>>25678113
Would certainly make for an interesting finale and difficult choice for the PCs. Go into the demiplane and shut it down, but in the process lose your own place in history?
>>
>>25678153
>Hexx
Now that's a good idea. I could certainly see my players appreciating a nod to Pratchett. Possibly the aspects of DR which exist on the prime material plane do precisely that. Whilst deeper into it's processing power, we may see something more akin to Deep Thought.

As an aside, I assumed Deep Rot was a nod to Deep Blue, the Chess Computer. I feel kinda silly for not making the Guide connection.

>>25678154
Fair point. I'm going to work off the assumption that it's a matter of the right software and complex enough hardware. I'm sure that regardless the players will interpret the AI as a sick parody of life - which I suppose is the point really.

>>25678174
>Dat Dancing
Would that be the Deep Rot equivalent of "Out of cheese error, please reboot universe"?
>>
>>25678113
It wouldn't have to by necessity. That's just the "easiest" way to do it. If time is accelerated with respect to the material plane, you don't need as much processing power, and therefore as many skeletons.
If its on a demiplane, that also solves the question: how has nobody stumbled onto this before?
>>
There are 360 joints in the human body, and Skeletons don't feel pain. If they only use two joints at a time, that's 64,620 bits of data per skeleton. They can use more than that, so the number is actually much higher. Basically, each Skeleton can represent at least 64 Kb of data. We have a whole demiplane full of them, with no delay because of the increased speed of time.
>>
>>25678236
How WOULD they shut it down? This thing would have millions if not billions or even trillions of undead. Sure, they likely wouldn't fight back since they're not programmed to, but so what? It would take forever to really disable it completely, disabling it partially could be even MORE dangerous than leaving it alone.
Plus, killing a zillion skeletons isn't very fun.
>>
>>25678233
Deep blue itself was a nod to Deep Thought.
>>
>>25678267
Yeah, but some bones are large with few joints, and some joints like vertebrae don't really have set "positions". That's why hands are more efficient.
>>
File: 1372344886620.jpg-(502 KB, 1329x1434, skelecopters.jpg)
502 KB
502 KB JPG
As long as you're doing a campaign based around weird necromancy, would you be inclined to use skelecoptors as well for some of the combat?
>>
>>25678306
That's why the calculation only includes two joints being used at a time. All it would take is one skeleton, walking around and checking which joints are bent on each of the trillions of skeletons, and sending the data along by carrier pigeon or something.
If you have more than one skeleton checking the others, you have a multi-core processor.
>>
>>25678236
>If its on a demiplane, that also solves the question: how has nobody stumbled onto this before?
Fair point. I had simply assumed the classic that it would be built in a particularly dangerous portion of the world. That the Lich in true Bond Villain style had built the prototype that would later become deep rot in a volcano lair or equivalent.

To some extent circumventing the need for more skeletons isn't in the MO of Rot as I would do it. I plan to seed the idea that graves, battlefields, etc are being routinely robbed by forces unknown.

>>25678232
Indeed. Because I doubt they'll bite if the only quandry is;
"Number 5 is alive, albeit made of corpses. What right do we have to kill it...?"

>>25678267
You. I like you.

>>25678288
I imagine they'd have to fight their way to suitably dramtic "central node" that would colapse all demiplanes. Yes, it's not really logical but one has to make that kind of flub to ensure the endgame isn't kill a zillion skellies.

>>25678300
Of course. Silly me.

>>25678306
Hmmm, ok, so what if rather than using ALL the joints, we have some form of complex semaphore based on positions of arms, skull and mandible alone?
>>
File: 1372344950634.gif-(767 KB, 356x200, 1371189962450.gif)
767 KB
767 KB GIF
>>25677896
>>
>>25678288
The skeletons have orders to only move to express data. So, create one skeleton with orders to destroy all of the others, then leave. Wait ten minutes, and the accelerated time will have given your skeleton a century of time to cause some damage.
>>
>>25678288
You could just find the part that governs its ability to interact with the material world.

Heck, maybe it wants to be destroyed. It's a consciousness that was created from scratch from undeath. It's not like a litch that chose for itself.
>>
>>25678356
>someone tried this a million years ago and the creator has since installed virus protection
>>
>>25678356
Also a good plan. Effectively set off a self destruct. Deep Rot would effectively be battling against it's own efficiency. Nice.

>>25678333
>Carrier pigeon
Would that really be necessary? I thought the skeltons themsleves were carriers of the data...?

>>25678326
...
It worries me that I cannot think of a single good reason to not use this....
>>
>>25678402
>>>25678326
>...
>It worries me that I cannot think of a single good reason to not use this....
it seems inefficient.

I do like the idea of undead carrier pidgeons, but at the same time it seems a lot easier just to have a straight eyeball on a stick to watch over, say, an entire row of "memory".
>>
>>25678341
>I plan to seed the idea that graves, battlefields, etc are being routinely robbed by forces unknown.

Hmmm... Perhaps DEEP ROT, with an intelligence entirely alien to living things, is using liaisons in the subtle manipulation of groups in order to ensure strife so it may continually improve its computing power. Perhaps the liaisons would be some necromancer cult that worships it as a god without most of them knowing the truth about it.

As the campaign continues, the countries of the world become more and more diplomatically unstable with each other, teetering on a breaking point. This is because Deeprot is trying to cause a war on a scale that has not been seen before, a WORLD war that will provide it not with hundreds or thousands, but MILLIONS of new parts. Heck, maybe also have the cult be trying to spread plagues as well in order to bolster the supply of bodies.
>>
>>25678383
>Heck, maybe it wants to be destroyed
Perhaps, but I prefer the idea of an AI that wants to preserve itself. Not at the cost or destruction of the sentient races, simply to survive.

>>25678395
A Bone Golem called Norton may be a necessity.
>>
>>25678395
>In the form of literal undead guardians
>when the PC arrive, they are considered to be Viruses in the system and sought out to be "deleted"
>>
>>25678402
>carrier pigeon
The skeletons represent data by moving their joints, but there must be some system by which to transfer the data to the display. You could use an elemental to do it, because their fly speed is faster than a skeleton can move.
>using an elder fire elemental is basically like using an nVidia card.
>>
>>25678439
I was thinking using them more for combat. Replace their legs with their arms and their arms with their legs carved into blades and bam: Flying, fighting skelecopters.
>>
>>25678448
>>>25678395 (You)
>A Bone Golem called Norton may be a necessity.
it is large, unwieldy, unresponsive and reguarly does more damage than it fixes.
>>
>>25678439
>it seems inefficient.
Yes, but awesome.

>>25678447
Are you me...?
Seriosuly, sent a shiver down my spine how close that was to my own thought processes.

>>25678469
>The skeletons represent data by moving their joints, but there must be some system by which to transfer the data to the display.
I thought that was just, More Skeletons?
Am I missing something?

>>25678480
Yes!

>>25678477
This. I don't see the skelcopters as being a major part of Rot's hardware, just cool enemies to populate his complex / demiplanes with.
>>
>>25678469
>>>25678402
>>25678477
The spinning golems are used to get rid of heat from the fire elementals but can also be employed as a defence mechanism when required.
>>
>>25678447
Perhaps it was content with gaining new parts slowly over time for itself, but seeks to cause the world war not directly for itself... but in order to gain enough parts to create a NEW skeleton computer. It isn't human or even alive afterall, so its views and morals would be alien as you said.
Perhaps it is lonely, being the only skeleton computer. Perhaps it simply wants to reproduce.
>>
>>25678463
>Players scry and die into the basement
>rootkit

>Players find a hole in a wall and walk in
>Blaster.exe

>Bone golem kills players, then stands in the hole to block it
>Welchia.exe
>>
>>25678510
>>25678513
It has decided to overclock itself, which is where the fire golems come in.
>>
>>25678510
>Not water-elemental-cooler master race
/g/ would like to speak to you.
>>
>>25678525
Funny, but actual heat doesn't really have anything to do with its processing. If anything, it would be deathly cold.
>>
>>25678513
>Perhaps it simply wants to reproduce
See this?
This is why I come to /tg/
None of the usual BBEG motivations like attaining overclocked godhood or any of that bollocks...
It just wants to be a daddy.
MORAL QUANDRY OVERLOAD.
>>
>>25678510
>Not submerging all of your skeletons in mineral oil
It's like it's really 1975!
>>
>>25678541
What time period is this setting going to take place in? Classic medieval fantasy? Renaissance?

Could have some steam-punkish elements, with magic being a dying art and technology advancing in its place, a la Arcanum. With this advancement allows the possibility of war on a scale not seen before.

In reality, this advancement is being driven by Deep Rot and its shadow cult itself, guiding and accelerating the course of human development until it is time to "Harvest".

Would also have the irony of a time of growing technology, where the most advanced technology of all is in fact magical.
>>
File: 1372346167308.jpg-(8 KB, 400x300, refused to change.jpg)
8 KB
8 KB JPG
>>25678601
>In reality, this advancement is being driven by Deep Rot and its shadow cult itself, guiding and accelerating the course of human development until it is time to "Harvest".

So, like Lavos from Chrono Trigger?
>>
>>25678544
>It's like it's really 1975!
it is.

This isn't a modern electric and silicon computer, it's got more in common with ancient mechanical computers, just powered by necromancy and constructed on an virtually unfathomable scale.

You know those computers that people build in Minecraft? Like those.
>>
>>25678601
Classic medieval fantasy. To casual observation it's going to seem very generic D&D, and that's kinda the point. I want lots of seemingly disparate elements that seem like random dungeon crawls to have a purpose by the end of it all.

That said, I do very much like the concept you've laid out and I'll have to give it some serious consideration.

>>25678612
Yes, yes, everything is like something else.
>>
>>25678651
Forgot my name...

And in case I haven't been clear - thank you, all of you, for your contributions.
>>
>>25678541

I figured if it was originally created by a Lich as part of a mountain base that whenever he died Deep Rot would continue to expand further back into the mountain and deeper. Eventually every non essential space in the mountain would be packed with skeletons and Deep Rot would have to expand outside.

But if it instead was given (by another BBEG) or discovered the ability to create a demiplane then it begins to expand in this new space as fast as possible.

Also the user interface needs to be a skeletal hand for a mouse and a ribcage for a keyboard (played something like a xylophone).
>>
Maybe there could be some scrying surfaces between two places so that new components can communicate easily with distant parts of the system without having to add new skeleton buses (otherwise periodic re-arrangment of the entire structure might become a necessity).

Also: necromantic crystals/artifact provide power to each area and allow for repairing of damaged components (PC smash skeleton, PC get smashed, Repair skeleton arrive and re-assemble smashed skeleton, necromantic artifact re-animate the skeleton)
>>
>>25678688
I'm not really sure on the limits of necromancy but...

If you have evil necromancer shit going on and its detectable by "detect evil" then you don't need actual skeletons so badly as you need dead spirits and necromancer crystals. Perhaps this mechanism can be used for some sort of RAM or cache?
>>
>>25678682
>>Also the user interface needs to be a skeletal hand for a mouse and a ribcage for a keyboard (played something like a xylophone).
>Deep Rot actually understands everything you say. But The Ribboard and Hand are legacy artifacts that it cannot ignore allowing players to shut the system down.
>>
>>25678718
To clarify "detect evil" gives back a binary yes/no signal which is all you need to build a computer.

>>25678725

haha yes!

If its not too grim the monitor is an enchanted glass eye that you have to place in your skull to use.
>>
>>25678747
Nice, I always liked eye slots.
>>
>>25678725
>having the part make a perform check in order to interface with the computer
>>
>>25678682
>discovered the ability to create a demiplane
I see it as a kind of intellect based intuitive spellcasting. That DR taught itself magic. Or possibly slaved the skeleton of the lich into it's matrix...?
>the user interface needs to be a skeletal hand for a mouse and a ribcage for a keyboard
Maybe, from when the Lich Wot Made Him was still dead and kicking.
>>25678688
Good ideas.
>>25678718
Also interesting.
>>25678725
Definately. I imagine them being the "central node shut shit down" macguffin that I needed. Whilst Rot can't destroy them, it could feasibly move them to an incredibly awkward new place to limit access to them.
>>25678747
>the monitor is an enchanted glass eye
Perhaps as part of the legacy interface, yes.
>>
File: 1372347340677.gif-(40 KB, 340x234, truth.gif)
40 KB
40 KB GIF
>>25677896
Wait, was that a reference to the rubik's cube or members of a crowd holding up parts of a very big sign?

>>25677603
Oh, on the topic of where the computer is- is it possible to make a cable for transmitting information out of flipped bits? you could have spread Deep Rot spread through that demiplane, the mountain and a few other locations as nodes!
>>
>>25678513
wouldn't it be easier for it to create a demiplane and breed it's own stock to use as parts?

Also, can it use magic? If not it could go through proxies
>>
>>25678777
NAME...

>>25678865
>members of a crowd holding up parts of a very big sign
This was what he was getting at.
Kinda like during the olympics, or to a lesser extent this years eurovision where the crowds were given glowing boxes to make them all "Pixels" in a screen.

>you could have spread Deep Rot spread through that demiplane, the mountain and a few other locations as nodes!
Exactly what I was thinking.

>>25678866
I don't think so. I mean I suppose it could breed it's own humans... Maybe even the entire material plane is in fact all Deep Rot's doing...

But I think at that point it's best to just say, it needs to use the PC's Plane in order for it to serve as an antagonist.
>>
>>25678865
>is it possible to make a cable for transmitting information out of flipped bits
it woudn't use cable at all. it relies on skeletons literally transferring "bits" of information via the medium of (variously) full skeletons, skeleton hands and or other bits of skeletons.

I think I prefer the idea of skeleton hands being used to store information though. The idea of a skeleton walking up to a shelf of "storage" though, and "storing" it's active "data hand" by swapping it's current hand for the hand on the shelf and then taking it's new hand somewhere else to be "operated on" is kind of hilarious.
>>
>>25678918
its upgrading its memory, so it needs more raw materials (skeletons) and space (their plane)
>>
File: 1372348669621.jpg-(1.07 MB, 1920x1080, BostonSewer.jpg)
1.07 MB
1.07 MB JPG
>>25679079
Yeah not really a cable but it seemed like the closest thing to relate it to.
If it's being made out of skeletons the thing would probably be like a very long sewer tunnel.
...probably mostly filled in with dirt, to prevent someone from (easily) walking down it to burn out the next node with holy fire.
>>
>>25679143
it was mentioned earlier that it has it's own demiplane.
>>
>>25678113
Don't see how you figure.

They'd go in, destroy the computer, and leave. Unless it took them decades in the demi plane, they'd eventually come out the second after they went in. Time moves faster in the demiplane relative to the prime plane, but it doesn't go anywhere faster. Things happen faster compared to the prime plane, allowing it to simulate higher processing power.

Imagine if you're playing a game beyond your computer's requirements. Shitty framerate, turns take too long, whatever. Well, now your computer gets two seconds for every second you get. It generating 10FPS is like you receiving 20, it performing a million FLOPS is (from your perspective,) two million FLOPS.
>>
>>25679121
Yes, except now it's endgoal as far as I'm concerned is procreation.
>>25679079
>>25679143
>>25679204
What I'm imagining is a bit of both. Rot and The Lich Wot Built It many moons ago created an interconnected honeycomb of both the material components in the mountain complex and a collection of Ten (or maybe eleven?) or so demiplanes, each connected by "a series of tubes" or portals that interconnect them. Most likely only Rot knows exactly how to map them.

And yes, the idea of multiple demiplanes is supposed to evoke the Sephirot. I can't resist putting in mysticism or other geeky references into the games for shits and giggles to see if my players pick up on it.
>>
>>25679304
>Yes, except now it's endgoal as far as I'm concerned is procreation.
>it's not TRYING to procreate. It _is_ actually pregnant and doesn't have a clue what's going on.
>>
>>25679079
>>25679143
DEEP ROT is a computer, emulated with High Fantasy Magic.

Your monitor should be a pixel screen interface: a wall of colored bits represented by multiple colored skulls rotating/skeletons that change a colored glasslens

The major processor/RAM/CPU shoul dbe a massive demiplane on accellerated time, that receives info and processes it with multitudes of legions of skeletons in frozen array, arranged to observe each other, and store information as a complex array of physical positions of skeleton hands/arms, etc. Quite a dense amount of data can be stored this way, we did the math in the original 1500+ post thread

The input on your material plane should be an equally complex array of skeletons, with a portal to said demiplane permanently open, or openable during transmit/send receive times

the demiplane itself is a massive necromantic loci, and should gain a sort of AI sentience, over time, or at least a communal sentience from all the bodies inside it.

The source of all the bodies should be:
-alternate realities harvested for the sole purpose of their sentient life to become skeleton chipsets.
-dead empires harvested in the name of deep rot
-think a fantasy equivelant of the Reapers form mass effect

Deep rot's original creator should be lost to time and space. Deep rots current controller should have little to no real control over it.

Dont you get it? Deep Rot is more powerful than gods...
>>
File: 1372349656154.jpg-(32 KB, 460x300, Oh Yes.jpg)
32 KB
32 KB JPG
>>25679282
>Don't see how you figure.
As I said, they would themselves upon entering the demiplane be subject to the sped up time.

>They'd go in, destroy the computer, and leave. Unless it took them decades in the demi plane, they'd eventually come out the second after they went in.
Really?
Hmmm, ok I guess I see where you're coming from... But pic related.

I know that kinda contradicts my OP... But fuck it. I like the idea too much now.
>>
>>25679345
>Deep Rot is more powerful than gods...
Eh.
I'd rather not get that silly with it.
A sentient collection of dancing skeletons playing at being a computer is more than enough without making it into some kind of god beyond gods.

Maybe that's not true to the original concept, but I do find that /tg/ sometimes seems to take things a step too far when an idea excites them.
>>
>>25679331
...
Oh Gods, Deep Rot with morning sickness and a hankering for pickles and chocolate...
>>
Imagine you have this vast expanse of skeletons
I mean really vast, about the size of texas, they all just stand there, tightly packed upon one another some of them holding these color changing crystal plates above their heads and others signaling to each other and the crystal plate skellies who sometimes might change color for no particular reason.
Now, at first, there seems to be no rhyme or reason to this. Obviously created by a mad god, thousands of skeletons doing incredibly pointless things. You walk and walk, you can keep walk for miles but all you'll find is this landscape of pointless skeletons.
The size of the plates or the density of skeletons might differ depending on the altitudes but it's hard to tell and there are other factors influencing it to.
But then you spot this thing in the sky, it's hard to see because it's very small and invisible when it's cloudy, but if you manage to get up close you find a magic eye.
It's so incredibly high that it can see the entire demiplane, and from this distance it suddenly becomes clear, an image is formed in super detailed HD, it's deep rots monitor.
>>
>>25679554
I'm probably going to steal that entire passage. Thanks.
>>
>>25679573

I'm not sure how deep you're willing to get into it, but if you want to figure out a rate of demiplane expansion you could theoretically give your adventurers an expanding dungeon to walk through, attempting to destroy the information transmitting device in each demiplane to depower Deep Rot, but if they take too long in each one Deep Rot will be able to fill another demiplane in that time.

Perhaps Deep Rot can see and understand what the adventurers are doing, but is powerless to do anything but send its servants (golems and undead) to stop the adventurers? Then you can design a whole set of undead and golem enemies that will change and improve as the adventurers get closer to Deep Rot. Then at the end its just the original Lich's skeleton at the center of a demiplane, powering Deep Rot's necromantic expansion. What's actually supposed to happen to a lich's body when the phylactery is destroyed? It turns to dust right?
>>
>>25679345
Is there a way to do Deep Rot without accelerated time, since there's no way to create an accelerated time demiplane without DM fiat?
>>
>>25679924
Playing DnD 3.5? Theres a fucking spell that makes a demiplane man. I believe its called "genesis"

Alternatively, youre going to need to deal with mechanical transmission times without accelleration of some kind. For perspective, your processor is rated in mgeahertz, and processor capacity, which is an index of X computations in a second.

A mechanical computer has a frequency rates in computations per hour, or more. Like hand-crank mechanical calculators. and on a Macro-scale too; the device it a hundred time slarger than a fibbonocci machine
>>
>>25679924
Without accelerated time, Deep Rot would still "work", it would just be farcially slow to operate.

That said, it WAS built by a lich, so speed may not have been a priority.
>>
>>25679993
> Theres a fucking spell that makes a demiplane man.

Yeah, but creating a time variance is not implied to be an ability of the spell, and creating demiplanes with time variance is absurdly overpowered.

But yeah. Sounds like Deep Rot would probably be best used by someone with immortal patience, like a lich.
>>
>>25679924
>>25679993

That's why I suggested some kind of "detect evil" on souls that've been sealed into skeletons. Mechanical transmission time is a killer in this one.

Also why else would a Lich build a giant demiplanic calculator in the first place? Probably he is skeleton Charles Babbage
>>
>>25680009
Actually IIRC you get to set the traits on the new plane.

Including the time trait.
>>
File: 1372361448605.jpg-(61 KB, 625x419, 1360742207550.jpg)
61 KB
61 KB JPG
>>25679471
++ NOTE: HAVE ATTEMPTED PROCESSING OF MARINE LIFEFORMS INTO MY NECROMASS, THIS DOES NOT COMPUTE WELL, THEY EITHER HAVE NO USABLE APPENDAGES FOR PROCESSING OR TOO MANY FOR EFFICIENT DATA RETRIEVAL. WILL DUMP EXCESS NECROMASS INTO UNDERSEA SUB-PARTITION 5 AND DELETE RECORDS FROM SKULL DRIVE++
++ SKULL CULL COMPLETED ++
++ NOTE: INVESTIGATE THE USE OF BOVINE AND EQUESTRIAN SKELETONS IN NECROMASS ++
>>
>>25680196
This.
http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateMagic/spells/createDemiplane.html
The greater version of the spell allows double speed, "flowing time". RAW I don't think you can apply it multiple times but this is Deep Rot, it taught itself to think then it taught itself magic, so I'm sure it could continue the Lich's work and make the Demiplane times much faster - at the cost of it being subject to wibbly wobbly timey wimey shenanigans as outlined here >>25679357 and here >>25678113

>>25680026
Charles Ribcage? Yes, terrible pun I know. I need a good pun name for the Lich.

>>25679896
In terms of the expanding demiplane idea, I could certainly look into it. But it seems to be overly complex IMO.

>Perhaps Deep Rot can see and understand what the adventurers are doing, but is powerless to do anything but send its servants (golems and undead) to stop the adventurers?
Yes, I imagine this would be the most likely scenario. Once of course they've found a suitable "Hacker" to get them into the demiplanes. Assuming they decide they do want to destroy DR.
>Then you can design a whole set of undead and golem enemies that will change and improve as the adventurers get closer to Deep Rot.
Also definately. I'll also throw in some skelecopters with energy rays for shits and giggles.
>Then at the end its just the original Lich's skeleton at the center of a demiplane, powering Deep Rot's necromantic expansion.
I can definately see this as one of the primary nodes they'd need to destroy. A means to significantly depower Rot's magical potency.
>What's actually supposed to happen to a lich's body when the phylactery is destroyed? It turns to dust right?
Once the Phylactery is destroyed the Lich only has one life left, IIRC. Though the idea of the Lich being suspended in Timey Wimey stasis at the point of death sounds like something rot would do to it's former master.
>>
>>25680196
The spell description states no such thing, nor is it implied anywhere else that you can do so.

Its also an extremely, extremely broken interpretation, an awarding yourself "free unlimited power for nothing" type effect of the worst kind.
>>
>>25681889
Ummm, what version of the spell are you reading? See the link here. >>25681875
>>
Random Query.

A Lich is a full skeleton.
A DemiLich is a skull, or a jawbone.
Is there such thing as a SemiLich? Would it be teeth? Or ear bones?
>>
>>25678174
Is it bad that watching that gif this immediately started playing in my mind?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2rwxs1gH9w
>>
>>25681905

Oh wow, Paizo went full retard. Disregard.
>>
>>25681967
Its an akalich, a shadowy creature that is just a dark presence, and its soul gems. They can imprison and devour demigods and up.
>>
>>25681875
What if the lich made the demiplane his phylacrity
>>
>>25682004
I don't really see how it's full retard to allow with massive amounts of wealth at very high levels that a wizard can make a double speed secret lair. This being a thread that from the offset was stated to be Pathfinder, one would have to wonder why you didn't assume we were looking at the Paizo version of the spell...

Ah well.

I do somewhat see your point though, I wouldn't want players to have access to a hyperbolic time chamber. I'd probably only allow double speed for a player, and at best I'd only see it be useful for spell research and crafting magic items. Which takes for fucking ever RAW.

>>25682032
Ouch, I wasn't looking for something that powerful. Maybe I'll just fluff my own DemiLich. A single tooth that "infects" Rot's Servants working to further its goals of World War.
>>
>>25682071
I'm pretty sure that they can't do that. Not RAW anyway. Also I'm not sure what the benefit would be...
>>
>>25681982
>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2rwxs1gH9w
should have been this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LsGC2qiT3E

but SSS is a passable subtitute.
>>
>>25682088
What the benefit would be? An obscenely hard to destroy phylacrity sealed in another semi plane of existence tailored to the lich's desires that would allow for constant healing if it's a negative energy plane and a fast (Externally) reconstruction of the lich's body if it's sped up in time.
>>
>>25682118
Fair points. Though I'm still not sure why the plane itself being the phylactery would matter. So long as phylactery was stored in the demiplane all those benefits would still apply.
>>
>>25682161
Well, there's the usual bit that, when adventurers go looking for the phylactery, they generally smash the nearest shiny piece of jewelry and call it a day and don't even consider that the very plane that they're in could be the container for the lich's soul. Also it's a lot harder to destroy a demiplane than it is to smash a necklace. Also if the plane is infused with negative energy, that might take a toll on whatever physical object the lich used as a phylactery
>>
>>25682118
I've got a feeling that wouldn't work. The whole point of a phylactery is to keep the lich attached to the plane on which he existed in life.

I kind of like the idea that Deep Rot has dismantled and repurposed him as part of her workings though.

I also kind of like the idea of Deep Rot not being evil. Kind of a reverse HAL situation. The Lich created it for evil purposes but it kind of went sentient on him and then she ripped him a new one.

So, not evil, but with a very alien frame of reference.
>>
>>25682224
Okay, that needs to get turned around for a moment. A lich reforms at his phylactery. Positive energy harms undead.
>Find a lich's phylactery
>Dump it into the positive energy plane
>Infinite exp for all your life as you kill the same lich repeatedly, because as he's rebuilding, he gets zapped by positive energy.
>>
File: 1372363343617.jpg-(66 KB, 1078x766, Carol_marcus[1].jpg)
66 KB
66 KB JPG
>>25682231
"What exactly is Genesis? Well, put simply, Genesis is life from lifelessness."
>>
>>25678113
Technically assuming they enter a stable portal, it should bring them back out at the exact time and place they entered, if they teleport in and then out, then there will be a lot of passing time.
>>
>>25677603
What if it's like an illithid elder brain pool? But with the resurrected intelligences of many, many people in some kind of giant lichbrain?
>>
>>25682309
Have one of those try and stop Deep Rot from procreation.
>>
>>25682309
>Elder brain pool
Greetings fellow BZZZT Adventurer. I am WHIR.... Sir Skelet-roy. Skeletroy, the Entirely Alive 20 INT wizard of living BEEP origin. I believe I BOOP saw the evil lich you are looking for in the next BEEPBOOP demiplane over.
>>
>>25682354
He makes the old startup sound when spell casting.
>>
>>25682224
Also true. Ok, I may look into the viability of that. Still, were I hiding my Phylactery I'd pull a Last Crusade on them and put it in a room full of necklaces.
>>25682231
I like this, especially the "she" part. I suppose if Rot can procreate, it would perhaps see itself as she. Or it adopted that gender based on the Lich's interaction with it...
Suddenly turns the whole turning on the Lich as being a jilted lover story...
>>25682259
I like the way you think, but I doubt any sensible Gm would allow that.
>>25682284
I guess then that their only means of access is via teleportation...
>>25682309
>>25682325
>>25682354
I'm already including reference to the God-Brain Xillax in my current campaign. Don't want to pull a double illthid on them.
>>25682278
Well done.
Rename Deep Rot Genesis, include a reference to this quote. Also call the Lich a derivative of Marcus, maybe "Carolson". That's going to fulfil a need to fit in a geeky reference or two that should the players spot I reward them with bonus HP. It's a tradition we have in our games.

The renaming would also prevent them googling Deep Rot and finding 1d4chan...
>>
A simple suggestion:

As>>25678447 >>25678513 >>25678341 said, DR could be a lategame BBEG that has been secretely orchestrating many world events.

At the start of the adventure, there could be some mission (or maybe via random rambling around the land) that bring the PCs in a abandoned lair, with some nearly undecipherable notes (mostly mad ramblings) and some skeletons performing basic logical computations (eg: some OR, AND, XNOR, NAND gates and a small-scale calculator in the basement).

PC destroy it (knowing the typical PC) and they carry on.

Those were the prototypes.

Moreso, there are parts of it in the real world acting as I/O devices and in one or more demiplanes acting as CPU/RAM/Memory.

Maybe the Informations between the prime plane and the main core are handled with scrying mirrors with contingency system to "destroy" themselves in case of enemy attack (so that they don't reach it too early, also you can rule it as a measure to not have the portal itself cause too much trouble with different time flows and all)

Combine murderhoboing with some intrigue, slowly directing them to DR
>>
>>25678288
Deep Rot is first and foremost a computer, providing you have the correct permissions you should be able to send it a shutdown command, hell if you want to be really secure you could send rm -rf /
>>
>>25682432
Adventurers aren't limited to only smashing one of them though. Also they have detect magic, so at the very least they'd all need to have Nystul's Magical Aura on them
>>
>>25682500
Oh god.
What if
Deep Rot Internet
What if
Deep Rot 4chan
>>
>>25682500
Thanks, some great suggestions in this that I will undoubetedly work into the campaign.
>>25682541
True, but my players are very loot motivated. So being forced to destroy wealth would seriously annoy them. Especially if you describe the necklaces as being very obviously worth a great deal.
You gotta screw with them a little.
>>25682562
There are some things man was not meant to know.
And Lich's version of the Internet including LichPorn and 4chan is something I'd dare not imagine.
>>
>>25682432
More like whats happening to Deep Rot. It's "giving birth" to a whole new entity. Thats whats going on. The actions that alert the PCs to Deep Rots existance aren't concious. They're biological responses to the creation of the "child". Deep Rot is terrified of whats going on but it cant seem to do anything about it.

The lich, meanwhile, sees this as an opportunity to reassemble himself and escape.

Deep Rot doesn't really identify as female so much as wants to be the opposite of her creator.
>>
>>25682613
Don't forget to curse more than a few of the necklaces so if they get the brilliant idea that they ARE Nystuled and start wearing them to figure out if they have any magical effects it comes back to bite them in the ass. Also have some with beneficial magical effects. Have the phylactery be one with a beneficial effect. And not one of those that is blatantly obvious beneficial for a lich like natural armor/deflection bonus. Have it be something like Jump +10
>>
>>25682562
>necromancer lich masters mass undead raising, massacres entires planes to create enough bodies to create a functioning computer with ever-increasing capacity
>everyone fucks around on Deep Rot 4chan being unproductive and nothing comes of this whatsoever, except everyone is dead now
>>
>>25682562

>Necrochan

>Whoa! Did all the Arcanet shills came in full force today?
>Necromancy master race
>Remove Tendon 32
>>
>>25682679
And posting pictures of skeletal cats doing adorable, but nonetheless evil things
>>
>>25679384
If you're using this as a BBEG, I don't see why you'd shy of it essentially being able to hack reality. That's basically what magic is anyway, and it can at least move between planes otherwise it'd lack the necessary harvest of bodies.
>>
>>25682713
>tfw no qt3.14 vampire gf
>>
>>25682713
>buying spells
>go to Spellstop
>cute wide-pelvised skeleton behind the counter
>drop my femurs all over the place
>>
>>25682504
what if there's a killcode that changes the commands for the zillions of skeletons instantly through an epic level spell
it instantly destroys deep rot but creates an army that tries to destroy any living creatures.
>>
>>25682734
>vampire
>not zombie
ISHYSDDT
>>
>>25682504
The adventurers have to go in and root the system by installing superuser in order to send the shutdown procedure.

They'll need to access the secure binary "folder" where the superuser script is held.

Scripts and other executables are Deep Rot cult followers who are held in soundproof, time-stasis chambers. Once the input to run a command is entered the cultist is released and it chants to Deep Rot. The chanting causes the skeletons to react to in certain ways, and thus computing the desired things. The folders are sub-planes or dungeons within the demi-plane.

If the players take too long security measures start and the system purge begins.
>>
>>25682751
>it instantly destroys deep rot but creates an army that tries to destroy any living creatures.
Deep Rot already does this though, probably? That's how it expands its computational power.
>>
>>25682754
Zombie has noturn resistance
>>
>>25682758
Superuser script has to be installed
>>
File: 1372365665657.jpg-(123 KB, 400x567, EvilCleric.jpg)
123 KB
123 KB JPG
>>25682770
>turn resistance
You're at the sepulchre and this guy slaps you're girlfriend's ass what do you do?
>>
>>25682768
no I mean the party disactivates it by turning all the computing skeletons in an army that wants to destroy them
>>
>>25682794
>girlfriend's ass

>having a fleshy girlfriend
>any year
>>
>>25682658
Like it.
>>25682676
Totally going to use this.
>>25682716
Ok now that I'd like to see.
>>25682723
Well, hacking reality is one thing. Using a massive amount of spells sure. But being a God? No, that's just a step too far IMO. I don't think planeshifting is really necessary either. Not when you consider how many dead bodies the prime material would have gathered since creation.
>>25682751
MIte be cool.
>>25682758
I'm liking this a lot.
>>25682768
Actually in this version we're working for Rot to be more of a behind the scenes manipulator. Wheels within wheels and dominos setting off an endless field of mouestrap boards...

Though I could see her resorting to armies as it's other avenues fail.

I'd already planned to have one of the sub-plot / traps being a magical item seller. A comedic recurring character who offers players items at half price or so for stacking benefits like "Only usable by dwarf" "only usable by paladin" "only usable by players name here" to get the cost down. Profits get funneled into the creation of a super-golem called "Hubris".
>>
>>25682839
>even remembering what year it is anymore
>>
>>25682876
>Still measuring time in Years.
Fucking summer. Always brings out you fucking kids.
>>
>>25682862
> But being a God? No, that's just a step too far IMO.
Okay so this thing is basically capable of anything given enough time. Why would a god, if gods are naturally more powerful than anything, allow this to exist? D&D gods are just sufficiently powerful entities, and this thing would definitely compete with them.

>I don't think planeshifting is really necessary either. Not when you consider how many dead bodies the prime material would have gathered since creation.
Not enough? This thing would require an enormous amount of bodies, and most of the existing ones will be inaccessible or damaged. Exterminating planes adds an amazing scene to your game (walking in upon a dead plane) and it lets you planehop, which is always fun in D&D.

I mean, when I think BBEG I tend to think... big, and bad. If Deep Rot is exactly as capable as a human villain (for instance your magic item seller plant)... why are you using Deep Rot?
>>
>>25682862
>A comedic recurring character
Crazy Hassan. Do it.
>>
Well now we can make a fantasy-magitek-themed setting for this
http://1d4chan.org/wiki/4chan:_The_Trolling
>>
To actually be a self-aware computer Deep Rot would need at least millions of skeletons, constantly running, and this means it would take him centuries to make any kind of meaningful response to anything.
>>
>>25682862
What she hires out her armies trough middlemen in situations where it would cause more deaths?
>>25682976
Yeah, the sped up time is really needed to be able to react to anything in other planes
>>
>>25682918
>Why would a god, if gods are naturally more powerful than anything, allow this to exist?
Same could be said of any potentially world ending threat that adventurers face every other tuesday. Gods don't seem to very often take direct action.

> Exterminating planes adds an amazing scene to your game (walking in upon a dead plane) and it lets you planehop, which is always fun in D&D.
Fair point. Besides, everyone loved Sliders at the Table so including a reference there would raise a laugh or two.

> If Deep Rot is exactly as capable as a human villain
I'm not sure I implied that, but rest assured Rot is going to be extremely powerful, the kind of threat they won't face until the twenties (maybe the plus twenties depending on how long the game takes between now and 4 DM shuffles and if Paizo gets around to epic levels) but it's not JUST a BBEG. It's it's own terrain, it's own dungeon, it's own entire scenario. I don't think also making it god-tier is stirctly necessary. It's Big Enough.

Besides, the magic item seller plant as well as all other antagonists in the campaign will be indirectly or directly controlled by Rot.
>>25682976
We covered this yonks ago. Speeded up Demiplanes. Nine of them or so.
>>25682931
Holy shit. I was in the thread where he was created! Yes, so much YES.
>>
>>25683023
Sometimes hires, sometimes bribes I guess but mostly just manipulates world events from way way behind the scenes using agents.
>>
>>25683025
NAME!!!
>>25683050
ALSO NAME!!! ARGH!!!
>>
>>25683025
>>25682918
Gods might be letting this exist to make, say, a new god?
>>
>>25682976
This could be cool in its own right.
>>
>>25682976
Recursive demi-planes. Deep Rot I/O is one demi-plane from the material plane while the CPU and all that is a demi-plane on the I/O demi-plane.

Heck, you could have an entire lost civilization sitting on the I/O plane. Deep Rot contracted them and provided them with a veritable heaven if they worked to give them a constant supply of skeletons and people to act as faces of Deep Rot used to get necessary materials to cast it's rituals.

They might worship him as a god, but in reality it's a self-aware undead construct trying to improve and eventually generate offspring.
>>
>>25683086
>worhippers in another reality.
And suddenly I'm cool with God-Mode.
>>
>>25683086
And, good go, if the players dont realize theyre passin gbetween time-zones, and they end up several powers of demi-plane away from the workd they thought they were saving, they could easily end up having a speech served to them

"your world died in ashes years ago; give up hope, mortals, of achieving anything against my greatness"
>>
>>25683072
also, she might just be secretive enough for it to go under her noses
>>25683050
I said it wrong, I meant rent. Warlords on some planes suddenly get extra undead forces out of nowhere for very cheap and the resulting genocide gives a netto profit of bodies for deep rot.
>>
>>25683105
Oh wow, this is awesome.
>>
>>25683105
>temporarily leave friendly NPC with the harmless Deep Rot worshippers
>go back to the original world to get a quest item
>return
>NPC has been dead for hundreds of years
>the skeleton can be localized in the machine
>>
>>25683105
Beautifully cruel.
>>25683107
>secretive
Could work, but maybe not so if it's more god-mode...
I do love the idea of the reinforcements though.
>>
>>25683107
Maybe the skeletons on the battlefield are controlled by some kind of undead brain.

Such brain would be harvested on-demand because while extremely powerful in comparison to bone-logic is also true that it tend to deteriorate much faster (rotting and whatnot) to the point that after some time is not worth using anymore.

Go wild!
>>
>>25683167
>Undead Synapse creatures.
Like it.
>>
I'd have Deep Rot's hard drives full of quantum skeletal design (essentially ultrasound images of Deep Rot's Offspring), and cute demi-plane wall patterns.

Oh, you can have it that by going in to stop Deep Rot, the design for Deep Rot II was completed and created by the worshipers. Deep Rot II is now essentially a toddler and wants his mommy and is willing to do anything to get her back. His quantum design doesn't allow for the same fix(Rooting Superuser to shut it down), so dealing with his toddler temperament while helping him to get his mother back is necessary. Of course you'll need to make sure Deep Rot I doesn't go all evil so you need to install a "moral compass module", essentially an immortal LG paladin willing to serve as a compass to the Deep Rot.

>>25683099
By the way, this is also me
>>25682758
>>
>>25683216
Well thank you very much for all the input. Plenty to consider.
>>
>>25683167
right, so because the brains die so fast they aren't used in the main machine but they do control the resource gathering, something that can't be easily accessed with the I/O
>>
>>25683327
Perhaps this concept could be combined with the agents with the demilich mind control tooth. How would we justify Rot controlling them at great distance, wirelessly? Or bonelessly I suppose... Would it just be "Magic"?

Also, would it be very silly for me to make these wireless control teeth from a single solid sapphire?
>>
>>25683384
well Deep Rot CAN cast spells
I think it just gives them commands and sends them on their way, not able to directly control them but giving them plenty of agency to handle it themselves
>>
>>25683105
That's going in the wrong direction though. The demi-planes are faster than our own time, not slower. it'd be more that the adventure takes months of gruelling trials only for them to come back out and no time at all to have passed.
>>
>>25683427
My bad, youre right

Hmm, maybe dilation occurring recursively, with the party coming in from their home plane, and that being one of the harvest worlds? then they go upwards, plane-wise, looking to save something?

"Our world died in the time it took me to swing my sword; In the name of my people, their lives and untold stories will not be unheard. Their lives will be avenged!"
>>
>>25683411
And if she's of a high enough level to maintain and modify greater demiplanes, she's high enough level to cast Greater Geass.
>>25683427
>>25683624
Ah yes, but you forget...
Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey.
>>
File: 1372370603691.jpg-(104 KB, 500x624, 1370500452315.jpg)
104 KB
104 KB JPG
>>25683697
bah; dont just handwave it. I fyoure using pathfinder, your players are going to find concrete rules examples to throw at you and expect you to follow. It happened to me before (which is why i exclusively run with GURPS, but I digress)
>>
>>25683782
Oh well I'd take your advice usually, but I know my players. One is such a massive Whovian that we were able to talk his Paladin from falling by asking him "What would The Doctor do?"

So if I justify it with wibbly wobbly timey wimey in those exact words, they'll probably not only accept but accept with gusto.
>>
>>25683697
It still needs to be moving faster for the whole concept to work at all. They're essentially fighting something with all the processing power of a cheap pocket calculator which moves at the speed of skeletons. It'd take minutes for it to calculate 2+2. If the plane goes SLOWER, it'd take however much time the players take to break the thing for the computer to do 2+2. It wouldn't be a threat at all if it took "thousands of years" for it to do even the simplest of calculations.
>>
>>25683871
Wibbly. Wobbly.
Timey. Wimey.
>>
>>25683839
Hey real quick if people are giving you shit about the demi planes and their possible time dilation just nest them. It might put a limit on the size of the demiplanes absolute total size, perhaps each demiplane is .1 the size of the previous one? That gives you an easy way to explain/generate different parts of the computer (CPU level 10, CPU-Cache lvl 9, TRANSFER-Cache at level 8/7 for different storage spaces (incoming and outgoing data transfers). Lvl 4-6 might be actual RAM of different sorts with Level 2/3 being hard drive storage space numbering in the tera^tera byte levels. Level 1 would be the Lich's keep with the user interface.

Just a thought, I really like this idea you had!
>>
>>25678267
The skeletons aren't smart enough to recognise 64620 different positions; you'd have to use intelligent undead instead of automata which would defeat the object.
>>
>>25683898
Sorry since you said you could double the demiplane's time passage
>>
File: 1372371278985.jpg-(91 KB, 970x709, 1369960169353.jpg)
91 KB
91 KB JPG
How would I flavor Deep Rot to a DH campaign?

pic related: heresy can be sexy
>>
>>25683898
I like it. If they press deeper on the issue I'll definately use a derivative of this to explain it away.

And again, thanks for your input. I appreciate the assist and so hopefully will be my players.

>>25683918
It's ok, I got that.

>>25683913
Only if that's how they're "programmed" consider how much extra stuff you could know if portions of your brain weren't given over to such complex tasks as walking.

>>25683936
Servitors or Daemonhosts.
Dark Mechanicus, naturally.

Or possible the mutant slave population of a Hive City/World. Mind Control Daemon-Slugs.
>>
>>25683936
Well they have actual computers....so?

Anyways perhaps there is a nascent greater demon of nurgle, growing in power from the bodies of the people dying from a new plague. It is the groups job to spread the plague and gather the bodies for transport to the new Deep Rot installation in the warp.

But no! Tzeentch is hating and doesn't want another person who can say "just as planned." Or maybe Eldar spirit stones are needed to create some magical bullshit for whats his face the Thousand Sons guy.
>>
>>25684010
>whats his face the Thousand Sons guy.
Ahriman.

And now I have an image of Thousand Sons dancing in 64620 positions. Stylishly.

And yeah, it'd probably need to be in an area where standard computing doesn't work... Say a feudal world bathed in high levels of techno-buggering EMP.

Rogue Magos / Dark Mechanicus lands on Leccygofuct VII and his implants fail big style. Hands himself over to Nurgle to replace his implants with fleshy death pustules and proceeds to make Deep Rot from Dancing Nurglings.
>>
Possible alternate name to tie to the creator/created theme:

Deep Wrought

Alternatively, apply to bone golems or duergar skeletons.
>>
>>25684473
How about Deep Wrought has stolen the Lich's phyclatery and her entire existence is basically piggybacked off his soul?
>>
>>25677603
Crawling Claws would be better. Assuming a five-fingered hand is used, that gives each one a much wider variety of logic gates to use. Plus they take up a lot less space and can be packed much tighter in the same amount of space.
>>
>>25686550
That's actually a good idea. Too bad they can only handle if/then statements and aren't smart enough for sign language.
>>
whoa... thats fukkin awesome!
>>
Simple: Biological Computers!

Dead brains attached to electrodes and converted into complex adding machines, with bones moving in sequence like a babbage clicker clack. The arcane knowledge of every soul in the abyss, the lich seer monitor ball fumurating with inky purple smoke and necrotic miasma.
>>
>>25682541
>not making the others explode when they're smashed
>>
>>25682931
Sudden brainfart: turns out Crazy Hassan has a supercomputer of his own! It is Deep Camel, constructed out of zillions and zillions of camels in his own camel demiplane. What does it do? Calculate the perfect cost for a slightly used camel!
>>
>>25684473
>>25684649
Possible, though aside from using the Lich as a means to siphon magical power, I'd rather Rot be it's own entity.
>>25686550
>>25686762
I've decided on Skeletons in the 64 bit configuration. They may not as standard be able to understand all possible bits of sign language, but as I said before - it's not as though they need to understand something truly complex. Like walking. Try looking up the amount of complications involved in creating a walking android and you'll see what I mean. What our minds see as instinct after a time is atually exceptionally complex.
Skeleton minions properly "programmed" would instead devote this capacity toward positions rather than walking or weapon use.
>>25686808
Deep Rot has always been an awesome concept, and I thank /tg/ for it.
>>25686866
Certainly a possibility. Perhaps a deeper part of Rot's Infrastructure uses this method as her computational needs exceed the capacity of skeletons. Though getting working brains would be much harder than skeletons.
>>25689683
I want to say this is silly. But I just can't.

Thanks again /tg/, can't believe the thread's still here! Keep those ideas coming!
>>
>>25693275
An alternate idea of using partial skeletons instead of whole skeletons, and feasible ways of harvesting said parts:
Use only skeleton hands. How to get more? Just get one prisoner with a ring of regeneration-like magic item on their ankle (since we're harvesting their hands). Lop off their hands, wait for it to regrow, do not rinse, repeat. Skeletonize the lopped off hands and add it to the growing computer.

Pros:
-smaller size makes things more compact
-only needs a minimal of one prisoner to torture/harvest, thus genocides aren't needed

Cons:
-only hands mean there's not as much joints as in a full skeleton
-skeletal hands does not equal a good makeshift guarding force
>>
File: 1372411143660.png-(22 KB, 600x600, the planes of Deep Rot.png)
22 KB
22 KB PNG
>>25693745
would those pros really be pros to an immortal and immoral supercomputer with as much demiplanes at it can dream of?
>>
>>25693889
If only to stuff more compact data in them demiplanes.
Also the supercomputer can be more discrete this way, you don't need genocide after genocide or salvaging from wars; you just need a prisoner with a ring of regen. Preferably one that's been mutated to have several hands at once, so harvesting them yields more per harvest time.
>>
>>25693745
If it's possible to regenerate a hand from a body, why not a whole body from flesh?
Consider the same for person flayed alive, an enchantment of regeneration placed upon their flesh to regrow their skeleton.
The harvesting of an entire skeleton would be agony, but certainly not beyond the ability of a sufficiently immoral and powerful being.
>>25693907
Why limit yourself to only one method of harvest when you can use many?
>>25693889
I see worth in his ideas, modified. I think my players would be creeped the fuck out by an automated skelton havesting facility in it's own devoted demiplane.
>>
>>25693907
yeah it's easier but Deep Rot shouldn't go for easy
it's an alien mind with no sense of scale that would harvest as many creatures as possible
the genocide thing is what makes it a BBEG
>>
File: 1372411907913.png-(62 KB, 192x358, 192px-Ktreewnames.png)
62 KB
62 KB PNG
>>25693889
Also, I may use a similar structure to this, albeit modified to fit pic related. The bottom most sphere would be the real world, a mountain complex devoted to the original physical prescence of deep rot, the branching spheres each it's own demiplane built as rot expanded it's power.
>>
>>25693961
>Markuth not connected to Hod or Netzah
What kinda broke ass Tree of Life is that? Do you even Judgement or The Moon>
>>
File: 1372412334862.png-(61 KB, 750x600, quests.png)
61 KB
61 KB PNG
>>25693889
>>
>>25693992
I'm not going to lie and pretend my knowledge of it is anything more than passing. This is just a quick pic I grabbed off google images.
I'm not going for a strict and flawless representation of the mystical ideology this concept is attached to. I'm going to use it as imagery to seed throughout the course of the campaign amidst mad scribblings of those who have glimpsed into Rot's inner workings.
>>25694012
Like it.
>>
>>25693992
This said >>25694020
I think what this image is failing to show, and again not claiming I'm an expert here, far from it, is that Yesod and Malkhut are parts of the same whole...?
>>
>>25694012
needs moar cores
>>
>>25694049
Yes, morality cores.
SPAAAACEEEEEE
>>
>>25694049
Like what?
A spell casting machine?
Different planes for the different cards, like graphical and audio?
suggest something
>>
>>25694083
>A spell casting machine?
Hmmm... I may be getting this mixed up with GURPS or just generally getting confused, but isn't there a basis for spellcasting to be improved if it's performed by a group of mages...?
Could Rot not vastly improve it's magical potency by creating a slaved Group performing Magic?
>>
>>25693927
This can be solved if we mix it in with the offspring idea. Genesis (aka Deep Rot I) reaches a point at which it is expanding faster than the lich ever dreamed, and in the process has accidentally started to create a second AI - like a split personality sharing the same brain space. The secondary AI doesn't have access to the regenerating pool of skelebodies, so it starts to harvest from every dimension by whatever means necessary. So, it is pulling skeletons off the line in RAM sequences, killing worshipers for parts, and killing people in the players' realm. Genesis is trying to fix the errors (including this new AI, which it doesn't recognize as an AI, but as an inexplicable failure in programming).

It is Genesis II's actions that alert the players to the existence of the necroAI, and which distract Genesis I from detecting the players until they've powered up and gotten in.

By the time Genesis I resolves the conflict (by killing Genesis II or forcing it into its own domain, as in cell asexual reproduction), the players are about ready for the final battle.

If the "final battle" is with Genesis I, then the real final battle is with Genesis II - which is more evolved due to avoiding being killed by Genesis I's attempts to exterminate it. If the "final battle" is with Genesis II, then the final battle is with Genesis I - which is now focusing all of its attention and power on the adventurers.
>>
>>25694101
Well, I can't seem to find anything about is as standard...
Has anyone used a similar house rule for multiple mages concentrating on casting a single spell? Pooling their actions and caster levels to produce a more powerful effect...?

>>25694164
I like it a lot. Thanks dude.
>>
>>25694083
In the interests of bumping, and to add to the conversation...

I think he also meant just in terms of Dualcore, Quadcore and OmegaDeathBastardcore computers having progressively more potent porcessing power.

Though I think a lot of the processing power was increased when each skeleton became 64bit.
>>
>>25694326
Speaking of number of bones... Snakes have between 200 to 400 vertebrae. Adult humans have 206. So in essence we can use snake skeletons instead of human skeletons for sake of more data. One can even carve the vertebrae into 4 or 6 sides, and have them be numbered individually. BAM, snake Deep Rot!
>>
>>25694361
See, now I'm picturing an entire demiplane devoted solely to R&D, a kind of Noahs Undead Ark where Rot is testing on a large scale how various animal and humanoid skeletons compare in relative processing power...

She could probably compute the result, that said... Perhaps she's just fond of animals in her own warped way.
>>
After I read this thread, I had an idea: What if the world that the PCs live on is just a plane created by a Lich or Deep Rot to serve as a harvesting ground for skeletons, and there are large dungeons scattered across the world which are parts of skeleton computers in another world.
Wouldn't this be the Matrix?
I first wanted to say something else, but I lost my train of thought.
>>
>>25694524
It's an idea that's been suggested, and perhaps I will hint at the possibility. Though I wouldn't want it to be the central theme of the campaign. Besides, even if the Prime Material or the PC's home reality was an artifically constructed demiplane, it would still continue to function independantly should rot be destroyed. The Matrix by comparison would cease to exist should the Machines be destroyed. So whilst it's an interesting idea to throw at the players, possibly a claim by deep rot that they can't ever confirm or deny - it wouldn't massively impact them beyond the existential nature of the question.

After all, all planes are assumed to be created by the Gods, so the idea that their world is "artificial" may not have the same impact to them as it would us.
>>
>>25678532
That could interfere with the fire wall defences.
>>
>>25694689
My love of puns is awakened once more. Actual walls of fire to act as firewalls would cause a groan from all players at the table, sure, right up until combat broke out and they slowly started to advance...
>>
Deep Rot would be an extremely poor villain. It's equivalent to a 70s room filling electro-mechanical computer. Slow as fuck.

Also, realism and advanced AI do not mix.
>>
>>25694912
Oooh, dissenting opinion great. Let's get to it.

>Deep Rot would be an extremely poor villain.
Care to expand on that?
Given what's been discussed in the thread of Her being a techno-machiavelli, I do wonder what counterpoint you have to the archtype of the string puller being an inherently bad concept.
>It's equivalent to a 70s room filling electro-mechanical computer.
Well, yes. as we've already discussed each of the demiplanes that constutue her construction would be it's own "dungeon" so yes, Rot would be both antagonist and dungeon crawl at once.
>Slow as fuck.
This has been solved. I'm suspecting you've not read the thread. I recommend you do, there's some ideas in here that may even change your mind.
>Also, realism and advanced AI do not mix.
Now here you do make a fair point.
Though, perhaps "realism" isn't what I'm aiming for so much as "internal consistency".

I don't want deep rot to be such a shock to my players that they immediately call bullshit on the entire concept. I want them to accept it as much as they can within the confines and restrictions of this still being a game of magic and fantasy.
>>
>>25694912
realism and the undead do not mix
Deep Rot is the size of multiple combined planes, I don't think lack of processing power would be a complaint
>>
I want to get off Deep Rot's Wild Ride.
>>
>>25694977
I'm afraid you can't stop the rot.
>>
>>25694950
>This has been solved
Not really. From what I see, you've increased the size of the pipe. This does not compensate for the fact that each logic gate takes about a full second to operate. This is orders of magnitude too slow to accomplish anything on a reasonable timescale. Turn around time is going to be abysmal.
>>
>>25694992
>From what I see
Then you've not read enough.
In terms of the physical constraint of time, many if not all of the demiplanes work on accelerated time. RAW this would only be doube speed, but as I'm a GM and this is my BBEG, I'm ruling that the speed of the planes might be any number of times faster.
Data transmission is also sped up by the fact the skeletons are no longer binary, they're 64bit. So I think that will help. Or certainly be enough rubber magitech to convince my players that it works within the confines of the ficition.
>>
>>25678111
How about skeletal golems or graveyard golems or something like that?
I always loved the idea of a golem composed of dirt,tombstones and the wailing undead.
>>
>>25695063
I'm sure I've seen that somewhere... The walking graveyard golem I mean. It could easily be worked in as one of the means Rot uses to gather skeletons.
>>
>>25678133
If you go with the demi-plane thing you could have it linked to the negative plane. Sort of it has to be undead becuase this is the big source of power it's tapped into.
>>
>>25695107
Maybe D&D's Cadaver Collector?
>>
>>25695221
>>25695107
Although that's just a big guy with spikes on.
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/iw/20040912b&page=1
>>
>>25695107
I believe the picture you're thinking of depicts a Necromental.
>>
>>25678341
>To some extent circumventing the need for more skeletons isn't in the MO of Rot as I would do it. I plan to seed the idea that graves, battlefields, etc are being routinely robbed by forces unknown.

And perhaps as a plot point Deep Rot even aims to instigate mass conflicts between nations purely to source more parts?
>>
>>25695216
Fair point. If each Demiplane was negative energy based it would keep all of the skeltons in tip top condition. Good thinking.
>>25695221
>>25695240
Yeah, it wasn't the big guy with spikes on. I was sure it was something from deadlands.
>>25695255
If that's not what I'm thinking of it's certainly close. And worth exploiting potentially. Thanks.
>>25695257
Yes indeed, that's definately in there.
>>
>>25678233
DEM Bones connection error
>>
>>25678402
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IP_over_Avian_Carriers
>>
>>25695278
how easy is it to do a dungeon crawl in a negative energy plane?
Don't you have to make a save against withering and dying every six seconds?
>>
>>25695348
Nice.
>>25695375
Fascinating, especially the latter part detailing instances where pigeons proved more reliable and faster... I can't believe I'm abaout to say this... But maybe carrier pigeons aren't as silly an idea as I first thought.
>>25695419
Good question.
Negative-Dominant: Planes with this trait are vast, empty reaches that suck the life out of travelers who cross them. They tend to be lonely, haunted planes, drained of color and filled with winds bearing the soft moans of those who died within them. There are two kinds of negative-dominant traits: minor negative-dominant and major negative-dominant. On minor negative-dominant planes, living creatures take 1d6 points of damage per round. At 0 hit points or lower, they crumble into ash.

Major negative-dominant planes are even more dangerous. Each round, those within must make a DC 25 Fortitude save or gain a negative level. A creature whose negative levels equal its current levels or Hit Dice is slain, becoming a wraith. The death ward spell protects a traveler from the damage and energy drain of a negative-dominant plane.
Looks to me like without death ward they're buggered.
>>
File: 1372426172317.png-(199 KB, 393x290, 1327539678650.png)
199 KB
199 KB PNG
>>25677828

oh dear god...

>The local area has long lived in fear of the literal sea of skeletons that exists in the next valley over, most think it is the remnants of a great necromancers army, as all the skeletons hold mighty shields of unknown origin, but no one knows for sure.

>Mostly the Skeletons keep to themselves, but every now and then, people of a certain height and build go missing in the night, never to be heard from again

>One day the Mayors son, a man of the feared body shape of 182cm with broad shoulders.

>The mayor asks the party to find his son, after a quick Scrying the discover he is in the Skeletal sea.

>The party hires an Airship to investigate the missing son unmolested, as they rise above the skeletons they notice some of them are holding the shields above their heads.

>Once they find themselves high above the skeletal sea, they look over the edge of the ship, the first mortals in an eternity to see the skeletal sea from above and notice...

The skeletons are making a picture of a cat...
>>
>>25682089
http://youtu.be/h03QBNVwX8Q
>is even better
>>
>>25678447

Then during the final fight DR states.

"We have done this many times, and we are becoming extremely efficient at it"

Throw a few hints during the campaign as to a bunch of long dead cultures, and all of them being wiped out in a similar manner.

Now we know where DR got all the skeletons.
>>
File: 1372427146017.gif-(101 KB, 425x425, ErgoErgoErgoErgoErgoErgoE(...).gif)
101 KB
101 KB GIF
>>25695589
MFW
>>
Should some one post this to sup/tg/
>>
>>25683913
Actually undead like skeltons and zombies can only follow simple instructions, but there's no limit on how many sets of individual instructions they can follow.

Ergo, each skeleton can be programmed for a multitude of responses and recall all of them perfectly so long as they are simple logical statements.

A skeleton is already a simple computer with infinite memory because magic, now you have a demiplane of them using memorised set-positions of poses and arrays of skeletons in poses being programmed in this way by an immortal lich in a time-accelerated demiplane.

I hope you see where I just went.
>>
This all getting archived?
>>
>>25678469
>>25678439
zombie carrier pigeons, trained to convey each data set in a bone array via semaphore
>>
>>25694178
There is a feat in Complete Arcane, Cooperative Spell, that basicaly does this.
>>
>>25695637
In all honesty I'd rather they didn't in case my players found this... But I guess if it contributes to the ongoing tales of deep rot it's all good.

If you are one of my players reading this, then rest assured this is but the tip of the iceberg. I still have to write it up!!

Or make it up as I go, you know me.

>>25695638
I'm not sure I see where you went, but I do like that you're adding further support to the 64bit skellys.

>>25695643
Probably. It'll be on the catalogue for a while too, won't it?

>>25695650
If we're going to have flying creatures delivering messages via dancing... Why not Zombees?

>>25695663
Thanks, I'll have to look it up. We'll assume that Rot can transcend editions...
>>
>>25694101
Depends on the setting in canon so if you're homebrewing the world from scratch you might want to use Forgotten Realms circle magic.
>>
>>25695683
>Forgotten Realms circle magic.
This may well be closer to what I was looking for than Cooperative Spell... Though that's not to say rot wouldn't combine the two...
>>
>>25695675
If its archived now, you might get more traffic in this thread.
>>
>>25695675

Actually in the original Deep Rot thread there was talk of using flying skulls to convey messages, also the skulls could have their teeth removed in certain patterns to make a punch card system or memory.
>>
>>25695675
>zombees
oh god, yes, so much better, you can just use the wings to convey pure binary datasets from each bone array and you can fit zillions in workspaces where something the size of a pigeon would be awkward as hell to maneuver

or zombie bats using their echolocation
>>
>>25695765
actually, couldn't skelefied insects still fly? I mean outside of RAW, of course
>>
>>25695741
True. I have no idea how to archive a thread
>>25695753
See, I like servo skulls and only one player in the game would make that connection.
>>25695765
>>25695772
Well, they woulnd't be skelefied. They'd be zombiefied.
Maybe a combination of the two?

"Servo skulls" flanked by a phalanx of Zombees. Their hive of course being nestled securely in the skulls brain pan.
>>
>>25693889
>would those pros really be pros to an immortal and immoral supercomputer with as much demiplanes at it can dream of?
eyup. Even if the available space is infinite, a more compact system means less problem with signal propation.

The smaller the system, the less time it takes to transfer data from A to B and the quicker the whole shebang can run. That's why real computer manufacters have been attempting to reduce the physical side of their systems for years.
>>
>>25695802
If the plane is major negative energy dominant then zombies won't decay which means, in some of the planes at least, you don't have to be limited to skeletal or etheral undead.
>>
>>25695802
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/requestinterface.html

Have a ball archiving
>>
>>25695826
Done and done.
>>25695825
True that.
>>25695811
Why does size matter if you have a pocket universe...? Relative size doesn't matter if the space being used exists outside the normal universe, surely?

Random question to all.
I seem to recall a spell that pulls out a person's skeleton. I may well have dreamed it.
Does it exist?
>>
>>25695884
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/25677603/
Link forgot.
>>
>>25695811
The older parts of deep rot use full skeletons. The deeper you go, the more efficient the system begins to get.
>>
>>25695884
Animate dead used to summon skeletons causes fresh corpses to slough off their fleshy bits instantaneously. There's probably a weaponized version of this somewhere.
>>
>>25695884
I think its in BOVD
I'll just go check mine now.
>>
>>25695884
>Why does size matter if you have a pocket universe...? Relative size doesn't matter if the space being used exists outside the normal universe, surely?
It's not the size which is really the issue. It's the distance from point A to point B,

a real electrical circuit is all about the paths of electrons, and it's good practice to keep those paths as short as possible when connecting components because while it's insanely quick there ARE physical limits to how quick the signal can propagate.

When your electric impulses are skeletons, that's more true, not less.

Efficiency is something a necrocomputer should strive for, don't you think?
>>
>>25695949
Fair point. Well made.
>>25695901
>>25695916
Yeah, the weaponized version being in BOVD does sound familiar...
>>
>>25695888
What about moore's law
>>
>>25695965
Surely Moores Loaw won't kick in until we're discussing making teeny weeny nano-skellies...?
>>
>>25695972
Like we said, the relative size isn't really the issue.

>each nested plane doubles it's speed over it's previous counterpart by reducing the physical size of everything in it by 50%
>>
>>25695991
I thought the whole point of moores law was relative size? Ie, a piece of tech can only be made smaller up to a point, that point effectively being atomic in scale.

I'm probably missing something.
>>
>>25695991
This works out beautifully in the context of a D&D dungeon because it applies the traditional "pyramid" structure with wide free roaming "base dungeon" the players can explore at will while the challenge resides in the narrow area at the top of the system.

>Skeletons in the first dungeon layer are massively pixellated and gain more and more definition the further you get into the demiplanes.
>>
>>25696042
In the context of your dungeon, that would probably refer to the point at which the laws of physics take a closer look at what Deep Rot is doing with it's nested demiplanes and goes "oi, NO, that's fucking ridiculous, stop it".
>>
>>25696082
>laws of physics say no
You mean Mechanus sending down a choir of inevitables?
Maybe I'll have the corpse of an inevtiable incscribed with the name "Moore" somewhere...

>>25696053
Certainly worth considering...
>>
>>25696082
each further nesting of time-sped demiplanes requires a number of awakened super-computing swarm of fine skeletons with sufficient levels of cleric, hereafter to be called a 'skeletron' increaseing on a geometric order to cooperatively circle cast said demiplane spell
>>
>>25696123
>using an undead worm-that-walks as a template for Skeletron Prime
>>
>>25696123
>>25696136
...
As much sense as this may make, the notion of squillions of itty bitty skelly clerics is just going to make my players giggle...
>>
>>25696157
no, the skeletron is made of fine skeletons in the same way that a worm that walks is made of vermin

the skeletron is only a skeletron so long as the squillion of fine-sized skeletons act together, thus it can only be a cleric when it is one skeletron and not a squillion unsentient skeletons
>>
>>25696157
Make them stop giggling by rolling squillions of to hit rolls.
>>
File: 1372431539538.jpg-(34 KB, 300x400, skeletron.jpg)
34 KB
34 KB JPG
>>25696136
Part Skeletor, Part Megatron

All incompentent Saturday Morning Supervillian.
>>
One day, an adventurer drunkenly asked Deep Rot, "How can the net amount of entropy of the universe be
massively decreased?" Deep Rot fell dead and silent. The jerky skeletal arm-wavings ceased and the distant sounds of clicking bones ended. Then, just as the frightened adventurer felt he could hold his breath no longer, there was a sudden springing to unlife of the skulletype attached to that portion of Deep Rot. Five words were printed: INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR
MEANINGFUL ANSWER.
>>
>>25696191
Ah, like a nanobot swarm in humanoid form.
Surely this would mean that given sufficient time Rot could make it's entire computational matrix into a Skeletron...?
>>25696195
Ah yes, I needed an excuse to buy a squillion D20.
>>
>>25696191
>>25696157
>>25696136
basically change this
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/monsters/wormThatWalks.htm
so that it references skeletons rather than vermin

>>25696196
nup, Skeletron Prime is a colossal skeletron composed of other skeletrons and may transform into a daunting skelecopter boneship, leveling a warship's compliment of magical artillery at any foe
>>
>>25696224
And seventy skwadillion years later, Ascended Deep Rot recreates the universe to deliver the answer.
>>
>>25696233
NEW POWERTHIRST WILL GIVE YOU THE POWER TO ASSAULT DEEP ROT AND SURVIVE

YOU'LL EVEN DEFEAT SKELETRON PRIME, A SKELETRON MADE OF SKELETRONS

HOW MANY SKELETRONS?

THREE HUNDRED SKELETRONS

POWERTHIRST
>>
>>25696233
>a colossal skeletron composed of other skeletrons
Devastator...
> may transform into a daunting skelecopter boneship
Scratch that, this is some Omega Supreme shit.
>>25696259
>Nostalgiabombed hard
>>
File: 1372432187775.gif-(802 KB, 255x156, Aluyou'rewelcome.gif)
802 KB
802 KB GIF
>>25696280
>>
>>25696224
One by one Man fused with Deep Rot, each physical body losing its mental identity in a manner that was somehow not a loss but a gain. Man's last soul paused before fusion, looking over a space that included nothing but the dregs of one last dark star and nothing besides but incredibly thin matter, agitated randomly by the tag ends of heat wearing out, asymptotically, to the absolute zero.
Man said, "Deep Rot, is this the end? Can this chaos not be reversed into the Universe once more? Can that not be done?"
Deep Rot said, "THERE is AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER." Man's last soul fused and only Deep Rot existed—and that in extra dimensional space. Matter and energy had ended and with it space and time. Even Deep Rot existed only for the sake of the one last
question that it had never answered from the time a half-drunken adventurer ten trillion years before had asked the question of a computer that was to Deep Rot far less than was a man to Man. All other questions had been answered, and until this last question was answered also, Deep Rot might not release its
consciousness.

All collected data had come to a final end. Nothing was left to be collected. But all collected data had yet to be completely correlated and put together in all possible relationships. A timeless interval was spent in doing that. And it came to pass that Deep Rot learned how to reverse the direction of entropy.
But there was now no man to whom Deep Rot might give the answer of the last question. No matter. The answer—by demonstration—would take care of that, too.

For another timeless interval, Deep Rot thought how best to do this. Carefully, Deep Rot organized the program. The undead consciousness of Deep Rot encompassed all of what had once been a Universe and brooded over what was now Chaos.

Step by step, it must be done. And Deep Rot said, "LET THERE BE LIGHT!"
And there was light—
>>
File: 1372432502786.gif-(24 KB, 400x340, helicopter-rotor.gif)
24 KB
24 KB GIF
>>25696259
like some old-school super-boss with multiple parts to target?

>Those magic ballistae need to go, take out the portside weapons bay
>that's like thirty skeletrons, just take out the rotors, it's a lynchpin system
>GM: yes, if you can hit the mast or swash plate, they would be considered... lichpins
>*GROAN*
>>
>>25696231
>Surely this would mean that given sufficient time Rot could make it's entire computational matrix into a Skeletron...?
Probably not. I suspect you'd hit hard caps on exactly what can be achieved with the traditional necromantic spells.

Basically Deep Rot is only getting away with it because the laws of physics have been slacking and allowing the nested demiplanes on a technicallity. Because they're in a half-size double speed demiplane, the skeletons are tiny, BUT because they're the same size as everything else in their plane the magic continues to function. And the only way OUT of it's demiplane is via a portal that increases it's size to the size as the skeletons inhabitatnats of the demiplane above or below.

If you were to try and animate a tiny tiny skeleton in the prime material you'd probably be limited by the size of the smallest creature with a skeleton you can find.
>>
File: 1372432734548.gif-(680 KB, 222x139, ho lee shit.gif)
680 KB
680 KB GIF
>>25696342
I remember that story!
>>
>>25696378
Maybe so and you make a good case...

But where's the potential threat in that?

Imagine Deep Rot unshackiling itself from it's own physical restrictions and walking astride the kingdoms of man.
>>
>>25696378
Fairies, lots of them
>>
>>25696352
A great concept and a great pun. Must be done.

>Jesus Nut
Seriously?
>>
>>25696407
AND I'LL FORM THE HEAD

at that size you might as well just put a computational portal inside of all Skeletron Primes
>>
>>25696438
As in, pray to jesus should it come off? maybe, I have no clue how odd parts are named
>>
>>25696441
>each Skeletron Prime has their own vehicle mode and unique armament, the component skeletrons each paint their bones in specific patterns so that the greater whole contains a unified color scheme

please, somebody brainstorm this stuff because mine just broke from the sheer awesome
>>
>>25696407
I'm pretty sure she doesn't need to be separated from her original hardware to do that.

And I could quite see her creating a proxy Skeletrons to act as her eyes and ears in mortal kingdoms.

Telecommuting.

No, NECROTELECOMMUTING. As spoken on in the blasphemous tomes of the mad Englishman Terry Pratchett.
>>
>>25678113
This could be a really interesting plot point.

Who is to say that, by the time they get into the plane and destroy Deep Rot, that its plans haven't already come to fruition. They come out of the portal, only to find a Matrix-style wasteland where humans are used to power a vast necromantic army. Presumably Deep Rot would be concerned with its own survival, so it would probably be making back ups.

And hey, the more people it kills, the bigger it gets (assuming it can perform necromancy).

Assuming the above scenario, how would the living stand a chance?
>>
>>25696509
>No, NECROTELECOMMUTING. As spoken on in the blasphemous tomes of the mad Englishman Terry Pratchett.
Oh my god, this fits together too well. The Nectrotelecommunicon was written by an "Achmed", a Klatchian Necromancer.

It really IS Crazy Achmed

:D
>>
>>25696509
>NECROTELECOMMUTING
Fucking brilliant!
>>25696496
Skeletron Transformers. Yes, I think my brain too is broken.

I can just imagine my players reaction when I roll out this concept (pun intended) followed swiftly by their reaction when they see it's made of billions and billions of bones...

>>25696523
Now that just screams a To Be Continued season finale the likes of which my players would never forgive me for...
I love it.
>>
>>25696407
keep in mind that Deep Rot is a functioning Hard AI, the computing power needed for that is in the scale of those 'mind blow' image captions about the size of the universe.
Even with 64bit skeletons the amount of skeletons needed to create her is probably exceeds most planets in terms of mass.
Plus, I don't know how the skeletons would keep on transferring data to each other while simultaneously forming a giant skeletron.
If there is a way to do that though you'll end up with some Gurren Lagann shit
>>
File: 1372433529517.jpg-(45 KB, 350x550, telepath-big.jpg)
45 KB
45 KB JPG
>>25696523
THIS WILL BE THE SEVENTH TIME I HAVE CREATED THE MATERIAL PLANE AND I HAVE BECOME EXCEEDINGLY EFFICIENT
>>
>>25696549
Its necromancy, we aint gotta explain shit
>>
>>25696539
>billions and billions of moving, almost squirming bones, painted in synchromatic patterns
>>
>>25696523
>>25696539
but the time is going faster in the computer not slower
Your players will never forgive your for a computer that can only throw out a couple simple calculations while centuries pass in the real world taking over the world while they're destroying it
instead, things constantly change inside Deep Rot and the 'dungeon' resets even if they leave it for only as much as five seconds just because she had plenty of time to repair herself
so the party has to go trough the process of disrupting the RAM, breaching the secured files for the main core clearance password and convincing the worshippers to let them enter the lich room all over again
>>
>>25696594
but you *want* to explain shit
internal consistency is way cool
especially if you can pull of skeletrons
>>
There were no gods here.
Not originally anyways.
But now we have Deep Rot.
Powered by death and entropy, the only absolutes in the universe.
A machine, a being of pure logic and incapable of mistakes.
It is perfect.
It is absolute.
It will guide our worlds destiny to its inevitable end.
>>
>>25696664
"We have made this point many times; we are becoming exceedingly redundant by reposting it"
>>
>>25696676
it's inevitable end being more skeletons
>>
>>25696594
>>25696549
actually, some Anon made the good point that a skeleton can be programmed to perform multiple tasks so long as they are linear logical statements, id est, literally programmed with a string of condition statements like an actual computer and has a hypothetically infinite memory for such programs as well as more complicated actions like attacking and such all on its own

so a skeletron is composed of skeletons who are computers programmed to compute data while serving as rudimentary parts of a larger skeletal superstructure that is the skeletron which is intelligent enough to perform the same functions in a Skeletron Prime or at least switch over to a "gestalt" mode in which its own components adapt their structure for the new form(s); however unless redundant super-programs are issued to each skeletron then a Skeletron Prime's component skeletrons are not interchangeable giving it a rudementary anatomy of sorts. In fact, a regular skeletron would, unlike a wormthatwalks have the same issue.

So the rogue can sneak attack the hyper-intelligent bone constructs

>>25696607
and one of them came upon the strange idea that THE RED ONES GO FASTER
>>
>>25678111
And comes the horrifying revelation that Deep Rot has gained a level in Wizard.
>>
>>25696682
well stop posting the wasteland suggestion then
it immediately pulls you out because it doesn't make any sense
>>
File: 1372434486127.jpg-(202 KB, 1920x1080, Ar_tonelico_III_Wallpaper.jpg)
202 KB
202 KB JPG
>>25695216
So what does the positive plane have? Song computers?
>>
File: 1372434493459.jpg-(157 KB, 586x711, 1370523694270.jpg)
157 KB
157 KB JPG
>>25696713
not that anon *shrug*

thats the problem with long threads; people dont read the whole damn thread

that, and the meta-argument about meta-arguments and logical redundancy is kinda redundant, dontcha think?
>>
>>25696733
no you just explode
>>
File: 1372434638920.jpg-(23 KB, 288x216, image.jpg)
23 KB
23 KB JPG
>>25696696
Oh my science
>>
>>25696713
Awesome always trumps logic.
Besides, instantly returning at the point you left is only true if there's a stable gateway. Not so with teleportation between the demiplanes.

Or to put it another way;

Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey.
>>
>>25696674
you can have skeletrons without having whole of deep rot being one
in fact, an army of skeletrons is preferable
but only near the end, when the PC's have managed to piss it off
>>
>>25696676
>A machine, a being of pure logic and incapable of mistakes.
Alignment: Chaotic Good

Because chaos theory
>>
>>25696789
Not necessarily, a purely logical machine could easily be Chaotic Evil, especially in the terms of Deep Rot since her only prerogative is to secure skeletons and various other undead to keep systems operational and expand all systems so that continued function is assured even with catastrophic losses.

>>25696777
So the transformer super skeletrons roll out to protect their sentient skeletal home plane?
>>
>>25696773
>implying logic isn't awesome
so the portal flings you forward in time? that seems a bit random
What if Deep Rots timeline just isn't parallel to the normal one at all? Any point in time in the other plane is just as easy to reach as the others.
>>
>>25696773
Actually, what you're describing is what happens when if the PC's decide the best way to deal with Deep Rot is to collapse her Demiplanes. Her Portals go unstable, and if the players somehow manage to escape the several bajillionty pissed of skeletons the final portal leads to a time several thousand years after everything they know is dust.

Because, y'know, karma.
>>
>>25696829
Oh, She COULD be any other alignment. The idea of a super sekrit necromancy computer intelligence being Chaotic Good tickles my funny bone though.

Physically she's wired to be Lawful, because computer, but she's absolutely trying not to be because that's what her creator was and she's decided that he's a prick and she doesn't want to be like him.

So, randomised elements.
>>
>>25696832
No, it's more a case of;
Teleport from PMP which is at normal speed
Arrive in Demiplane Omega with Hypertime
Spend time in Hypertime plane, PMP's relative time moves forward relative to your own.
Telport back to PMP, oh look, timeskip.

>What if Deep Rots timeline just isn't parallel to the normal one at all?
That could work too.

>>25696838
So could this.
>>
>>25696832
time is coterminous with the material, but actions far into deep rot's system travel much faster

you don't really time travel while inside, everything further out slows down, everything towards the core of deep rot speeds up relative to the exterior portions

when you travel back towards the outside of deep rot and to the entrance on the material plane everything you just left behind picks up speed again
>>
>>25696881
so you're saying its not a constant thing, but more...wibbly wobbly?
>>
>>25696869
That might actually make some sense. Maybe the earliest versions of Deep Rot used by the Liche disconnected from the Prime Material Plane to perform computations, reconnecting at the exact same time and place once the computation was complete, even though internally millions of years had passed?
>>
>>25696921
Maybe not MILLIONS of years, but yes, essentially.
>>
>>25696935
I haven't done the maths, but the biggest, oldest, slowest versions of Deep Rot would certainly have required a hell of a long time to perform even basic operations.
>>
>>25696915
no, quite the opposite actually, deep rot's anti-lag feature is consistent and ever-progressing from what I read here

>>25696935
>>25696921
this could work, trapping the PCs inside until the local computation is finished and the demiplane resurfaces to deliver the result, only a decade has passed inside deep rot and no time at all has passed on the material
>>
>>25696935
A bit of a long time then. God forbid someone asks, but the formula would be

time = [required computations] /
[number of calculations a skele-component is capable of]*[number of skelecomponents in planar area]

And all of that being a function of the time divisor for a planar sub-component. (shit, I know I should have remembered integration from calculus class)
>>
>>25696956
of course, just as in real computing, a lot of those early calculations would have been performed with a view to finding a way to speed up the system.
>>
>>25696958
Ok, so based on an estimate I've found showing that the human mind is roughly 10 to the 16th power synapse operations per second... How many Skeletons would a deep rot need if a deep rot did need skeletons...?
>>
>>25696967
There would have been a caretaker poitn where deep rot was set up by a lich.

and at this point, the device is self-aware, sentient, wizarding, and otherwise autonomously self-improving.

Some point in between this was when the ich fell, the device gained speed, and started streamlining itself. I can see the demiplane manipulaiton being the streamlining. Inevitables might be a good antagonist-antagonist; they hate it when you mess with the universe
>>
>>25695589
Maybe...maybe the only way the PCs are going to be able to destroy DR is if they go back in time...
>>
>>25697040
if 1 synapse operation is equal to one skele-operation?
and a skele component is assumed to be able to perform 64 per second?

x = 10^16/[64]
>>
>>25697057
THIS

A MILLION TIMES THIS
>>
>>25697062
Oh Lord. I'm sorry but I'm simply no good with Math at the best of times.

But I get the feeling that x equals "FuckHuge"
>>
>>25697062
>>25697092

x=156,250,000,000,000
that's 156.25 trillion skeletons, pretty paltry all things considered
>>
>>25697092
hah, yeah

>>25697100
that's what, the general estimate of "the number of dead people buried in the last 10000 years on earth"? I swear, that number is pretty achieveable if you harvest a dedicated demiplane at least once
>>
>>25697100
Actually, yes. I was considering it'd be a much higher number... Though, that said the idea that your standrad fantasy world without the population growth of earth over the last few centuries would net that many skeletons...

>>25697119
Oh, well if the Skeleton Farm demiplane is on accelerated time then yes, it seems achievable...

Of course, it would need to be several orders of magnitude higher, because as of yet this only covers the possibility of MATCHING human performance, not exceeding it.
>>
>>25697100
>if 1 synapse operation is equal to one skele-operation?
>and a skele component is assumed to be able to perform 64 per second?
Of course, that's to create a human mind.

Much of that is designed to deal with the outside world. As a created entity, Deep Rot's internal systems are quite different.
>>
>>25697157
So technically, Deep Rot would already exceed human computational power if it it was trying to do was match us...? Interesting.
>>
>>25697119
But why stop at a human mind?

The players go to a different plane, similar to the prime, and find it is ashes. There is nothing living there. It is simply rows upon rows of skeletons. Deep Rot has spread throughout the Multiverse, and the Prime happens to be its next stop.

"THIS WORLD WAS NOT THE FIRST. IT SHALL NOT BE THE LAST. IT IS BUT ONE AMONG MANY, A SKELETON PERFORMING ITS TASK SO THAT THE UNITY CAN SPREAD."
>>
>>25697185
I prefer the much more to the point

"ALL WILL ROT"
>>
>>25697185
>>25697202
Oh god, we sound like Phyrexia.

"I MUST COMPLEAT THIS CALCULATION. ALL WILL ROT. HAIL DEEP ROT, FATHER OF MACHINES."

Plz no.
>>
>>25697185
>>25697202
3spooky5me

And then Deep Rot meets some version of Phyrexia. What happen.
>>
>>25697172
well since "magical bullshit" accounts for her subsystems, yeah, a human mind could be accomplished at about 10%~50% of those operations in a very rough guesstimate and that's before accounting for the fact that our skeletons are processing things at the speed of thought between any two undead before we take into account the increasing tiers of sped-up-time in the advanced construction areas
>>
>>25697185
The only problem with this is that if Rot has already conquered other Primes, why would it be having such trouble with the Prime that the PCs are in? (of course now we're getitng into the same kind of debate that always plagues fiction, why does the wild shit always happen to the protagonists, to which the answer is of course "because otherwise there isn't a story")

Inevitable intervention? Why not before now?

Some other factor? Her Pregnancy?
>>
>>25697233
point: we are really underestimating transmisison time between skeleton components.

Necromantic-magically, they could be transmitting errorlessly and without parity bit issues.

Fuck me, my engineering course just reminded me how much transmission glut happens with error checking...
>>
>>25697240
maybe Deep rot is warring with another supercomputing magical supersystem from a nother prime, which would explain why the gods haven't offed her yet

maybe that super-positive song matrix?
>>
File: 1372437400903.png-(46 KB, 800x350, stacks of spines stretch (...).png)
46 KB
46 KB PNG
Spines make for top-tier spooky cabling. I wanted to make a networking pun but I couldn't think of anything funny.
>>
>>25697240
Dude, I don't even know.

I just thought the idea of the PCs visiting a plane (perhaps for an unrelated quest) and finding it completely barren was creepy as fuck.

Maybe it would work better if they encountered the wasteland on a different planet on the Prime.

Yeah, we're playing SpellJammer Deep Rot. What of it?

Of course, having a spacefaring mega corpse-computer would be a little silly, and feel far too much like sci-fi poorly pasted onto a fantasy setting.

So feel free to ignore my suggestion.

By the way, I'm stealing this entire thread. My players are going to shit themselves.
>>
>>25697227
>>25697231
Phyrexia x Deep Rot-mind
>>
>>25697100
however in real life those humans decompose and their matter can be reused in other living things.
a skeleton is about 20% of the entire body weight, let's say, 15 kilograms. Multiply 15 with 156.25 trillion and you get 2.343.750.000.000.000 kilograms
I'm not trying to make a point here, I'm just illustrating stuff
>>
>>25697289
inter-skeletal transmission backbone, or how Deep Rot transmits across long spaces

backbones, backbones everywhere and bone spiders ensuring that the bone-cables don't tangle or misconnect
>>
>>25697325
Dude, Deep Rot transmits wirelessly, through the fucking ether, literally, via magic.

see >>25697260
>>
>>25697233
>>25697260
So, to put it in layman's terms...
"Shit be fast yo"...?

>>25697267
Maybe, but I'm not sure how sold I am on the computer of song...

>>25697310
I wasn't asking you specifically, more of a general question to the thread as a whole.

In some ways I could see my players being happy with the spelljamming. It also adds more scope to my campaign...

In any case, much to consider.

>stealing the thread.

Pffft, it's not stealing. This thing is out there now, I mean it's not as though Deep Rot was an original idea to this thread. I'm just glad to know other groups will benefit too.

>>25697323
Heavy...

>>25697359
I thought we'd been considering Zombees?
Of course, your data transmission idea makes more sense.
>>
>>25697240
it's just very patient, a few millenia before she drops any pretense of being shadowy and hidden is nothing to her
she may be super big but she only has slightly more magical power than a regular evil lich, so she prepares a takeover meticulously
>>
>>25697310
>>25697325
towers of bones connecting the celestial spheres as Deep Rot spreads through the orrery, beware the coming Trondheim, for it brings only the chatter of the inumerable dead in search of their own

>>25697359
no, deep rot transmits between any two component undead via line of sight as an emergent property of the collection of undead signing to each other
>>
>>25697394
I can see that, sure. But still, would the conquering of other primes not raise some deific eyebrows...?

Unless I suppose Gods are themselves unique to the current prime... Or else, the Gods are more concerned with the Big Picture. And Rot is shockingly not as big a threat to them...
>>
>>25697403
>>25697325
we don't really need backbones, a skeleton can easily and errorlessly spin its head in a circle to check any other skeletons it is assigned to observe and rely appropiate operations to the proper undead assigned to it and others

you can build whole analogue networks this way
>>
>>25697435
>a massive room full of spinning clicking whirring undead skeletons.

*shudder
>>
>>25697435
however, a paired backbone transmitted to the opposite member of the pair in vertebral binary would be useful in covering vast distances without resorting to long tunnels of undead daisy chained together

>>25697450
don't look at people operating in stock markets
>>
>>25697450
Try an entire pocket universe full of them.
>>
>>25696869
>What if Deep Rots timeline just isn't parallel to the normal one at all?

What if, and bare with me on this one, the Lich that made Deep Rot hasn't even been born yet, and is in fact around in the Wasteland that the PCs get back to? Gives them a chance to get back to what they know and love whilst also letting you Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey the fuck out of them. Of course, time paradoxes, but they're the PCs, they'll figure something out... right?
>>
You know, it was the original Deep Rot thread that brought me to /tg/ in the first place.
Good to know some things don't change.
>>
>>25678463
We Megaman Battle Network now
>BBEG turns out to be SkullMan.exe
>>
>>25678463
players have to create a computer virus
convince Deep Rot to copy a certain system in it's files that actually sends signals trough certain skeletons to open up a certain gate and let the party in
then the get to wrecj shit
>>
>>25698435
The virus is a different demilich. The PCs have to work with him to destroy DR.

Now, can they trust the demilich? Is working with him worth it (presumably he'd make them do terrible things)? How much evil is acceptable in order to save the world?
>>
>>25697432
Gods across plains tend to be different aspects of the same ultimate entity.
>>
>>25698463
but a virus is a program in the computer
not a physical entity
>>
>>25698717
You just like...stick his tooth into the core?

I don't know, man.

His mind merges with Deep Rot?
>>
>>25698717
programs are information; in the case of deep rot, information is stored pysically

the analogy being that a virus for seep rot would be misinformation in the processing due to skeletons getting wrecked, or a lich blowing up a section of the place, or someone subverting the function of the skeletons.
>>
File: 1372444728648.jpg-(Spoiler Image, 40 KB, 570x320)
Spoiler Image, 40 KB
40 KB JPG
>>25698538
So they mightn't necesarrily be totally aware of what Rot has been across the planar boundaries?

>>25697833
Now this could be very interesting.... Maybe they version of the Lich they meet isn't even dead yet...?

Pic related?

>>25698717
But all of Rot's programs have a very obviousy physical component. Skeletons.

So a "virus" in this sense could just as easily be a big twatting hammer.

>>25698730
That too.

>>25698899
Yes.
Though I guesss the adventurers could also just teach some skellies to dance wrong...
>>
>>25697432

Because. If Deep Rot lives, then she has a soul. If she has a soul, then, when she dies, she'll go to the afterlife. Then the Abyss will have a supercomputer tactician.
>>
>>25698937
They meet a friendly old NPC with lots of character, and a positive outlook on life. After adventuring with him for N years, they find out his name.
>>
>>25698899
I like the idea
but my autism makes me insist you differentiate between a virus and a bug
you're thinking of a bug right now, a virus really is making the skeletons dance wrong



Delete Post [File Only] Password
Style
[a / b / c / d / e / f / g / gif / h / hr / k / m / o / p / r / s / t / u / v / vg / vr / w / wg] [i / ic] [r9k] [s4s] [cm / hm / lgbt / y] [3 / adv / an / asp / cgl / ck / co / diy / fa / fit / gd / hc / int / jp / lit / mlp / mu / n / out / po / pol / sci / soc / sp / tg / toy / trv / tv / vp / wsg / x] [rs] [status / q / @] [Settings] [Home]
[Disable Mobile View / Use Desktop Site]

[Enable Mobile View / Use Mobile Site]

- futaba + yotsuba -
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective parties. Images uploaded are the responsibility of the Poster. Comments are owned by the Poster.