Monday 18 May 2015

Reasons not to lock myself in Time forever

In Arnold's game I am a Void Monk named Zengar of Strongtown.

He looks nothing like this


Currently Zengar is sitting meditating by a lighthouse, he has just passed the 2000 xp mark and as soon as the next game starts he will be Level 2.

At Level 2 he gains the following ability:

"Lock Time

- You designate a length of time (of any duration, including infinite).  For that length of time, your body becomes frozen in time, rigid and utterly unmoving.  While in this state, you cannot be altered--you are effectively harder than adamantine.  The only things that can affect you are spells that affect all matter (like disintegrate) or time spells.  If the time spell is cast on you, your stasis lock is dispelled and you are stunned for 1d6 rounds.  This ability is usable 1/day.

It takes an action to go into stasis lock; you cannot activate it fast enough when falling, unless the fall is more than 200'.

In your hands, an immovable rod turns into an immovable quarterstaff.  If you have an immovable quarterstaff in your hands when you use this ability, you can have the option to also lock Space as well as Time.  If you choose this, the effects of the immovable rod apply to your entire body while you are in stasis.  If other people are holding the immovable rod, you have the option to bring them (willingly) into stasis with you."

With the following proviso:

"Once you gain this ability, you must resist the temptation to immediately use it on yourself with a duration of 'infinite'.  Make a Wis check with a +1 bonus for every reason you can name for staying on this mortal plane a while longer.  (Why postpone annihilation?  It is what you truly seek.  On the other hand, what's a few years in the face of infinity?)"


Therefore, here are my reasons not to lock myself in time forever.



- Will never reach outer space.

- Will never find the sphere of Annihilation.

- Will never erase the universe.

- Will never be able to lobotomise my friends, thereby leaving them trapped in the illusion of self.

- As an extension of the above point, all intelligent beings could theoretically be lobotomised and it is debateable as to whether this is not indeed a reasonable duty for a void monk.

- It is just possible that in the future a member of some ideology opposed to the void monks (i.e. almost all ideologies) might seek out the frozen monks and maliciously un-freeze them. Therefore the eternal non-being of all void monks, including myself, is not safe until all other ideologies no longer exist.

- As an extension of the point above, since time itself is an illusion, it is possible that some previously-living opponent of the Void Monks might use their own apparent death as a device, travel forwards in time, and maliciously awaken the time frozen monks. Therefore I should not freeze myself in time until there can be no, and have been no enemies of the Void Monks throughout all of time.

- Will never find that fat fucker Oshregaal and feed him his own teeth.

- Will never find that witch he had as a hostage who I should probably try to get back.

- If I freeze myself in time without being utterly and absolutely certain that I am truly one with Total Absence, it is just possible that some tiny worm or germ of thought or being might still remain, timeless as I would be, still within my timeless skull. If this did occur then, instead of reaching true non-being I would instead be trapped in an eternal almost-being with a fragment of the False Reality encoded in my being, inaccessible not only to myself but also to any future Void Monks. I would be in hell, and would be hell.

- As an addendum to the above, if I do become utterly timeless and do persist to the death of time in this cosmos, it is possible that the vile powers of False Being might use their awful abilities of meta-illusion to 'reincarnate' this universe into another, therefore all these agents of False Reality, or 'Gods', must be introduced to the Void before time ends in order to ensure that it in fact does end.

- As a further addendum, should I persist to the end of time and either one or both of the two above circumstances take place, then any fragment of reality still encoded in my timeless being might prove the 'seed' or source of a new False Reality on the other side of time, thereby making me the origin of all 'matter' and 'being' in that fresh cosmos, truly the most evil entity imaginable. This should be avoided.

- If time is an illusion, as I KNOW that it must be. Then is avoiding or freezing time truly escaping it? Or should the true path be the denial of time from within time? A patron who leaves the theatre does little harm to the play, but an actor who, on stage, refuses their part and acts against the stories flow _whilst still on the stage_ does true damage to the False Entropy of the feigned reality. Is this not the greater duty?

- As an addendum to the above,I  must immediately seek out other Void Monks and relate the stated revelation as it may be of doctrinal significance.

- It is certainly of doctrinal significance, perhaps paramount significance. It is possible that other Void Monks may resist or deny the fundamental correctness of the revelation. This opposition is no doubt indicative of partial or total entrapment by the False Reality, therefore those who oppose must be introduced to the void. All time frozen Void monks must be woken and queries as to their understanding of this concept as, without it, their stasis may be invalid. I do not have the power or ability to unlock frozen time monks, therefore the other members of this party must be imbued with or otherwise learn this ability so that they may be of service.

2 comments:

  1. Zengar will get +15 on his Wisdom check next session to avoid suiciding himself with immortality.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I especially approve of how the rest of the party gets homework. That's true wisdom.

    ReplyDelete