HELP PLEASE! RINGWRAITH!

[whiteLimestone]

I got got my first Ringwraith and I have no idea what to do. He's tearing up the battlefield something awful right now, but I'm worried he might start going after us next.

Does anyone have any lore on Zealous Warden, the grouchy guy that guards the Dersite battleship dock? Is there anything that might make him not attack us?

Oh right, his prototypings are the following: a pair of glasses, a taxidermied squirrel, a spoon, a paper crane, Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll, a lock of hair (mine), a dragon pendant, and a kitchen timer.

[tenaciousTheseus]

Well,none of your prototypings sound TOO bad. If I remember correctly, that guy was pretty stringent with the rules and happy to switch towards trying to beat people's heads in. Don't know if that helps, but I can't think of anything else.

[genesisArtificer]

Dragon can make things difficult. Anything by Carol carries small charge of Dream Aspect. Also you may have a null session and the ringwraith would still have Red Miles

[ExtropianDreamer]

Right, I'm still writing my FAQ on Wraiths at the moment, but I'll share what I know.

First off, ZW is fairly far down the chain of succession - the game doesn't favour him getting the ring anywhere near as much as it does PM or JN. Which means that something somebody has done has probably pissed him off big time. I'd advise you to see if you can't do a little digging and find out what that was. His own stats, which do still matter somewhat, are fairly middling - not too high, not too low.

Dersite law tends to vary slightly from session to session, but there's usually a legal method of demanding the ring be returned to a rightful owner. ZW tends to respect that, assuming he's not too pissed off enough to listen. Shank him the instant that ring comes off his finger. Even if your particular variant of Dersite law doesn't have a way to do that, there should be something you can use in there to at least distract him for a while.

Given your prototypings, he's might display abilities conforming to the aspects of Dreams, Time, Mind, Law and Space, along with basically anything that you can do. Hiding is probably not gonna work too well. Stats are probably gonna get a decent buff too. That's all kind of random though, so don't take it as gospel.

Worst case scenario? He starts taking orders from the King and you end up fighting two final bosses at once - though he definitely won't be able to use Red Miles in that case. Decide whether that's worth it.

Unfortunately, every Wraith is unique, so I can't give you any more specific info than that.

[whiteLimestone]

EDIT: Because I missed your post somehow eD, sorry.

Okay, so look for any Dersite laws that would demand turning over the ring to authority. I'll try to scry them. Maybe the Mage of Mind can get him to calm down long enough to listen to Da Rules or something? Is that viable?

Oh man, this is only my second session I'm not ready for this. There's no way to, I dunno, block Red Miles, is there?

[velvetDownpour]

Dude, RED MILES can break bedrock. It can break pendants. It wrecks quest beds.

Of course there's no way to block it.

[genesisArtificer]

There is no way that is not a result of Corruption or intevention of debug NPC.

However they are dodgable with Space and Time Abilities. Or poweful Light buffs like [Dance of Thorns] If you encounter Red Miles run like hell. Maybe you will survive. Also if you are God Tier - a good news to you. that atteck doesn't trigger a Heroic Death, only Just. So you won't die for opposing him if he uses that power.

[timelyTurnabout]

"The kid can't escape the miles. No one can escape the miles."
Fortunately that isn't entirely true, but yeah - "dodging" those red tendrils tends not to work reliably unless your stats are simultaneously off the chain, the grid, the handle, and the rocker. Beserk Trigger might actually *raise* everyone's survivability, if the miles come into play.

But in general, avoid those.

Also if you are God Tier - a good news to you. that atteck doesn't trigger a Heroic Death, only Just. So you won't die for opposing him if he uses that power.

WOAH WOAH CAREFUL. Yes, I think GA is correct, but don't rely on that, though. Yeah, that tends to be true, but I don't think anyone has found any hard-and-fast rules on what counts as heroic or just - I expect it varies between sessions and even players. Getting anywhere near him, attempting to de-ring him, might be sufficiently "heroic", so be careful.

But yeah I second everyone's suggestion to try to approach it from a personality standpoint, and not a combat one.

I honestly don't know much about ZW, other than that one quest where he asks you to bring him canned pickles while he's on duty.

[whiteLimestone]

Okay, I've done a bit of scrying and I found out what set ZW off. Apparently one of the players exiled the Black Queen and he took the ring off that players corpse after he was killed resisting arrest.

Also, apparently getting killed resisting arrest is neither Heroic or Just somehow. Good to know. Unfortunately, I suspect now that having out Mage do the Mindy thing will just set him off more.

[ExtropianDreamer]

Something else to note. When a carapace feels they've significantly changed from who they used to be, they tend to change their name to something more suitable. They always keep the same initials though.

If ZW still stands for Zealous Warden, he'll still likely follow the laws of Derse. If not, he's changed somehow and might not be so stringent.

Remember, if he's acting alongside the Black King, he can't use Red Miles - ZW is one of the few Ringwraiths with the right personality to actually do that. It's a bit weird and probably a glitch, but take advantage of it if the BK is still alive and kicking. Or not, because even then you're still making the final boss fight into a dual boss.

[timelyTurnabout]

Just a thought - this topic may go better in the "Emergency Situations" board. This board gets a little more traffic though, so I'm definitely not fussing or anything.

Good luck!

[whiteLimestone]

Eep, sorry TT! Didn't mean to miscategorize, I swear!

Okay, did a bit more scrying. He's still Zealous Warden, which I guess is good in this instance. I'll start trying to find good laws to remind him of, and if that fails I guess we can try to dual boss him and the King. I do not want to end up facing Red Miles.

Wish me luck!

[ExtropianDreamer]

Heppni ok sigr, my friend.

[whiteLimestone]

Well, that could have gone better. No one died, though, so I guess that's good?

We were able to convince ZW that the ring should be turned over to an appropriate authority figure and offered to escort him to one. He insisted on wearing the ring for the trip back to Derse, and there's no real way we could say no to that because how else would he be able to fly there? He'd get suspicious if we pushed too hard.

I'm just glad we were able to convince him the Black King was too busy to accept the ring himself. I don't know if double-up-ing on prototyping items does anything but I didn't want to risk it.

In any case, we got to Derse, he took off the ring, and both our Grace and Bard stabbed him in the back. Unfortunately, we were spotted. By HB, DD, and CD. Apparently killing a respectable citizen in front of Agents aggros them, who knew?

Long story short: We can't go back to Derse now without being mobbed and the Dersite Agents are down one HB. We're working on a way to get our dreamselves outta there as I type this.

[genesisArtificer]

There are Quest Beds in the Crypt of the Moon. The Agents shouldn't know about them. Evacuate your Dersite Dreamselves there.

This is actually the best thing, for few reasons, those being:
a) Others won't reach you there
b) If you die and you are on top of your Echeladder, unless someone does the Corpse Smooching you will Ascend. At least this is how it worked out for me, when I was hunted on Prospit.