Seeker of Thrones 6-68
“It is said in some circles that the among his hoard the Grand Dragon scattered nightmarish beasts that, much like the trap-door spider, could conceal themselves while they wait patiently for prey. These creatures, however, are rumored to have the devilish power to conceal themselves as furniture, or puddles of water, or even men. They are said to have only one weakness – they are vastly stupid, and left alone are incapable of distinguishing others of their kin from enemies or prey. They have little imagination and will simply copy the form of the nearest object.
Imagine, then, if you will, a little thought experiment – a room of only these things, hundreds of them, duplicating each other’s form in idiot redundancy. The thought is, of course, quite ridiculous and chilling in equal measure. I prefer to believe their existence is confined to rumor alone.”
-Pree Parzy de Peroxes, S.C. 260, The Magnificent Beast
Mammon: Great DM, or Greatest DM?
I understood that reference!
Evil Lair 101: never make a room with only mimics for it is overdone and the people will expect it, not to mention their lack of brains.
Nonono. Make exactly ONE room with only mimics. It will make them paranoid, and they will never trust another room again.
The Wiggling One wiggles wisely.
As Pree Parzy De Peroxes’s writings note, only a few speculate they even exist, so you get one good, more or less surefire shot at surprising your intruders with them. If you are going to use it, you might as well go overboard. It is somewhat lucky that our merry band of thieves entered in a relatively less mimic’d room of the fortress.
If they successfully get over this area without setting anything off I’m gonna happily imagine that those were all actually just normal chairs in the middle of everything, and Mammon was being super trolly
Mammon simply went through a brief chair-hoarding phase, when he was convinced furniture was the currency of the future.
If your goal is to murder, a room with only mimics can certainly do that.
If your goal is to entertain, it can certainly do that as well.
I see no issues here!
It is their instinct to gather near furniture. As more mimics arrive, the amount of ‘furniture’ grows, and so they attract more mimics.
…they are not particularly smart creatures.
SEA OF CHAIRS
Don’t be rude. It’s a perfectly normal amount of unsuspicious chairs, simply doing chair things.
Now what would be REALLY amusing would be if that was actually just a hoard of normal chairs.
Everyone thought Mammon is hoarding gold, but it’s all a decoy so that no-one will realize his REAL prize!
Behold! The Infinity Chair-Hoard of Yre!
Called “Choard” for short.
MIMICS
ALL
THE
WAY
DOWN
MAKE THE DUNGEON, PUT ALL THE MIMICS. PUT A MIMIC INSIDE THAT MIMIC. NOW PUT ANOTHER MIMIC NEXT TO IT.
It turns out that the *smart* mimics disguise themselves as wall statues…
Exactly what I was thinking.
No, the “smart” mimics disguise themselves as living creatures, then walk among civilization, the prey none the wiser.
Then the mimics realize that food being sold by merchants and restaurants is just as filling, and decide to just get jobs. Sure, it’s hard work, but more consistent and less risky than living the life of the serial killer cannibal.
In truth, sapient strains of mimics ascended centuries ago. They’re just all blending in with “normal people” and playing it safe. There’s a reason people abandoned barbarism for civilization, after all.
I am sorely tempted to compare this mass of mindless mimics to the members of certain political parties in the world I am most familiar with. They however would make the same claim against me, and I, being unable to entirely disprove this, must abandon this line of thought entirely.
Would you indulge yourself by tossing a coin, were you in a similar situation?
A room of chairs, none of which you want to sit on.
Each one the exact imitation of the one beside it.
What better metaphor for greed?
This just in – Burglary at Restaurant Furniture Ltd – but first, this message ….
This just in – Burglary at Restaurant Furniture Ltd – but first, this message
Well clearly they just need 1,000 undead hunter’s charms.
Hope Suuz doesn’t run out of wire any time soon.
Looks safe! Just some chairs.
Chairs. Why did it have to be chairs?
Because the tea cups will never ever recover.
I imagine one could spend days tossing different items into this hall of mimics and watching the ripples of shape-changing move through this grand infestation.
As much as I like the sight and sensation of wanton bloodshed, and strange as it may seem coming from the lips and pen of a knight Belligerent, the crew is doing the right and proper thing of going the quiet Path.
Cleaving a path through what looks to be at least two Lordran IKEAs worth of mimics is a full days work, and I doubt that these lucky lads and lasses can afford to put in that kind of time in this part of the Infinite Fortress. Slaughtering that many beasties is loud, messy work too, I might add. It’s the kind of thing that tends to get noticed by those looking to keep trouble out; not an ideal turn of events for a rescue operation.
If this is how Mammon guards the bits of YRE that he’s hard pressed to give a tenth of a shit about, then I’m certainly looking forward to seeing his arrangements for the vaults, record rooms, and living spaces of the fractal dungeon…
And Some say, it was the longest recorded set of Musical Chairs in history.
In this adventure, the Rising King makes the mistake all nascent rulers do; She is learning how to DIVIDE, perhaps even how to CONQUER, but she is not learning how to RULE.
An important lesson, oft learned too late.
I hope Mammon saw fit to include any OTHER kinds of monsters in the whole fortress, or this is going to get tedious.
Like the third panel of 5-41?
It is an infinite maze.
He did, but they all went extinct. Replaced by mimics that copied them, I’m sorry to say. Took almost a millennium before anyone noticed.
Why mess with what works? I’m pretty sure Mammon is more interested in keeping his vault safe than keeping things interesting.
Naw, you misunderstand. Stocking the place with thousands of mimics wasn’t intentional. The Infinite Recursive Bank just became host to a mimic infestation. It just takes one supplicant’s offerings to actually be a mimic to start it. After a while, Mammon realized his place was crawling with them. However, seeing as they didn’t hurt the loot in storage, the workers are expendable, and thieves tended to fall prey to beasties, he figured they were a good problem to have.
So he has guys move mimics to known thief entrances every once in a while, and let the two problems sort each other out. Either the thieves kill the mimics, or the mimics eat the thieves. Either way, Mammon wins.
Now, if I am the DM, those are just chairs, to scare the party into staying up on the ceiling, where some other nastiness is waiting. Or more likely 19 out of 20 are just chairs, but there are still mimics among them, in case the party would have the idea. 😛
You. I like you.
This room is looking like a Big Head’s shack.
Mimic breeding grounds.
You’d expect more beds…
dammit people, will you stop swearing by your gods body parts? XD
curses by anatomy
are popular for reasons three:
1. it’s funny
2. cost no money
3. they’re easy to see
But they are GLORIOUS!
if vengeance is sweet
but strength comes from meat
I know what I’ll eat.
This reminds me of the introduction to Play School.
Apart from the lack of bears.