Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by A G Thing »

Yeah I have, but I think the fact that you would have to develop some sort of blinking mechanic to deal with it makes it a little bit hard... :lol: Anyone know the longest someone has lasted in a staring contest? :shock:

But realistically how do you handle them in a CR description versus WHO Lore description?

First when you look at them they are harmless so any PC who tries to avoid blinking will have to make some sort of check to avoid such eventually. Second a crafty PC can declare that they simply close one eye at a time opening each one alternating by winking instead of blinking. Sure eventually they might have to turn a corner and lose sight but if they know of the weaknesses they can negate the threat until another character can improvise a mirror or make another construct or undead (though it must be sentient I guess) to look at it.

They turn to stone when you look at them, but in D&D stone is destroyed all the time. So in order to avoid easy destruction maybe you would have to make them out of Adamantite or declare them indestructible when looked at.

They move so very fast when not looked at but they do seem to have momentum constraints. They can clear a room in a very quick speed but they seem to only get about normal movement in a blink and sometimes even less than that. So since their speed is fast but unknown how do you rate it?

Then if you look at them for too long they ingrain themselves in you brain so you have to be careful. Anything that captures the image of an Angel becomes an Angel so smart players who bring mirrors can keep Angels at bay indefinitely by having them look into it. Creating illusions of Angels would theoretically create more of them as well. Another thing that works in this fashion is shadow magic creating shadows so they might be linked to the plane of shadow. This is not so bad as it is similar to a Vampires Domination and as keeping your eyes closed prevents the Angel from taking hold, but it is ultimately irreversible after a point and requires time to develop fully so that might make it more of a disease that continues to trigger over rounds as long as the eyes stay open. Also the fact that illusions can create them could lead to some interesting plots if someone misuses such power.

They don't kill but drain your possible future time by shunting you into an alternate timeline but Ravenloft does that through the Dark Powers and so it is possible that you could find your way back if the Dark Powers willed it but in the show it was tantamount to a death sentence as you were not supposed to be able to get back. Does time traveling no longer work on the character except through exceptional circumstances, and if it does, then does the Angel realize the change to their food supply? In the show they just cause you to vanish from your current timeline and appear in another. This however is not caused seemingly by simple touch as the Angels have grabbed some people and been seen by others in time to talk to them since they cannot free them, so I guess it could take a full round action. While this does not kill the character this eliminates them from play for the foreseeable future so this is similar to a death effect.

So to summerize
-Invulnerability or near such possibly listed as an epic or high DR only vulnerable to magic.
-Gaze attack with a will save vs Domination disease Death Effect creating an Angel in the mind of the victim but may be negated through closing of eyes.
-Images of Angels become Angels.
-Touch Based full round time shifting Death Effect but only when not watched so perhaps shorter or longer depending upon observers.
-Extremely fast movement.
-Weakness that they cannot move while something (Sentient) observes them at all.

I don't know how to calculate this CR? Anyone got any ideas?
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Wiccy of the Fraternity »

Has anyone else felt disappointed with the most recent batch of episodes since the show returned form it's break? With the exception of the odd moment in Let's Kill Hitler and the end of the latest one I've not once been entertained by it (heck, Matt Smith himself has been caught citing disappointment in the scripts and story lines).
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

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I think it might be that they are trying to develop the characters a bit more in these episodes but in doing so they are missing the mark a bit on them. A lot of the issues the came up lately were personal to Rory and Amy as well as the Doctor including the fact that he blames himself for the danger they are in and that his mistakes have been leading to these issues.

I also think that tying up some of the threads such as River's back story and even the whole woman with the eye patch thing need to come up more. The Doctor has been losing or screwing up quite badly missing the mark on his opponents and the problems that arise more and more. It almost seems like he simply stopped looking for her and the Silence fell into the backlog without even a whimper in later episodes. Too much circumstance and not enough of the Doctor being the Doctor.

I get the impression thought that they now are trying to keep up a level of excitement through the new and perhaps they need to do more of the tried and true to set it up. So far it seems like they have decent premises and the right lines and such but they are rushing into the climaxes a bit fast. The mystery that usually settles firmly behind the Doctor is not being presented except through constant affirmations of his failure and impending death. They just are not giving enough to tie these things together and every episode feels like a simple random trip with little background plot to catch hold of. The Doctor needs his confidence back and I am hoping that the next couple episodes will guide it back on path. I am hoping they did this mostly to set things up for some sort of grand reveal later on.

Keep hope alive fellow Whovians! The Doctor has regenerated from far worse wounds than a couple lack luster episodes! :wink:
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Wiccy of the Fraternity »

I've found that since Moffat took over the metaplot has generally improved, but the individual story lines have worsened. I think it's a shame really since they have a good cast that deserve far better.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Jester of the FoS »

I liked Let's Kill Hitler but felt it needed more, well, Hitler. And Night Terrors seemed neat as a concept but missed the mark.

I liked the ones after. The one with timelost Amy was interesting, if odd. Not as many Whos with a moral dilemma. And the one in the hotel was fun: creepy and interesting with a fun throw-back to an old Tom Baker episode.
So, really 50/50. But it's hard to compete with a couple solid Moffat episodes as a Neil Gaiman script.

I thought today's was good. No much in the way of scares but another fun throwback and hilarious dialogue. Very watchable.
And next week has me excited. Very interested to see where it goes.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Wiccy of the Fraternity »

Last Saturdays' was good and I really enjoyed it, but I think the support cast was what gave it the strength more than the script (which was beyond ludicrous in places). This weeks should be interesting and I am looking forward to it, but did they really gloss over all those years of the Doctor's life between 2 episodes?!
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by A G Thing »

Well... What did everyone think of the season finale?

Good? Bad? Bleehhh?

I personally thought it was an OK sort of wrap up but I also saw a lot of it coming from a mile away! Still the events were suitably complex but it ended on a massive cliffhanger with only a minor resolution to the problem and who was behind it. If you also managed to catch all the background references to Omega that kept popping up one would wonder if they are trying to set up another multi-season world spanning conflict with another ancient enemy of the doctors.

Still now that Rory and Amy are no longer traveling with him constantly and the show is established I wonder if they will get rid of that annoying intro explanation that plays before the opening theme. I understood it the first couple of times but I think it is just leeching time that could be better used on the episodes. Not many shows have or need such devices to keep them accessible and it just seems like a waste!
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Wiccy of the Fraternity »

The season finale only confirmed what I'd already worked out in my head, so it was below average for me. Definitely the weakest of the season finales of the current run (yes, even worse than when the Doctor was rejuvenated by the people of Earth calling for me, as cheesy as that was).

What annoys me most is that they've just shot through about 200 years of the Doctor's life for no good reason.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Jester of the FoS »

Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:This weeks should be interesting and I am looking forward to it, but did they really gloss over all those years of the Doctor's life between 2 episodes?!
Well, we also don't know how long he spent looking for River in the mid-point of the season before the crop circle dragged him back. Could have been a good 50 years there.

His age has always fluctuated. He actually got younger between the 7th and 9th Doctor despite the 7th Doctor being around long enough to get fairly old.

I never liked the 1-year for 1-season progression of Tennant, because it didn't leave much room for expanded stories (novels, audiodramas, comics, flashbacks, etc). And made regenerations of the Doctor extremely short lived. Now there's some wiggle room and we feel like he lived. The 900 years couldn't have solely come from the 1st Doctor.
A G Thing wrote:If you also managed to catch all the background references to Omega that kept popping up one would wonder if they are trying to set up another multi-season world spanning conflict with another ancient enemy of the doctors.
I totally missed those. When and where?
Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:The season finale only confirmed what I'd already worked out in my head, so it was below average for me.
Well, I think every single view knew going in that he wasn't going to die. That was always a given. So the purpose of the episode shifts from being a "what" to a "how". And there were two or three different ways he could have cheated death (flesh double was my bet until we saw the shape-changing man suit run by tiny aliens again).

So instead we got to see what happens when a fixed point in time is altered and have a fun experience with River and the Silence and crazy colliding time. I was worried it would be all tension and build-up to the non-event and instead they made it a ride with said non-event already having happened... or rather not.
Which was the problem as we already knew he wouldn't die. There were no more revelations beyond the foregone "how does he survive??" question. No revelations about River, no twists with her no longer mysterious past.
Wiccy of the Fraternity wrote:Definitely the weakest of the season finales of the current run (yes, even worse than when the Doctor was rejuvenated by the people of Earth calling for me, as cheesy as that was).
I liked that one because I like a good "I've been playing you all along" twist. And this Doctor is good for that.

This one did a decent job of continuing to build the Silence story, which is almost a three-season trilogy of related arcs. The first season teased their existence, this season was all about introducing their key members and motives and having them win, and we'll see where that goes next.

I do think the season suffered for the gap, which meant that there's have to be two big dramatic cliffhangers in the season, and the second just wasn't as impactful as the previous. And six episodes just felt too short, I was just getting into watching Who again when it ended. I also think the episode had a little less tone of massive epic of epicness. Which is fair since we had massive Dalek invasion, followed by Dalek invasion and Cybermen, followed by the Master killing a third of the population, followed by the Daleks almost wiping out everything everwhere, capped by every star exploding at once. There's only so far you can stretch the big finale before you hit a cap of epicness and cannot up the stakes any more. This season finale teased the end of time (again) as well as the much more poignant death of the Doctor, but I think it was a much more deliberate step down on the epic scale so there'd be room for the next year.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

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Jester of the FoS wrote:
A G Thing wrote:
If you also managed to catch all the background references to Omega that kept popping up one would wonder if they are trying to set up another multi-season world spanning conflict with another ancient enemy of the doctors.

I totally missed those. When and where?

Well a lot of the references were based on fan speculation but some of the best evidence seems to center around the two episode weeping angel return and "the lodger" episode. These videos and sites point out the clues better than most that I have found and one claims to have some sort of still image from the next season... Still the symbol appearing is in the episodes of the earlier 5th Doctor seasons so much does lend a lot of weight to the speculation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kjlIGOm ... re=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsEZMdfPEus

http://livingoutmydreams.blogspot.com/2 ... ories.html

Now beyond that hidden in season 6 it is more or less from what I understand in the repeat of "the lodger" tardis and the episode "When a Good Man Goes to War" is all I have found. The speculation has dropped off as I can see about it for the second half of season 6. But with so much reference to god's, faith, what the Doctor fears and cracks in time along with all the other evidence seeded over the Matt Smith run it would be odd to not see him connected somehow!

http://www.denofgeek.com/television/929 ... solve.html
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Jester of the FoS »

A G Thing wrote:
Jester of the FoS wrote:
A G Thing wrote:
If you also managed to catch all the background references to Omega that kept popping up one would wonder if they are trying to set up another multi-season world spanning conflict with another ancient enemy of the doctors.

I totally missed those. When and where?

Well a lot of the references were based on fan speculation but some of the best evidence seems to center around the two episode weeping angel return and "the lodger" episode. These videos and sites point out the clues better than most that I have found and one claims to have some sort of still image from the next season... Still the symbol appearing is in the episodes of the earlier 5th Doctor seasons so much does lend a lot of weight to the speculation.
Ah, so mostly the clerics in the Angels two-parter. Which could be Omega foreshadowing or could be a costume designer being told to make a religious symbol and not realizing the significance.
And the proto-TARDIS that we now know was tied to the Silence.

I'm all for some Omega, and he'd be the best villain for the anniversary storyline but I don't see him tied to the Silence.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by A G Thing »

Jester of the FoS wrote:

Ah, so mostly the clerics in the Angels two-parter. Which could be Omega foreshadowing or could be a costume designer being told to make a religious symbol and not realizing the significance.
And the proto-TARDIS that we now know was tied to the Silence.

I'm all for some Omega, and he'd be the best villain for the anniversary storyline but I don't see him tied to the Silence.
Well to tie the Silence to Omega one needs to look at the fact that they were building a tardis which is primarily a Timelord thing and for which Omega is uniquely qualified to teach them of. Also there is the fact that we don't know who Madame Kovarian was talking to when she is confused as to why she was being subject to the torture and possible death through through her eyedrive! Lastly since the Silence is a religious order that may comprise the race that cannot be remembered, the headless monks and then finally the military called the Church! I think as the are all connected and they are all religions that they are worshiping I think, Omega. Also in the God Complex as it lies dying, the Minotaur tells the Doctor, "An ancient creature drenched in the blood of the innocent, drifting in space through an endless shifting maze. For such a creature, death would be a gift." After the Doctor consoles the Minotaur, it says with its dying breath, "I wasn't talking about myself." But who says it was talking about the Doctor... Where is Omega trapped first?

From the wiki: http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Omega
"Omega had transported through the black hole into another universe made of anti-matter. Omega shaped the universe by force of will and access to the black hole's singularity. He could even create simple life. Radiation destroyed his body. The gauntlets, armour and helmet he had designed to protect him from the corrosive effect of the anti-matter now constituted his physical form. At first he shaped his new world into a paradise. As the centuries rolled by he grew weary and depressed, feeling abandoned by his fellow Time Lords. The landscape slowly transformed into a drab, grey desert. The universe that had become his home was unstable, unable to exist without a powerful will to give it form; he was trapped. (DW: The Three Doctors) "

Then he was supposedly destroyed... He had god like powers in some respects and it was through will that he kept himself alive. I think he could be sort of pretending to be a god like being that is influencing people into doing it's will.

It is a stretch but this could be Omega? The drenched in blood of the innocent thing does draw into question how many innocents Omega has killed but perhaps it is referencing the victims of it's religious orders. But yeah it may not be as well! But the evidence is piling up for him to return and if it is just one colossal red herring then it is one I fell for quite readily! So those are my speculations!
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Jester of the FoS »

A G Thing wrote:Well to tie the Silence to Omega one needs to look at the fact that they were building a tardis which is primarily a Timelord thing and for which Omega is uniquely qualified to teach them of. Also there is the fact that we don't know who Madame Kovarian was talking to when she is confused as to why she was being subject to the torture and possible death through through her eyedrive!
Maybe. But I like the Silence being independent. That's what made them cool. I was guessing Omega after season 5, until someone mentioned to me the whole reason all the Doctor's enemies joined forces to trap him in the Pandorica was to show it was something new, something unknown.
And the Silence certainly are that. A new creepy race and organization. The Doctor's never really opposed an organization or religion before. Trying it to a known commodity, even Omega, cheapens all that a little.
A G Thing wrote:Lastly since the Silence is a religious order that may comprise the race that cannot be remembered, the headless monks and then finally the military called the Church! I think as the are all connected and they are all religions that they are worshiping I think, Omega.
Maybe.
I think the Church in the angels episode was just a throw-away bit. A funny idea that the Catholic Church, in reinventing itself over centuries, becomes an army. And the contrast of having religious figures fight and killing "angels".
I don't see it tying into the Silence much. And the Headless Monks are just a creepy idea, another weird and funky monster.
A G Thing wrote:Also in the God Complex as it lies dying, the Minotaur tells the Doctor, "An ancient creature drenched in the blood of the innocent, drifting in space through an endless shifting maze. For such a creature, death would be a gift." After the Doctor consoles the Minotaur, it says with its dying breath, "I wasn't talking about myself." But who says it was talking about the Doctor... Where is Omega trapped first?
I can't see that. The season was thematically all about the Doctor's death. And while the writers have proved able to slip in key lines that are important that season, it's a bit of a stretch to slip in clues that won't be relevant for two or three seasons. There's too much time in-between, casual viewers will forget and it will have no impact. Even something as obvious as the TARDIS whispering to Rory "the only water in the forest is the river" is only really caught on a second viewing because the intervening three weeks wipes that line from the memory. Now instead of three weeks it becomes three years and the twist falls flat.

I hope we get the return of Omega. He warrants a two-parter and especially the anniversary episode, but I don't think he warrants three seasons of build-up and mystery. He's not that subtle. He doesn't strike me as a behind-the-scenes dude.
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by A G Thing »

Yeah I admit it was a stretch but that symbol and the stuff I and others connected it to well... I just thought I could try and outrace that pesky hyper plot that always sneaks up on you as a fan! :)

I like my surprises but the little ones like River being Amy and Rory's child, or things referencing the Doctors death are obvious so I just keep looking deeper and deeper! I keep trying to get ahead of it!

So yeah, I guess I will have to wait and see... Sighhh.... If only I had a TARDIS! :)
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Re: Doctor Who (It's Spoilerific)

Post by Jester of the FoS »

So Day of the Doctor...

The build up to this episode was very well done. The Night of the Doctor mini-episode blew my mind. The surprise was great.
The actual special was pretty solid. So much going on and small nods to the history of the series and past adventures. It even tied up some loose threads, such as why Queen Elizabeth fired on the Doctor in the Shakespeare episode.
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