skarekrow13 wrote:Ok....rant engage:
Let's start with her soul.....
"Soul of Priscilla the Crossbreed, trapped inside the painted world of Ariamis.
Special beings have special souls. Use the soul of this crossbreed
bastard child and antithesis to all life to acquire a huge amount of
souls, or to create a unique weapon."
The
first think that jumps out is the word "trapped." I don't buy
"imprisoned" since I am sticking to my "drawn in" theory but perhaps the
loss of the doll indicates that she can no longer travel back and
forth. Next words of note are "crossbreed" and "bastard" child. This
suggests that she is not an experiment in the strict sense (test tubes,
Frankenstein rig etc.) but could be an experiment of what happens when
two species mingle. The use of crossbreed reinforces the idea of her
parents being different species. The word "bastard" implies that she
has two parents but they weren't married. The alternative term is
"illegitimate" and most often refers to a child that occurred as the
result of an affair. I hadn't noticed the term "antithesis of all life"
prior to today but it fits nicely with the rest of the discussion.
This could mean a couple of things. The obvious is an existence
dedicated to ending life. Another interpretation could be that she is
contrasted to "intended life" and in this case it reinforces her
"abomination" label.
However, I'll come back to it after discussing her weapons for what I think is a third meaning.
Priscilla's dagger:
"This sword, one of the rare dragon weapons, came from the tail of
Priscilla, the Dragon Crossbreed in the painted world of Ariamis."
"Possessing the power of lifehunt, it dances about when wielded, in a
fashion reminiscent of the white-robed painting guardians."
And her Scythe:
Scythe born from the soul of Priscilla, the stark white crossbreed trapped inside the painted world of Ariamis.
Even the Gods feared Priscilla's lifehunt ability, and in the hands of a mortal, its power will turn upon its wielder.
Both
weapons have similar features and point to the possible real nature of
the word "antithesis." Lifehunt I believe is often mistaken for the
"bleed" effect on the victim. This seems to be confirmed by Priscilla's
Scythe and it's ability to turn on a mortal as it inflicts bleed on us
as well. The dagger contains the power of lifehunt as well, and the
only similarity in effect between the two is bleed damage. I believe
that this is merely the mechanism to show in game what the weapon should
actually do to you. A paradox exists with this weapon and the dagger.
The scythe states that the God's fear the power of Lifehunt, yet the dagger
is armed with occult energy, what the gods supposedly are weak against.
Yet the dagger does not mention gods fearing the power of lifehunt.
What could this mean? The bleed and occult damage are fine and dandy
but lifehunt is a different power. One to be truly feared. Yes, the
bleed damage can destroy an opponent (Asylum, Firesage, etc.) and the
occult can be nice as well. However, the bleed effect is not easily
triggered on the Gods, and the dagger's increase in occult damage isn't
sufficient to outperform "regular" weapons. So what do the gods really
fear......
Losing their soul. Not death. Their
soul......completely obliterated. No rebirth....no passing go to collect
$200.....game over man. This is the true lifehunt ability and the
"antithesis of all life." Not the "ending" of life but the
disintegration of it's core. The scythe provides the best glimpse of
this. It states that the power will turn on a mortal. The bleed kills
us and obviously game mechanics don't allow for permanent Chosen Undead
death or even respawning mob perma death. The scythe only provides a
glimpse into this theory though. The real sinister evidence is in the
dagger. Note in the description of the attack form that the dagger
dances. Not "the user attacks in a dancing manner." The dagger
controls the attacks, not the wielder. A dagger that is living and
possibly sentient and potentially malevolent. This is lifehunt. The
weapon takes control. In your hands it controls the attacks and hunts
for the life (souls) of others. It stands to reason the scythe is the
more powerful weapon, with a higher lifehunt. The control this weapon
exerts on you is obviously not benign. As it seeks to end the lives of
others, it seeks yours as well. It makes sense then that both weapons
require high dexterity to unlock their full potential. It would take a
feat of agility to keep up with a weapon that dances of its own accord.
Federally......You
could be onto something that they're merely responding to a threat in
this world. I only have two pieces of evidence against that and they're
far from flawless. The first of the two pieces is Priscilla herself.
She doesn't attack on sight. If she's confident enough to talk to you
first rather than a sneak attack from the fog gate it stands to reason
she could have the rest stand down. Also, she might be able to
communicate telepathically. I don't believe her lips move while talking,
and I have confirmed that several important NPC's do a talking
animation (Quelana is enchanting to watch speak). So she could ask you
to be peaceful as soon as you step in. It could also be that when you
reach her negotiations are a last resort. The second evidence piece is
the bloated hollow who is hiding and doesn't attack you. His location
is pretty far off the main path so he should have a reaction when you
find him if he was hiding from you. Also, he has a window and appears
to be sorrowful. Is he looking out and weeping at what happened to the
world? Finally with this guy, he drops a pyro spell which I theorized
before could mean that pyro is not native to the world/bloated hollows
as it demonstrates a clear passing of the torch (ha ha get it?) of this
skill. Pyromancy does seem contradictory with the rest of the world.
It could still be though that he thought he had a hell of a hiding spot
and is too terrified to attack you.
Federally wrote:She talks to you because she is merciful. She does
not fear you, she is Priscilla the Half Breed with powers even the gods
fear! She is not threatened by a mere undead, so she decides to give you
the chance to escape her Lifehunt ability, and permanent death based on
your post, by giving you the opportunity to leave peacefully. She
simply has the wisdom to realize the others may have misunderstood your
intentions so she gives you the chance to use the only exit, incase you
were simply trapped and wanted to leave.
Also um I was under the
impression Prisc was Seath's daughter and this was common knowledge.
Did I just get this idea in my head somehow or am I missing something?
It seems to me Seeth (Seath?) procreated, through means unknown, with an
undead or maybe a god during his experiments. Since she has a boss soul
I would think maybe both parents need to have special souls too so a
normal undead or human wouldn't work. Guess I'm just rambling
now.
skarekrow13 wrote:The common theory is she's Seath's and Gwynevere's
daughter. Fed....that makes a lot of sense too. Like I said, I don't
know if I agree but your guess is as good as mine for sure. The
telepathy possibility is really my biggest hang up because you're right.
She shouldn't fear us at all. Until we teach her otherwise. Not that
I've killed her three times or anything. My hang up is that she seems
to plead for the inhabitants of the world and not just herself. If she
can think at us strongly enough across the world I would believe she'd
reason with us before we slaughter everyone. I feel she either thinks
the hostile inhabitants don't have a place either and are refusing to
leave or she's not wholly aware of what's going on. Again, this theory
is a big assumption on my part since it necessitates that she can
communicate with her mind, has the desire to do so, etc. And this post
is really just to continue discussion since we're having a great one at
the moment.
Hellooo, that's not a bad theory and haven't done
anything on the goings on of the Painted World beside Pris, Jeremiah and
Ariamis stuff. I know there's a lot of thought out there resulting
from the Occult ember, Velka stuff etc that I haven't delved into. It
could be that there's a warped Nito element in her. In my theory though
I would differentiate between Nito's power and Lifehunt. Nito has
power of death, which seems like the antithesis of life. However, the
game is built on the concepts of reincarnation and ressurection which
mean that death is actually just a section of life not the opposite.
Nito's good buddies are a good example of this as he brings them back
from the dead, meaning his power is to partially restore life or at
least animus. He does know a few ways to kill (miasma in the opening,
hand to hand, sword dance) but Nito is fairly well linked to death as
rebirth. Priscilla could be too, since my ideas are definitely not fact
but it seems that death and life aren't opposites in this game.
The above is information on Priscilla, her soul, her past and her power. Since that is so well covered I will try to focus more on her motivations and what she has done. Firstly I will examine Priscilla's connections to Seath and the occultists. Seath is virtually the only candidate to be her father. No other dragon is in a position to be it so it is all but confirmed he is her father. Her mother is more contentious, with people split between Gwynevere and Velka. The main evidence for Gwynevere is due to her size. She is the only person big enough to be the mother. However that is only an illusion and it is far more likely, using the statues as evidence Gwynevere was much smaller thus removing her as a candidate. In opposition Velka's size is unknown but she is linked to Priscilla through varipous statues (the evidence is presented elsewhere so I wont try to dig it up). So we now have her parents locked down. Their influence is notable. Seath appears to have driven the gods from anor londo but how? He has his crystal hollows and channelers but they are outside of the city and are unlikely to stand up to the sentinels and knights.
Priscilla on the other hand is within the city, hidden with many occult weapons. She has an army of hollows within the city that could all have been armed with occult weapons courtesy of the blacksmith. At Seath's request she could easily have taken the gods by surprise, attacking from within and driven them away. Her lifehunt power would certainly be enough to scare the gods away rather than face her in combat and risk eternal death.
Now her relation ship with the Exile King (sorry if I steal anything you said Skare). It is likely that like Priscilla he was shunned by the world and forced to flee to the painted world. The position of his corpse suggests he had a close relationship with Priscilla. He spent his last moments with her. It could also be that he attempted to flee the painted world before he died to find a healer. After all Lautrec has a sealer with him, both from Carim, and the sealers are closely associated with Velka. But then there is the fact he does not appear on your way to Prisc but rather in an optional area, one which resembles an execution spot and hides another pyromancy. So rather than Priscilla's protector he appears to be an executioner. The surges certainly would be effective execution techniques to be used on prisoners as they flee their cells. But enough of the pyromancer.
What of Prisilla's powers? Her invisibility is interesting. Even the sorcerors of Oolacile could only bend light around your shape, not turn you completely invisible. Yet even then there are no connections to Oolacile. Except for Seath. Seath is the most likely culprit for Oolacile's destruction. He uses the ruins as a hiding place for many of his valuable items but most importantly he holds Dusk. Dusk was a princess with a crown that boosted the power of sorceries. Using her knowledge with her crown and her ring Seath could have easily bred the magic of Oolacile into his daughter. This could have resulted in her poewr surpassing what normal mortals could do. Ther is also a second theory. The doll says she was "drawn into" the painting. Skare has pointed out Ariamis may have literally drawn her into the painting. So what if this isnt magical invisibility? What if she literally becomes part of the painting for a time? Her footprints do not disprove this, rather they act as proof. The footprints represent her moving while part of the painting. This is a disturbance in its fabric and results in the footprints.
by Federally Sat May 19, 2012 7:57 am
So who's next?! 
