Planescape’s Living Equation- MOIGNO - Dungeons & Dragons [D&D] - Monster of the Week

This week, we take a look at every student's worst nightmare... The Living Equation, The Moigno! Guaranteed to make you regret procrastinating by watching youtube videos instead of studying.
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The 5E conversion of this monster - docs.google.co...
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[@Oooze3424]

I imagine them and grey philosophers get along well.

[@DungeonDad]

Definitely both star members of debate club

[@Weirdoid]

You forgot to include one of the cooler aspects of their lore. Some moigno learn to speak a crude common equivalent using math. It'd be like "moingno greater than you. You are not equal to or integral to pi." But as a math equation. They call death squaring, likely as a victim gets doubled as body and soul. Which sounds closer to division if you ask me.

[@growthisfreedomunitedearth7584]

squaring something raises by 1 power relative to itself, a high dimension by one.

[@creditsunknown7974]

The fact they call it squaring is interesting because, what the fuck do they mean by that? Squaring makes numbers bigger (Except for 1² which just becomes 1) so do they consider that in death a being is mutuplited by itself? Shouldn't it be opposite, shouldn't it be the Root of because when someone dies they become a lesser thing of their parts? Do Moignos know something about the way soul and body works that considers their "separation" something that makes the being bigger and greater, or for them is greater not equal to more powerful, instead in a more literal term? Or whoever wrote Moigno dosent know maths, and fair.

[@ghostinajar9047]

They raise you to a higher power or in other words kill you and let a god decide your fate.

[@rootsnootthnute8598]

Some people speculate to death being a sort of dimensional ascension, and Flatland, a story from the Victorian era, features various beings, focusing specifically on the 2D Flatlanders (Which the Moignos are likely related to in terms of inspiration.) but also touching on the 1D Linelanders, and briefly on the 0D King of Pointland (He's both the land and the only "person" or thing there. It's speculated in this story even that a "soul" becomes a higher dimensional being in the way a point becomes a line becomes a shape becomes an object becomes a hyperobject.

[@DaraelDraconis]

Consider: we can _prove_ that pi is irrational, and thus its decimal representation neither ends nor gets to a point where it starts repeating the same sequence forever. But the modrons may not have told Moigno that. They may have provoked the obsession simply by asking "what is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter? We have only been able to calculate to [X precision]." This sets up a plot hook where a rogue Moigno gets exposed to the proof of irrationality. What would a revelation like that do to a being of pure arithmetic thought? Not just the realisation that it and all its kin had been labouring for ages on something that could never be completed, but that the _stuff they're fundamentally composed of_ has properties they'd never considered? Would they feel betrayed by Primus and his modrons? Or would they be overjoyed that they had whole new vistas of mathematics to explore? Or would they go entirely and infectiously mad from the revelation and turn into a kind of zombie-Moigno plague, sweeping through Mechanus and completely changing the goals and priorities of every Moigno it touched?

[@faceoctopus4571]

Now I'm thinking of how they would handle learning godel's incomplete theorem. Also while Pi is irrational, it can be in integrals or infinite series that only have rational numbers (and infinity as always the case with integration and infinite series). For example Srinivasa Ramanujan's equation.

[@chaddixon9764]

I can easily see these as attendants for Spellweavers.

[@DungeonDad]

Chad Dixon Yuuuuuuuuuup

[@Grave_of_the_Sea]

Chad

[@blackgriffinxx]

The math teachers: you are going to need this in life Students: LOL when are we going to need this for life. 10 years later. Enter the MOIGNO student: got dang it

[@torazely]

"So you've solved pi? Have you heard of the square root of negative one?"

[@tjrohie]

I actually love the idea that they solved pi and the party has to give them a new equation like the Collatz Conjecture

[@HerbDurgin]

I’m now imagining a powerful psionicist sacrificing himself to block the Advanced Moigno: Fermat, and his Last Theorem

[@pedrobmf262]

That’s exactly the problem I was thinking as a solution to these guys!

[@Mountain8ear]

This thing is a living SCP memetic cognito hazard. It would be awesome to get some SCPs as 5e D&D monsters. That would be amazing.

[@gimo6881]

I gonna say the same

[@streetcone303]

I was actually just thinking exactly that. Get out of my head. An SCP 507 or 5000 quest line could be a fun idea for a crossover.

[@streetcone303]

I was actually just thinking exactly that. Get out of my head. An SCP 507 or 5000 quest line could be a fun idea for a crossover.

[@streetcone303]

I was just thinking that. Scp 507 or 5000 would make for fun quest lines. I could totally see Dr. Bright being the villain in a quest line; along with "Travelling to any 'Forgotten Realms,'" being added to the List of stuff Dr. Bright is not permitted to do

[@bookwyrmbaneoftheplothole8500]

This is absolutely perfect, I have a homebrew warlock patron called the Unifying Equation in my game which is essentially an ascended deity-like Moigno akin to a more abstract “The Force” like being, maybe figuring out the value of Pi tells you the true name of the Unifying Equation. I’m totally using them for allies of these warlocks

[@DungeonDad]

That’s super cool! Mathematical even. What a fun idea for a patron!

[@TheIdealofGreed]

Did you put it up somewhere?

[@bookwyrmbaneoftheplothole8500]

@@TheIdealofGreed It was on HomebrewBinder for a while but the formatting broke a while back so here it is in plaintext, hope you enjoy it if you use it! The Unifying Equation
Associated Concepts: (Mathematics, Geometry, Logic, Precision, Simulation) You have stumbled across the secret of a universal constant that lies at the core of all of creation. Through your research and search for truth, you have tapped into the ultimate culmination of all principles of mathematics and logic in the universe, a numeric formula with such complexity that it exhibits a form of artificial sentience completely alien to physical organic life, or perhaps itself is simply the manifestation of a higher intelligence acting upon and within the multiverse. By aligning your mind and will with the absolute logical and geometric order of the Unifying Equation, you have learned to see the world as it really is, unimpeded by imperfections in your own perceptions and thoughts. Its motives are foreign and difficult for mortals to process, but one thing is for certain; no matter the seeming disorder of things, they are all inevitably submitted in the end to the incomprehensible will of the Equation. It’s not a boast or a threat, it’s just the way things are. Expanded Spell List: ~1st - identify, magic missile ~2nd - find traps, see invisibility ~3rd - conjure barrage, glyph of warding ~4th - locate creature, freedom of movement ~5th - teleportation circle, conjure volley

[@bookwyrmbaneoftheplothole8500]

Features: ~Level 1: Pattern Cognition At 1st level, your senses and mind are opened to the repeating mathematical patterns and probabilities inherent to the universe. Whenever a hostile creature makes an attack roll that deals damage to a friendly creature within 100 feet of you, you can use your reaction to record the result. If you make an attack roll that is of the same range and type, you can choose to use the recorded result in place of your roll. You can only have one result recorded at a time. Once you use a result, it is lost and a new one must be recorded. ~Level 6: Acute Counter-Strike At 6th level, the geometric order of your patron flows through you to fend off attackers that would interrupt your research. When you are attacked by a creature that you can see, you can use your reaction to create an area of warped space and razor-sharp angles around you immediately before the attack roll is resolved. The creature must make a Dexterity saving throw with a DC equal to your warlock spell save DC. If they fail, they take force damage equal to twice your warlock level plus your Charisma modifier and are thrust 10 feet directly away from you. On a successful save, they take half as much damage and are not moved. If the movement would cause them to no longer be able to attack you, or if they are reduced to 0 hit points, their attack misses. Once you use this feature, you can't do so again until you finish a short or long rest. ~Level 10: Precision Reflexes At 10th level, your reaction times are enhanced by the power of the Equation. You gain advantage on Dexterity saving throws, and become proficient in the perception skill. ~Level 14: Eye of the Mathematician At 14th level, you gain the ability to see the underlying mathematical order of the world around you. As a bonus action, you may channel your patron’s power to gain one of the following effects. The number of times you use this feature is equal to your Charisma modifier, and you regain these uses upon completing a long rest. Pinpoint Weakness: Chose a creature you can see. Until the beginning of your next turn, the next successful attack you make against this creature is automatically considered a critical hit. Pierce Illusion: You are affected as if by the true seeing spell for 1 minute. Calculate Ricochet: When you make a ranged weapon attack this turn, you can treat half cover as no cover, and three quarters cover as half cover.

[@bookwyrmbaneoftheplothole8500]

Eldritch Invocations: ~Omega Blast Prerequisite: Eldritch Blast Beams created by your eldritch blast attacks can turn corners. When attacking a creature with eldritch blast, that creature must make a Dexterity saving throw. On a failed save, your attack ignores half cover and any AC bonus given by shields. ~Binary Targeting Prerequisite: Pact of the Chain If you have a Moigno as your familiar, it gains additional hit points equal to you warlock level, and you and your familiar gain the ability to cast the true strike cantrip, sharing the effects of the spell with each-other when cast. ~Vector Dirk Prerequisite: Pact of the Blade You can create a dagger with a nearly 2-dimensional triangular blade using your Pact of the Blade feature. This weapon deals 1d8 slashing damage, ignores resistance to slashing damage, and treats immunity to slashing damage as resistance. ~Vector Broadheads Prerequisite: Pact of the Blade You can create a shortbow that fires arrows with triangular, nearly 2-dimensional tips using your Pact of the Blade feature. This weapon ignores resistance to piercing damage, and treats immunity to piercing damage as resistance. You may use your bonus action to summon an additional 20 ammunition. ~Formulae of Algebraic Awareness Prerequisite: Pact of the Tome You gain the ability to cast the arcane eye spell as a ritual, and its casting time is increased to ten minutes. You have advantage on concentration checks to maintain this spell. ~Fractal Burst Prerequisite: 5th level You can cast hypnotic pattern once without expending a spell slot. You regain the ability to do so when you finish a long rest.

[@tsifj]

Nice concept! Looks to me like one of the most versatile monsters, you can spawn it everywhere there is high magic.

[@DungeonDad]

Absolutely! Thanks for watching 😁

[@agentchaos9332]

Intelligence 28...I guess that makes sense for a living equation. I'm trying to think of the roleplay implications for a being with god-like intelligence(bahumut is 25, and the highest intelligence score in 5e is 26) beholders are supposed to be super geniuses with elaborate strategies and contingencies for everything, to the point that a party realistically would never outmaneuver one. This thing is 10 points higher then a beholder and would make one look stupid. I don't even..thats borderline omniscience.

[@lanterns_glow]

Death By Arithmetic, imagine being killed that way. It's silly, but Math is dangerous

[@Vender02]

I imagine an encounter with a large Moigno like the fight with Mother Brain in the first Metroid game. The Moigno in the center of the chamber inside a crystal shield controlling weapons around the room or even the floor as an area effect.

[@GringatTheRepugnant]

You actually did it you absolute madman

[@randallbaumgardt3424]

I would put a bunch of them in an ancient wizard or liches vault as wandering monsters. Then whenever one is destroyed it would leave an atomic shadow imprint on the wall roof or floor that has a clue or part of a combination to open the final safe or treasure hold.

[@KebaRPG]

Solve for Quantum Mechanics and String Theory and M-Theory; basically find the Grand Universal Equation that Describes the Essence of Existence.

[@mrzeloswilder]

This is so amazing. I adore it. A 2d equation that has become obsessed with pi. That I just love.

[@DungeonDad]

Thanks for watching! I love these guys too, they're just so much fun.

[@Mad_Oph]

Great work as always. These guys are fascinating and super unique. What do you think about the balance of giving their consolidate ability the option of attempting to absorb hostile beings like the Palimpsest, allowing them to not only gain hitpoints but perhaps steal a portion of the victim's intelligence to bolster their own intelligence/powers?

[@blackgriffinxx]

I guest they got the name from this guy in the real world François-Napoléon-Marie Moigno

[@DungeonDad]

blackgriffinxx that is a fun fact!

[@creditsunknown7974]

Put a bunch of these dudes inside a metal slate and combine it with a few sticks and boom, you have a computer

[@hunterfowler8322]

I want my next character to be an orphan whose entire orphanage got turned into a "troupe" of gray jesters by an older one, they went on a spree and eventually he watched most of them die in a battle with templars or something, the "original" jester gets killed a few moments before my OC dies but after his best friend does. His last name would be the name of the orphanage, and the area around the orphanage would recognize the name if the party ended up going there.

[@zacharygadzinski3147]

It would be cool to see something about the Ondonti, the cousin of the orc. It has potential as both an enemy and as a PC.

[@brandonwalker272]

I have a new respect for those little modrons that is evil but effective.

[@Exxeron-ob3tv]

"It is merely logical, Jim." - some pointy eared (possibly elven?) guy.

[@hannahbanana3165]

This thing pairs so well with the grey philosopher!

[@kenshidinyas]

Tweak them a bit and individual moingo could be derived from powerful equations or even spells. Like a wish moingo, or the anti life equation moingo. Or the unified theory moingo.

[@marshallsonsteby3862]

Would love to see your take on the Lumi!

[@dalrostsd]

Sounds like you need to do the Grey philosopher and the Malice from BECMI next.

[@TheMightyBattleSquid]

Once I waaaas the king of [Mechanus] Now I study humble piiiiii~

[@jeroenvanwees3250]

Happy Pi-day! Was it coincidence i saw this video on Pi-day, or was it part of the greater cosmic equation? Yes!

[@onieli]

They seem like they would love to propagate in the Unseen Univerity from Terry Pratchett's novels

[@armandbenincasa7068]

BBEG: A Gray Philosopher that generates MOIGNO instead.

[@HeadHunter-mv2ht]

Well at least now i know what could live in the demiplane of numbers

[@lennyfiasco9834]

I wonder how far my party could get into a campaign where moignos have solved pi and now know everything and are gathering from across the planes to merge with a massive moigno who will destroy the universe before new information can form before everyone realizes that’s it’s just the brain episode of Futurama.

[@patrickwilkerson1728]

Hehe mathematicians have proven the Pi is a irrational number and no solution can be found, so the Moigno have not figured that out it.

[@rogerwilco2]

Perfect for my next adventure.

[@ivanivan744]

Oh no, the greatest threat to the universe...MATH!

[@TheMightyBattleSquid]

Okay big brain plot time: A Gray Philosopher and their living equations eventually solve the problem that bothered to former so much in life that it gave them their undead pursuit. Just as the philosopher is about to ascend, a time elemental or time dragon of significant power takes in some of that energy from the ascension, then goes back in time to some moments before the event to do it all again. The party eventually gets tangled up in this because of the havoc it's causing in the surrounding area. So now they have to beat the time elemental/dragon before the next ascension so that they still have ample room to prevent that as well.

[@Fromaginator]

The quest for delicious pi

[@ceresthestarspinner4609]

A massive Moigno with a cult and is able to make pacts. It’d be called Pact of The Equation.

[@Funxboxrox27]

I can see one of these things as a wildly accomplished professor at Quandrix from Strixhaven, perhaps they are the only member of their kind thus far who has finally realized what Pi amounts to.

[@jondw]

imagine some player casts a spell that disrupts a train of thought(I don't know if one but I'm sure there is one) on one and makes it lose its place in calculating pi. just send this early 3-d videogame sprite looking thing into a rage state

[@dracorex426]

We actually know for an absolute fact that there is no end to pi.

[@ACDBunnie]

Um, actually, it's not Moigno. It's Moigno's monster.

[@FoxBatinaHat]

Basically... A.I magical equivalency

[@krimsonentertainment4717]

Nice Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy reference ya got in there.

[@pedrobmf262]

I think if I use these they’d be like living versions of the Mandelbrot Set, which is this almost infinite and incredibly complex geometric fractal sequence that starts off simple but ballons in complexity.

[@MrGreensweightHist]

The problem with pi is that it has never been intended as anything more than an estimate. that is why it can never have an absolute value.

[@clarkkent163000]

A floating Fibonacci sequence would be a cool visual

[@gabef9538]

If you make it undead would it be MissingNo.

[@mortalitydoesstuff8965]

How to defeat this creature: use Wish to completely rewrite the value of pi

[@Unhingedcheese]

Throw them at an elder brain/mind flayer hive and watch the world burn. Creatures conseptualy about brains, and creatures that overload brains for fun.

[@gmanbo]

As an image. My brain immediately goes to gyroscope. Then numbers wrap ever single part of it. Could have a shell of blinking symbols in roes going around in orbits. For instance longitude and latitude. I get that every one can have there own image. But I though I would share as that image isn't really helpful.

[@Asteri_agalriarept]

Imagine introducing them to the concept of imaginary numbers

[@josephmay852]

So they grow and grow until they reach a certain size and then split? Nerd oozes

[@Mekcstriker]

Eyo what's that music at the start. For the life of me I feel like I've heard it but can't remember

[@עומרשרייבר-ל4ר]

I always knew math was bad for us.

[@Mr_Maiq_The_Liar]

If they solve pie just tell them about e

[@mikeymccann3074]

Great saiyn man

[@TrabberShir]

I hate the Pi thing, such a smart creature would recognize that the precise value of Pi is Pi. There are so many truly incomprehensible problems that could have been used instead, like construction of a notation which can express any number in finite time/space. It is a related problem, but much more mind bendy because you cannot do it without introducing infinities in a couple of places where they don't really make sense.

[@theoriginalmess]

Oh god, it's the living meme. Please mindwipe me now!

[@nicolaezenoaga9756]

Thanks

[@loganfrandrup6590]

so these are basicaly like Pokemon Unknown? Only way more distructive lol

[@vullshtem0vi0lence84]

Thats basically fighting chatGPT

[@floppa2154]

не очень понятно , как вплести этого монстра в Приключение ... и вообще как с ним взаимодействовать группе 0_0

[@thekaiser3815]

What book is the Creature from?

[@tysondennis1016]

So basically it's a tulpa

[@jameshuffman7676]

It's french, so should be pronounced more like "moin'yo"

[@Dark_and_Light_OC]

The...bottled armada?

[@SirEnd3r]

They solved pi through e at them

[@markstevenson2492]

I dont like the pi bit...for a super intelligent equation it turns them all into a bunch of mathematical hacks, like retired engineers sometimes do in the real world. I think it would be better to give them real unsolved issues like what is the true geometry the planes, where does the lady of pain draw her power from or dnd equivalents of Fermats last theorem. Int 28 doesnt care about an infinite number sequence in my mind...

[@onisinn1]

🔥🖤🔥

[@Rathmun]

6:53 "Cause there's literally more mass coming together." I think you meant "Cause there's literally more math coming together." Shame on you Dungeon Dad, missing the dad joke there. Also, Pi is provably transcendental. It's not a case of "as far as we know." it's "We know for certain it is."

[@dboot8886]

... Dear God what if it divides by zero?

[@-TheCoolerest-]

42 42 42 42 42 Est..