Thread 96296273

Where's the joke, Fucklew?

>>96296273 (OP)
Upscale.
I'm not the usual upscaling anon, I'm original upscaling anon, who was upscaling but stopped long time before current upscaling anon appeared. TL;DR upscaling things.

>>96296273 (OP)
And the Thog.

>!
>bonk!

>>96296327
The joke is that people still pay him to pump out this trash.

>>96296327
I think the joke is weak because it's foreshadowing in disguise
she's going to hear Roy party's telepathic comms

>>96296639
>over 4k paypigs
Does he at least not charge for months without updates?

>>96296327
The joke is that the stool squealed.
For a "stool" (informant, narc) to "squeal" (talk) is old timey gangster movie slang.

I feel like this is a level of ditz we haven't seen from Sabine before. Like a person forgetting that they can smell, or see the color blue.

>>96297743
People forget languages all the time if they don't use them. If she's not in the habit of using certain racial features they'll get rusty.

>>96296273 (OP)
This is not funny.

>>96296327
Honestly, it's fine. Burlew's rule of ending each strip on a joke has resulted in many that are forced and unfunny

>>96297216
I doubt it.

>>96296600
got me

>>96296273 (OP)
This is good. Not like, belly laugh, but like... nice. Well done.

>>96296327
The joke is that 3e is a bloated mess.

We will still be in this dungeon in 2030.

>>96298597
You like references huh?
What if I were to tell you the cake is a lie?

>>96298020
>Burlew's rule of ending each strip on a joke has resulted in many that are forced and unfunny
This isn't a Burlew- specific rule. It's a rule of classic gag-a-day newspaper strips that "you need to end on a punchline." Because webcomics are rather close to newspaper comics in spirit, that's what many webcomic artists, Rich included, will do. This worked better in the first arc where it was mostly archetypal idiots running through a dungeon, but with longer, more involved, and more serious stories the newspaper format doesn't work as well. A graphic novel format would serve the stories Rich is trying to tell much better but his livelihood is newspaper comics, basically. So that's what he's going to do.

>>96296347
fyi the --tta argument can help reduce the waifu artifacting in the grey title text

-newish upscale anon, who was never terribly prompt with it anyway

>>96300025
>the --tta argument can help reduce the waifu artifacting in the grey title text
Didn't do anything, but changing model to UpPhoto actually helped quite a lot.

Alright, fuck it, I got a fuckton of time and nothing to do. I just gotta click on "First Strip" and then follow the right arrow right?

>>96300240
Yes. There's some paywalled side stories but they're all just background info for the characters in the web strips.

>>96296639
>22 years
>only 1331 pages
Calling that "pumping out" would be generous

>>96300240
>>96300296
you can easily find (pirate) the xykon, o-chul and belkar backstories, idk about the rest
xykon and o-chul's are generally considereded high quality writing (for OOTS) so I'd recommend reading them. can't say -when-, i read them after reaching page 1k+ on OOTS and it was enjoyable, maybe for some people reading them before the main story would fit better, its like some star wars watch order crap

so where does the theseus-ship-linear-guild-subcontracted-by-IFCC go from here
we know where OOTS is and is headed
we know where xykon is, what the ending of their current course is, and the few routes they'll have to choose when they reach that fork
but what the FUCK is demonale going? going back and exploring the traps to see the actual gauntlet puts then on route to meet xykon, sabine actually squeezing info from the mimic puts them in route to meet OOTS but they simply won't have the info or might/skill to follow/catchup trollhalflingrandma through the final dungeons, i doubt they're goinna split up, so what now?
the dungeon being made of dungeonmasterium that acts as a lead sheet for all forms of magic really sets things into a hallway choice and i can't tell what rich is setting up here

>>96300338
taking the average from the entire run, yeah
but frequency has varied a lot,theres been (consecutive) weeks with >1 comic and months with 0 or 1 comic. considering the arthritis episode + IRL job, its not quite the usual patreon milking shenanigans

>>96300435
A recurring theme in the comic is that you can never trust a shell game, gods never tell the whole truth, and that good triumphs in the end but "the end" is a moving target.

All this points to "the last gate" being neither of those things.

>>96300347
the earliest reference to Start of Darkness that I can think of is strip 701
the most correct way would probably be to go by publication date

>>96300599
...the final gate is akshually elsewhere? theres more gates, that somehow not even gods can see? the final gate is unique/different inherently?
all i got is that we saw an ocean and a planet through the rifts, i still don't see where thats going either. well, it could easily be "snarl colletcts/absorbs realities instead of unraveling them like the gods thingk" but thats just too easy, rich has had way too much to think ahead with the average pace

>>96298597
>this (final, epic-built, world-ending, etc) dungeon isn't a plain hallway!
>what looks like a house has no one here RIGHT NOW what the hell!
Surprisingly mundane things for nale to be complaining about considering the scale of his involvement, he knows about the snarl for fucks sake.

Wouldn't it be funny if the Troublesome Trio ends up chugging some amnesia juice? Or at least some of them? Like Thog, who is just stupid enough to drink a random potion.
I also think that Nale+Sabine will end up being banished to the Snarl World. Elan can't get his happy end with his brother getting tortured in whatever hell or getting unmade but he also can't just have Nale run amok, so sending him to live life eternal with Sabine onto a world all to themselves but also devoid of innocent bystanders to harm, sounds like an acceptable compromise.

>>96300717
He's right to be extremely confused. The dungeon doesn't make sense, especially from the way he approached it, because the whole thing is built on layers of deception. They went into it in a way that skipped their ability to encounter anyone, and they don't know any tricks to go forward.

The whole thing is meant to prevent anyone from actually getting to the end by a number of means, and he doesn't know what any of them are yet.

>>96300599
>gods never tell the whole truth
Thor came clean to Durkon directly though. Feels like it would be extremely pointless and petty to just lie at this point to basically your living avatar, especially for a good god.
The gods clearly don't know what is really going on with the rifts either.

>>96296347
Why even bother upscaling this? it feels weird to use AI for this.

>>96296600
Dub dubs has it perfectly

>>96297743
Players forget abilities all the time and what she said is true, when you're at the far end of a campaign with dozens of abilities and gizmos you will

>>96299935
It's a good choice
Schlock Mercenary stopped being funny when Howard stopped the quip a day and throwaway joke formats. It was only readable when the whole book had finished and you could run through the whole thing and get the arc. This began happening as early as the Zoojack mission.

>>96300692
>"snarl colletcts/absorbs realities instead of unraveling them like the gods thingk" but thats just too easy
it was also just too easy to make the
>gobbos dindu muffin dey just want a place for future doctors and engineers to live peacefully
retcon, yet here we are

calling it now, this IS the endgame:
>Snarl is just another god
>other gods were being mean and oppressive to it, knowingly or not
>Snarl created a world and was just trying to defend itself when it killed everyone else
>gods gain 2 new colours
>everyone kumbayas and live happily ever after
>Azurites are forgotten

>>96302845
every Schlock Mercenary page had a punchline, up until the very end
not all are jokes, but the same is true of oots
Schlock Mercenary went to the shitter when it started preaching morality
so, you know, it's the same old tune

The last gate was sealed from the other end, in the Snarl's world. That's why Serini calls her dungeon "backstage". The monster in the darkness is a Greek God that fell out of the snarl after countless Aeons - why this happened, I'm not sure, but it might be related to whatever went down with the order of the scribble. The finale will involve the four original pantheons plus the dark one teaming up to unravel the snarl altogether and create countless new worlds. Screenshot this if you don't believe me

>>96303284
They were punchlines but not jokes
I think it was way more fun when even the numerous HOLYSHITWTF moments were laughed at
Losing that and taking itself more seriously was the beginning of the long end

Alright, so, I'm slowly making my way through OOTS. I'm up to the Azure City Siege. It's been pretty fun, though Nale is a lot more of a saturday morning villain than I expected from these last pages that got me into it.

Anyone else can't help but picture Xykon as sounding like the Monarch from Venture Bros?

>>96298617
For ADHD there is medication, just FYI

>>96304877
>Spoiler
I didn't exactly but I can picture it

>>96304877
In regards to spoiler, I imagined Skeletor. Unimaginative, I know, but the sarcastic bantering of the OG Skeletor is just too perfect.

>>96305594
Xykon is way too "Self-aware" to have it the skeletor voice. Monarch is the one who's got more of that type of humor. You can't picture Skeletor doing the OOTS-style "Obligatory deadpan comment" that basically every single plage of OOTS has.

We posting voice head canons? I know people like to picture Belkar with a deeper voice but I always imagined him as kind of boyish and slightly nasally. Almost a little bratty to match his petty asshole persona.

>>96305609
Politely disagree on that. Skeletor was a pretty on the ball kind of character, he just seemed dumb because he spent most of his time screaming at his minions. And that was because he was basically the one villain with normal intelligence on a crew filled with brain-addled cartoon villains.

>>96305789
Monarch just feels his general "Vibe" more, I guess.

For Xykon it's something like Katz, but without the drawl and older sounding.

>>96304877
>>96305609
Interestingly, Start of Darkness does tell us a bit about Xykon's voice. Since he doesn't have vocal cords anymore, his voice is now produced magically, and it inherently has a little bit of reverb to it. He also seems to think that if he consciously pitches his voice down, that he sounds like James Earl Jones.

>>96305936
Kinda. Monarch's whole thing is that despite his professionalism, he's basically an overgrown teenager who hasn't grown out of his asshole phase, so his nasally voice repeatedly oscillates between appropriately menacing and whiny depending on his mood.

Though I could imagine him talking like The Monarch if he was well and truly fed up with Red Cloak's shit and reminding him who's in charge again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20v5JqcubXE

>Skeletor
I imagine him as one of the other ones, maybe the fear one

later on when Xyke gets his moment(s) of awesome, I think of him as a cross between, I dunno, maybe Ryan Gosling and Megatron

>>96304877
>Nale is a lot more of a saturday morning villain than I expected from these last pages that got me into it
the overall tone shifts considerably after Azure City

>>96306067
>Monarch's whole thing is that despite his professionalism, he's basically an overgrown teenager who hasn't grown out of his asshole phase,
So...Xykon?

>>96306174
Nah, Xykon's more of a burnout than a teenager. Teenagers are insanely passionate and narcissistic because their brains are being rewired. Teenagers care too much about stupid shit, much like The Monarch cares too much about "doing it right" when it comes to arching Venture. Xykon's thing is that he generally doesn't care about anything unless it momentarily amuses him or pisses him off. He lets a lot of really stupid shit that his minions pull slide unless it personally inconveniences him that The Monarch would have whined or thrown a tantrum about.

>>96306174
NTA but no
when Xykon acts the ditz he's like Richard Branson or Elon Musk; clowning around because he knows he can

a
>teenager who hasn't grown out of his asshole phase
unironically thinks he's acting cool / approporiately

>>96306209
I don't know, your motivation being that you don't want anybody to be able to tell you what to do seems pretty teenagery to me.

>>96306226
I'll put it this way then
If the Monarch came across Henchman 21 and 24 in an intense debate about who'd win in a death match between Christopher Reeve and Stephen Hawking, he'd throw a fit and threaten to dart them both if they didn't get back to work
If Xykon came across two goblins getting into a debate over whether Strahd or Lord Soth would win in a boxing match without their spells, he'd either ignore them or Redcloak would be pissed to see him arguing Vecna would kick both their asses with one boney arm tied behind his back

>>96306226
>your motivation being that you don't want anybody to be able to tell you what to do seems pretty teenagery
you have no idea how many small-business owners that describes

>>96306287
Monarch pretty much started arguing himself when he became 21's bud, but I do get your point.

>>96304877
>Spoiler
I imagine every hammy skeleton villain to sound like Skeletor

>>96306425
It's a law, skeletons either sound like Skeletor or Papyrus.

>>96306581
Papyrus doesn't have a voice, he speaks in beeps

I think we can agree on most skeletons sound nasally, so by extension Xykon has a nasally voice.

>>96307256
they don't have noses how the fuck can they sound nasally

>>96306226
Xykon's primary motive is to stave off boredom and amuse himself, typically by watching someone suffer. His refusal to submit to any other authority is secondary, and it's more due to pride than immaturity. Even then, he never lets his pride blind him - Xykon's M.O. is to fuck around, and then instantly get serious whenever there's a real threat

>>96307256
like other anon mentioned, Xykon canonically sounds almost exactly like James Earl Jones

>>96303889
The monster in the dark is,an actual monster/creature. In the prequel some hunters recognized the species (but didn't reveal it to the reader) and that it was a juvenile.

>>96307317
Greek Gods routinely took the shape of other creatures so I don't consider that conclusive. Moreover, Rich never explicitly stated that MITD was a D&D monster, just that it was "something someone else made up".

>>96307323
And which Greek god is the MitD supposed to be? Don't you dare claime the MitD also suffers amnesia.

>>96307353
I'm not invested in any particular God, but most likely it would be Dionysos, as he's the God of both madness and festivities. The former would help account for his mental state, (alongside being deprived of worship for Aeons) and as for the latter, it's well established that MITD likes parties

Continuing to make my way through OOTS

Should I feel proud for thinking "Lol she gon die" the literal moment I saw Therkla? Evil women turned good by love who are secondary love interests ALWAYS die. Like LITERALLY always, they end up sacrificing themselves to save their "hero paramour".

>>96307442
Moderately impressive, it was one of the first deaths that was played for any degree of pathos or shock value. Early OotS was very much playing with the boundaries of meta-humor, humor, and genuine storytelling while searching for its groove.

>>96307551
Wasn't it ridiculously obvious though? Like I said, "Love Interests" like her ALWAYS die. They need to die because at that point they've sacrificed so much for the hero that just going "Yeah, sure" and going her own way would feel weird and anticlimactic. And obviously, Elan wasn't just gonna drop Haley for her. The only options left are "Death" or "Girl just kinda stands in the side like a cuck while the man she likes is with someone else".

Well, there is the "Harem" ending but that's locked behind being a Japanese manga author.

>>96307611
Bear in mind that arc was in 2007, most people read it when they were like 14. "Media literacy" gets meme'd on but it's easy to still line yourself up for saturday-morning-cartoon-tier plot beats without really thinking about it at that age.

>>96307633
I'm pretty sure I would have guessed that kind of plot beat when I was 14, but then again, not everyone is a no-life nerd like me. The thing about plot beats is that unless you're either extremely ballsy or willing to ruin your own story, you WILL have to follow them. It's just a logical conclusion, like i said with Therkla. The only real options were Death, Cuckquean, or Bigamy, and this being a western webcomic, It's pretty obvious what it was gonna be.

Okay...made some more progress, and.
>Both of Varsuvius's kids are dark skinned when both V and the mate are light skinned

>>96307970
V is constantly away from home. Might as well be a literal reference to children not being his, since V cannot even be bothered with marital duties.

>>96308013
I don't think it'd be spoiling you to mention that V's kids are explicitly adopted. That should have been mentioned already by the strip you're at

>>96308013
Okay but as far as I've read V's relationship is "Good" isn't it? And I imagine that for Elves, going away for as long as a decade would be pretty much nothing. Like a parent going away for work for a month or two.

>>96308034
...That makes more sense, I guess.

>>96308034
Oh. It's been years since I've read those particular strips. I forgot.

>>96308046
It gets addressed way later in the comic, so I won't say more than that V struggles at taking other people's viewpoints into account in general, and that extends to their marriage

>>96307245
The Undertale the Musical voices are the canon voices as far as I'm concerned.

>>96307315
He's specifically a higher pitched Darth Vader.
At least if you're taking Xykon's word for it, it's actually kind of hard to tell how you sound to others without actually listening to a recording of yourself so he could just be doing a really bad impression and not realizing how off it is.

>>96307442
It wasn't that shocking but being a week to week reader when the story was happening I half expected Rich to subvert the obvious outcome in some way. In hindsight it's kind of surprising that Rich just played it straight, which is probably part of the reason why I barely remember the character outside of people bringing her up on rare occasion.
Honestly though I kind of feel like that whole stretch of comic you're currently on has kind of just faded from my mind, outside of a few really big stand out moments and a really major fight that features Xykon's best monologue in the comic's run so far. Those things aside the whole stretch of comic feels weirdly like filler up until Roy finally gets brought back.

>>96304922
Rich comment to make in a thread where 90% of the comments are going to be zoomers screaming WORDS WORDS WORDS I DON'T WANT TO READ BREVITY IS WIT

>>96307611
it was obvious, but the question was how to pull it off well
I think they did alright
plus a lot of people enjoy the will-they-won't-they

>>96308568
I find those ridiculous too, but Thogs are fun anyway.

>>96308568
Thogs are a ludicrous way of pointing out the comic is far too slow and packed with too much filler

>>96308568
For what it's worth, I don't hate OOTS at all, but I'm also not very mature, and Rich's writing style practically hands out material for comic remixers on a silver platter

>>96310528
Thogs are just editing a comic for some laughs, Rich.
It's not a personal attack against your work or you as the artist.

>>96311552
it bloody well ought to be

>>96310528
Thogs are literally just youtube poops of a webcomic, you're reading way too much into them.

>>96311552
Why did you capitalize the R like you're addresing Rich? The comment above that uses the word Rich is using it as a descriptor, and is only capitalized because it's at the beginning of a sentence.

>>96311910
>The comment above that uses the word Rich
I wasn't replying to that comment, check again.
>Why did you capitalize the R like you're addressing Rich?
Are you on the spectrum?

>>96310514
>>96310528
>>96310615
Oh, no, Thogs are based, don't get me wrong. It's the driveby "comics are meant to be looked at not read" posts that I take issue with. Thogs are classic effortpost OC and to be lauded.

>>96312177
>makes a schizo post pretending to be speaking to Rich
>accuses others of being on the spectrum when others point out it's forced and awkward
pottery
also, your next move is accusing of samefaggotry

>>96312941
Retard, I was replying to a post bitching about thogs, so I addressed it as "Rich", as in "you must be Rich Burlew to be so butthurt about edits of the comic".

So, speaking of the actual comic at hand, how far do you think Nale will make it before he jobs pathetically yet again? Has he ever scored a single *real* victory?

>>96313023
He did take down Malack. Though he corked it soon after, so I guess the only way he really wins is if he eats a massive loss soon after as compensation.

>>96313023
He's learned the meaning of friendship and the power of teamwork. He's headed for a heroic sacrifice to save Elan in the 11th inning of the final battle, count on it.

>>96313056
I mean, he'll die, sure, but will it be normal death where he gets sent back to hell and spends eternity with his succubus gf or DEATH where he gets fuckin' soul erased or some shit?

>>96312968
>you must be Rich Burlew to be so butthurt about edits of the comic
which was particularly stupid of you, considering the post you replied to was criticising the comic

>>96313088
I'd say there's good odds of it being Snarl-related and the payoff is realizing he's frolicking with Kraagor at the big end credits roundup.

>>96313023
all things considered, Nale is the least bad guy of the current bad guys, other than the beastmaster ogre bitch whose name I can't bother to remember, so I'm guessing he gets to live and apprentice with Juan or strike out on his own or some crazy shit like that, the kind of fate for lovable rogues who don't stop their life of petty crime at the end of the movie

>>96313135
>so I'm guessing he gets to live and apprentice with Juan or strike out on his own or some crazy shit like that
After he died and became a demon? Not anymore. If you were to be 'metanarrative' about it his best bet is really to just get the 'Villain couple who actually likes each other' ending where he just fucks off to hang out in hell with Sabine.

>>96313154
>'Villain couple who actually likes each other' ending where he just fucks off to hang out in hell with Sabine.
i did consider that, and it's still a distinct possibility
i personally don't see Lord of Hell as his choice of happy ever after though

>After he died and became a demon? Not anymore
the way the story is going, if they win and defeat the bad guys, that's not going to be an issue
say for example either the underworld gets a change in management, or the gods do a deal (maybe as a favour to Elan, or in recognition to Nale for services rendered), they can resurrect him easily with zero baggage from current events

>>96313201
>i personally don't see Lord of Hell as his choice of happy ever after
What that makes me think of is Elan's conversation with his father about every evil empire that's overthrown was still an empire for a good long while and the emperor gets to live high while the getting is good. If Nale was truly going to get out from under his father, including "not discounting a good idea because his dad had it first", running a literal evil empire but with the goal of doing it well ties everything up with a bow cleanly.

>>96301912
Yeah, so what if someone lied to Thor? I can think of at least two gods in his own pantheon that would.

>>96313351
Is that really the same thing? Hell Lord is a lot more stable than Mortal Tyrant. Heroes don't overthrow hell. They might find their way to it to save someone or something. But not overthrow. Other demons overthrow hell lords.

>>96313488
That's my point, Nale would move past his obsession with his dad by falling into a situation where he was in a situation beyond his Dad's dreams, or even needing to turn it down. Could even call back to the giant throne specifically built to spite people.

>>96313351
maybe
I don't see Nale as the kingdom-running type however, he's way more of a Haley or Belkar type

>>96313488
>Heroes don't overthrow hell.
That depends on the setting and the campaign.

Games?

>>96313023
It would be shocking and also really stupid if Rich spent all this time setting up the IFCC and establishing Nale as their intermediary only to toss it all in the trash anti-climatically. I can't imagine a satisfying scenario where he's not involved in the final battle between the Order and Xykon's crew in some capacity. Also this thing has been dragged out long enough and I really don't want us to have to sit through 6 months of the Order fighting Devil Nale just for the sake of wrapping his plot thread up before finally getting to Xykon.

Well, I finally reached #1000

It's been pretty fun, I guess. But can I just say that...the heroes win too much? I mean, I get it, the good guys win. But the order of the stick wins *too much*. Every arc ends with either their victory, or a small temporary setback. A character dies and it's nothing but a timeout that ends up actively helping them in the long run anyway.

The closest thing they've actually had to real defeats is the gates being destroyed, but that's not really a defeat when basically the only thing that really matters is one gate surviving. The bad guys don't get their hands on it, so that's a victory.

I mean, what have they *really* lost? Some random side characters being murdered? Most of the villains get murdered horribly anyway, and the ones that don't are still on the track to it. It feels a bit...anticlimactic. You know there's no real danger at any time, and sure, that's true for most stories, but here there's no *illusion* of danger either.

I guess I'll keep going. Maybe something will shake things up. Or maybe they'll just continue murking bad guys and winning.

Also, is it just me or is literally every single couple interracial? I mean, seriously. Think about it. Which couples DON'T have different skin colors? Haley and Elan...those two samurai...and that's it. Everyone else is either a different skin or a different species.

>>96305763
for some reason the voice I always imagine for Xykon is MODOK as he appeared in MvC3

>>96298936
Epic

>>96315229
>Spoilers
Rich has always been kind of a liberal faggot yeah. It doesn't really ruin the story but you notice it from time to time.
In regards to the writing, I've been reading this shit since before I started Middle School I'm 32 now and that's the main reason I'm still reading it. I'm just waiting to get off Mr. Burlew's Wild Ride.
He's going to die before he actually finishes the story, isn't he?

>>96315361
Yeah, I kinda guessed he was. It's not bad enough to ruin the story, but it does shine through. It's just gotten really noticeable. And every time I think "Surely I'm just exaggerating" then boom, another example appears.

Well, like I said, it's not a complete poisoning of the plot. Hopefully it stays that way.

>>96314606
>I really don't want us to have to sit through 6 months of the Order fighting Devil Nale

Don't be ridiculous, anon.

At the pace this comic is updating, it's more likely to be 6 years.

>>96315229
Did we read the same comic? I remember the Order getting their asses kicked and forced to retreat several times. And the only interracial or interspecies couple I can think of is Roy x Celia.

It has been forever since I've read anything other than the latest once-in-a-blue-moon update, so I'm fully open to the possibility that I'm wrong. But what you're saying doesn't match my memory at all.

>>96315603
I'm presuming it's the lack of permanent deaths in the party, since the "Roy's dead" arc didn't have him stay dead, and Durkon is still technically around inside his vampire'd corpse at the point that anon would have ended. Then again, one could complain that the "Roy's dead" arc consisted of the villains sitting on their asses twiddling their thumbs waiting for the heroes to get back to the mission, but I imagine that was mostly just to give us a preview what a "Xkyon grabbed one of the gates" victory would end up like in terms of story progression; Xykon's forces just building a giant fortress-shaped blocked around the gate to keep intruders out while he and Redcloak theoretically worked out that ritual, technically sitting around waiting for the Order of the Stick to come bust their heads in. Aka more or less the situation they were in during that first dungeon delving story.

in today's thog, the gang looks for nale's friend but finds an even greater treasure
maybe more editing than thog puritans allow but whatever

>>96313488
>Heroes don't overthrow hell. They might find their way to it to save someone or something. But not overthrow.
Jesus Christ solo'd the Harrowing Of Hell campaign track so well the DM was in tears

>>96315229
you're sort of reading back to front
for us who've been following for the best part of 2 decades, it's been quite an exciting ride
it's a COMIC, heroes are supposed to win at the end
and it's not an Alan Moore type with massive casualties, half the MCs dead, and a doomer ending all the time, it's funny and self-referential

is this how all post-MCU stuff is supposed to be? morally ambiguous and serious and doomer and tragic?

>>96315603
>I remember the Order getting their asses kicked and forced to retreat several times.
Yeah, and every time, they escape, they make up a plan, and then they beat the villains's asses. And any loss they have just ends up leading to a *benefit*. Sure, Roy "died" but then he came back with a crazy new technique that allowed him to go fucking Kaioken mode with his sword and basically become the Protag when he previously was mostly just the leader of the ensemble cast.

>And the only interracial or interspecies couple I can think of is Roy x Celia.
Okay, let's see if i can't remember. Sabine and Wren is the first, obviously. But also Roy's Dad and that Ghost, Durkon and that Cleric, Roy's Mom and that Spanish Dude, Belkar and that Rogue Girl, Tarquin and that Free city woman (She did sleep with him at least)...I'm sure there's more, but these are just the ones I remember.

But like, try to think of the ones that *aren't*. Of the few that are, every single one except Haley-Elan and Two-Samurais are dead or divorced (possibly both)

>>96316424
>heroes suffering any sort of permanent loss
>"doomer and tragic"
Do you really think that a story has to be either edgelord nonsense and happy happy funtime saturday morning adventures where good always wins?

>>96317398
Roy lost his master and his family, and died
Durkon was exiled, became a vampire, and died
Haley lost her mum and family, and had a pretty harsh childhood
Elan's family are bad guys
Vaarsuvius's soul is in danger and also lost his/her spouse and children

would that count as
>any sort of permanent loss
to you?
or must all adventures feature maiming and permadeath?

>>96317398
added spoilers because someone's not done reading

Roy lost his master and his family, and died
Durkon was exiled, became a vampire, and died
Haley lost her mum and family, and had a pretty harsh childhood
Elan's family are bad guys
Vaarsuvius's soul is in danger and also lost his/her spouse and children

would that count as
>any sort of permanent loss
to you?
or must all adventures feature maiming and permadeath?

besides, OOTS *is* a comic on the lighter side of things, where the MCs are not expected to die until the final battle

>>96317385
>Yeah, and every time, they escape, they make up a plan, and then they beat the villains's asses
Like...most fantasy stories?

>Sure, Roy "died" but then he came back with a crazy new technique that allowed him to go fucking Kaioken mode with his sword and basically become the Protag when he previously was mostly just the leader of the ensemble cast.
I'm pretty sure binge-reading is making you misremember shit hard. He only came back with knowledge of the Spell Splitter technique, the crazy soulsword stuff only happened at the Godsmoot. The immediate effect of that arc was that his party lost months worth of time that could have been adjudicated properly if Roy was there, since
>The party wouldn't have been split to begin with
>Haley wouldn't be back in debt to the Thieves' guild in her attempts to revive him
>Belkar would have just had the justice brand removed by a priest since the party would have been annoyed having their kill machine hobbled by it and seen no point in keeping it up
>Durkon wouldn't have sat on his thumbs trying to twiddle them with someone giving a clear direction
>Varsuuvius wouldn't have sold their soul to the IFCC because they wouldn't have gone so loopy from being tranceless that they'd have been alone for that dragon mom to threaten their children
>Elan...well, he'd probably still have been Elan

Like, narratively you could still argue they needed to go through that period of separation to understand their limitations and grow as characters in V and Belkar's cases, but that's specifically hindsight speaking. The whole point of that arc is that the Order of the Stick fucked up hard because of their inexperience and overconfidence, and they had to serious up if they didn't want to be spending more filler arcs getting themselves back up to par.

>>96317398 <- this guy be like
>why wasn't Harry beaten up as a child
>why didn't Hermione get captured by Death Eaters and raped to bits
>why did Ron survive
>why wasn't Hogwarts a not-Auschwitz hell
>at least half the Weasleys must die
>STOP HAVING HAPPY HAPPY FUNTIME SATURDAY MORNING ADVENTURES REEE

>>96317438
You're counting stuff that happened in their backstories. That's not a loss, it didn't happen in the actual comic. None of their actual losses were real losses

>Roy's Death
Let him meet his family and gain magic sword skills.
>Durkon's death
He got to talk with his deity and still came back to do stuff.
>Elan's family are bad guys
That's just a fact. His family are bad guys, and he keeps defeating them again and again.
>Vaarsuvius
Is the closest thing I'd call to a *real* loss, and even then, we only saw his family for like ten fucking panels.

>or must all adventures feature maiming and permadeath?
if your adventure to save the world doesn't include real dangers along the way, what's the damn point? If death just means a small time-out, then what the hell are you supposed to be afraid of? They're obviously not gonna nuke reality itself, so there's nothing.

>>96317486
your expectations for this comic is too high
go read Watchmen and Wild Cards

>>96307256
>I think we can agree on most skeletons sound nasally
I blame Undertale for this. Even though Papyrus doesn't have a voice in-game every lets player independently comes to the same conclusion that he sounds like Skeletor. Probably because they both go "Nyeh"

So maybe I should just blame Skeletor

>>96317486
What is a "real loss" to you, anon?

>If death just means a small time-out, then what the hell are you supposed to be afraid of?
Okay, that made me snicker. Please, double check which board you're in, anon. That's not OOTS's fault, that's been a complaint regarding D&D for ages ever since revival spells were made. There are apparently some grognards still salty that it's no longer standard procedure to just rip people's sheets up upon character death.

>>96317451
> He only came back with knowledge of the Spell Splitter technique, the crazy soulsword stuff only happened at the Godsmoot
Yeah, because he was explicitly told he was still thinking of it as the family sword instead of his sword. He wouldn't have learned anything if he never trained with his grandpa.

>The immediate effect of that arc was that his party lost months worth of time that could have been adjudicated properly if Roy was there, since
Yeah, and they *all* led to them just momentarily suffering some setbacks that not actively let them get back to where they were, but straight up helped them in the long run. And the villains did literally fuckall the whole time because Redcloak was too busy playing City Builder.

>>96317504
>That's not OOTS's fault,
OOTS is a story. What they do with that story is of their own choice. They don't *need* to make resurrection easy. It's not like Wizards of the Coast specifically came down from the heavens and said
>"Rich Burlew, make resurrection in your comic easy or we're suing your ass!"

>>96315229
>the heroes win too much
nope, fuck you. every arc took like 5 years and every victory was a slow and hard-fought slog as a result. Also Roy was dead for like a decade.

>>96317500
>>96307256
It really goes back to how the how people thought that in voodoo Baron Samedi, the Loa of death talked with a Nasal voice due to how his nostrils are plugged with cotton in a reflection of the traditional burial styles of practitioners. Undead stuff in the west being inspired by these beliefs lead to the nasal voice voice thing being carried over into non voodoo culture and has remained as such to this very day.

>>96317563
I said "the heroes win", not "the heroes win quickly"

You're just complaining about the update speed.

>>96317575
Yeah well the setbacks and victories hit different when you were actually living through the slow ass updates. Johnny-come-latelies with the benefit of binging can fuck off with their zoomer ass criticisms.

>>96317585
The time it takes for the author to update the story has no bearing on the story itself.

>>96317520
>>96317531
I'm pretty sure you're using a lot of hindsight to bitch about the story, anon, cause most of this reminds me a lot of the people who say "Well, if I WAS DARTH VADER, then I wouldn't have fucked up like he did and did this!" kind of shit.

Cause yeah, Order of the Stick can be too verbose for its own good, and characters can act conveniently dumb at a moment's whim, but "falling forward" is a pretty standard staple of adventure and fantasy comics in general. And I think you're missing the ultimate point about that arc; They wouldn't have NEEDED to go through ANY of that bullshit if Roy didn't go full cowboy and get himself killed, but he did, they realized they can't keep handling things the way they did, and they made their setbacks into something that would help them in the longer run.

That's, like, how stories go.

>And the villains did literally fuckall the whole time because Redcloak was too busy playing City Builder.
Which they point out in the comic, is something Xykon explicitly gets pissed about, and is a mistake he corrects every other instance in the comic by outright threatening Redcloak every time he tries to make another cautious approach to a gate by going "We're not going to make another Gobbtopia you green fuck, now shut up and do what I say". Which I'm pretty sure you read if you got all the way to the Godsmoot.

>They don't *need* to make resurrection easy.
Dude was dead for months in-story and years irl because they couldn't find a single diamond to resurrect him, along with his bones. I don't call that "easy resurrection".

>>96317593
>The time it takes for the author to update the story has no bearing on the story itself.
Alright you midwit larping as a literary critic, you're objectively wrong. The kickstarter to reprint the old collections shattered records, it was big news at the time which you'd know if you weren't a fetus back then. Do you think that happens with mid tier stories? And these weren't the drooling masses that flock to Twilight films, this was a webcomic on the internet about dungeons and fucking dragons. It got that kind of praise and following from the most cynical jaded fucks on the internet.

so yeah, fuck your binging ass opinions.

>>96317601
>I'm pretty sure you're using a lot of hindsight to bitch about the story, anon, cause most of this reminds me a lot of the people who say "Well, if I WAS DARTH VADER, then I wouldn't have fucked up like he did and did this!" kind of shit.
No, I am pointing out that the heroes win way too much and the villains too little, and you people are freaking out because someone actually looked at the story as a whole instead of being stuck in a boat arc for 10 years.

>That's, like, how stories go.
Stories also usually have *permanent* consequences for their losses. There was no permanent consequence for Roy's loss other than them wasting some time, which *didn't evne matter anyway* because the villains didn't do anything. They were OBJECTIVELY better off from Roy dying than not.

As I pointed out, literally the only actual permanent loss from this consequences was...Varsuvius is divorced to someone he hadn't seen for years and we hadn't seen for more than two pages.

>Dude was dead for months in-story and years irl because they couldn't find a single diamond to resurrect him, along with his bones.
No, he was dead because they split and they had a literal timer of four weeks to the Cloister running out. They were *waiting*. And while they were waiting, Roy got to learn a mega skill.

>>96317622
>NO, THE TIME BETWEEN UPDATE AFFECTS THE STORY BECAUSE UH...THEY REPRINTED IT AND IT WAS POPULAR!
>STOP CRITICIZING THE STORY, YOU CAN'T DO THAT, IT'S POPULAR, YOU CAN'T SAY ANYTHING BAD ABOUT IT, YOU CANT YOU CAN'T
I'm sorry that you spent 10 years on a single arc, boomer, but that objectively does not change the story, and shitting your pants because of it doesn't either.

>>96317628
I think what I'm ultimately saying is that you're apparently expecting far more out of this comic than what's actually there, especially because you have yet to explain what a "real loss" is supposed to be. What, were you expecting a member of the party die every single story?

>>96317647
>tf2 meme
>boomer unironically
really not dodging the underageb& accussations

>>96317647
>>STOP CRITICIZING THE STORY
you can criticize it, but your criticisms are stupid and wrong and we're allowed to say so

>>96317657
>because you have yet to explain what a "real loss" is supposed to be
A "real loss" is a permanent consequence that actively hinders the heroes. Death is one of these, sure, but there are other ways. So far, the only thing that has actively fit this is Varsuvius.

And don't say "But it's just a humor comic!" becaues that point has far, far passed.

>>96317664
I'm sory to tell you this anon, but TF2 is 18 years old.

>>96317695
No, anon, give actual examples. You can't just say "they haven't suffered REAL LOSSES" repeatedly like it means anything, you need to say what you think is an "actual setback" if you're going to just poo-poo over a comedy D&D comic.

>>96317702
Nigga i literally just fucking told you.

>>96317717
>Death is one of these, sure, but there are other ways
Considering you were whining about a character death not being a "real loss", you better start listing the other ways, bitch

>>96317729
>Considering you were whining about a character death not being a "real loss"
A character "dying" for an arc so he can go train is not death, it's a glorified time-out. They joked about the DBZ reference, but that LITERALLY it.

>you better start listing the other ways, bitch
Permanent fucking consequences? What the fuck do you want me to do? Want me to start listing every way a charater can be physically or magically maimed or crippled or damaged or cursed?

I just told you that Varsuuvius was the only one with a real loss...which would have been great if it wasn't on the character with the least screentime of the whole cast. It's a lot harder to care about divorce when you've only seen the family for two pages.

>>96317752
>What the fuck do you want me to do? Want me to start listing every way a charater can be physically or magically maimed or crippled or damaged or cursed?
You're the one who brought up the idea. You should have no problem listing some then.

>>96317695
>TF2 is 18 years old.
It's not the age of the property, but who it appeals to.

Children. TF2 appeals to children. You are a child. And a stupid child giving stupid wrong opinions about things he doesn't understand is annoying. You are an annoying child.

>>96317767
>"What do you mean by a real loss"
>"I mean X"
>"Well why aren't you listing what's a real loss, huh? Tell me!"
>"It's X"
>"SOOOO WHY AREN'T YOU LISTING THEM, HUHH? YOU SHOULD HAVE NO PROBLEM TELLING ME WHAT IT IS?"
Okay, you got me anon, I'll stop giving (you)s now

>>96317772
>It's not the age of the property, but who it appeals to.
Yes anon, this game which has been popular for practically two decades is *definitely* a children's game. And you're totally not a seething oldafg who's having a freak out because someone dared to criticize the story he's been following for said decades.

>>96317787
You gave two examples, death and divorce, and then bitched they weren't good enough. Suffice to say, I don't think you know what you want out of this gag comic.

>96317802
Okay anon, sure, that's all I listed. Your story is perfect and flawless. You can go call the nurse to give you your medicine and go to bed.

>>96317752
>there's no real loss!!
>okay there is but I didn't care about them so it doesn't count!!

>>96317823
>Too mad to think I need a (You) to call him a bitch
Lol

Seriously, you're expecting far too much out of this comic. It's a comic where Rich outright stole a gag from Monty Python. The idea that death is something to be brushed off is not how it's actually treated in the story outside of a single instance in the Vampire Durkon story, and even that was specifically for a joke. Order of the Stick has flaws, but bitching the heroes don't suffer "real consequences" is like complaining Fred Flintstone should be in a coma from all those bowling balls to the head, or that Toriyama didn't depict the slow and painful recovery process every time Goku is put in traction in the hospital. Your expectations of this story are very much mismatched to the genre it's in, which despite Rich's attempts to make it dramatic and serious is still stuck as a gag comic, so we're not going to be getting a comic about Elan rushing to Hayley's side to console her about her sudden miscarriage or Varsuuvius tearfully breaking down and revealing that they gave the universe cancer or something anytime soon.

...We might get more moments of Red Cloak telling people just how super sad he is as a goblin, but that's a maybe.

>joke comic about D&D RPG world
>one of the earliest strips is about the switch to a new edition nerfing Belkar's weapon
>autist rants about how it's not deadly serious enough
what causes such mental illness?

>>96317500
It's kinda funny that the Nyehs make everyone imagine him as Skeletor, because if you extrapolate from the tone of his voice bloops, Papyrus should have a fairly deep, gravelly voice

An OOTS thread actually lasting? Crazy.

Anyway, anybody got a place I can read Heart of Darkness again? I don't have my file anymore.

>>96318555
>Heart of Darkness
START* of Darkness. Also, trips.

>>96318555
>>96318571
just google 'oots start of darkness read online', or some such, not hard to find

>>96296327
>a stool squeeling
>3e = bad

wtf happened in this thread

anon is entitled to an opinion, if he wishes events were more serious then that's fair game
the sane response is to say
>I feel that's untrue, I see things differently because X
and not
>this story is OBJECTIVELY TRAGIC and you are STUPID AND IRISH for thinking otherwise

extra irony because the second group keeps making fun of anon for being immature, with zero self-awarenees

>96319463
troll or samefagging?

bets, gentlemen

Sometimes I start writing a reply but then I remember literal children use this site and it's summer...

>>96319474
Both. Who expects pathos from a stick figure comic?

>>96317467
>>why didn't Hermione get captured by Death Eaters and raped to bits
Why didn't she though?

>>96319463
>anon is entitled to an opinion
And given that it's a stupid opinion we're entitled to mock him

>>96319793
*obligated, really

>>96319793
Yeah when you put your opinion out on a place like 4chan you should be expecting you'll be called a retarded faggot, especially if it's a stupid opinion.

>>96318936
Okay, so, that didn't fucking work. Internet Archive doesn't let you download it, Libgen doesn't let you download it, I can't find any stupid place that lets me download it.

>>96325867
christ you're bad at this
https://files.catbox.moe/rirey5.pdf

>>96325867
I'll upload what I have
https://files.catbox.moe/42zb60.7z
https://files.catbox.moe/s6gd6k.7z
https://files.catbox.moe/t38x66.7z

thog

>>96326560
NTA but thanks

on the other hand, holy shit this is a steaming pile of woke Disney crap. fuck Burlew and fuck this shit, I'm not finishing it

goodbye Burlew

>>96326690
...start of darkness? there's nothing woke about it

>>96326829
>>96326690
Yeah I'm also curious where this Woke accusation comes from. Is it because the systematic oppression of a group of people is a major plot point? That's not woke that's just a thing that exists.

>>96326855
I'm guessing it's cause of Red Cloak's whole motivation regarding "The Plan", even though that motivation is already in the main comic and he turns out to be full of shit the moment he places his pride in "The Plan" over the life of his baby brother

>>96326829
>>96326855
I can only imagine it's the general "Material advantage" thing where both Roy and Durkon admit that even though they didn't do anything, they still "unfairly benefitted" from goblins being a "monster" race

Kinda dumb, though.

>>96326829
>everything you know about the comic is wrong
>the villains were actually discriminated against
>the good guys are actually bigots
fuck off with that

>>96326855
>That's not woke that's just a thing that exists.
It is woke, because the entire point of "woke" is the assertion that
>hurr durr these bad guys wouldn't be bad if they hadn't been oppressed and discriminated against
That's the argument of the childish and irresponsible minds who flock to the woke banner. People who seek to find excuses for villains to dodge accountability and blame, even if only a small % of it.

>>96326879
Yep
We all know where that shit comes from, what are its real-world connections. Saying that "this is just, uh, a plot point in a comic book, it has nothing to do with real life" is a bald lie.
>that motivation is already in the main comic
SOD tries to make this argument more forcefully and I reject it as spineless pandering bullshit.

>>96326889
I wonder how nobody ever pointed out that if the shoe were on the other foot, it'd be clear that none of the Goblinoids we've seen in the comic would feel the slightest bit guilty over humans and other species living in shit conditions.

>>96326932
I think it's worth it to consider that it matters less whether or not they actually do have a point regarding Goblin lives (I personally think it's majorly flawed for a number of reasons), and more what Red Cloak does/did with that info. Namely, he became an far bigger hypocrite and villain than any other in the comic besides Xykon because he'd never admit that he'd be willing to kill any number of goblins in the here and now if he can pretend that he "did the right thing" to the non-existent goblins of the future

>>96327007
>if the shoe were on the other foot, it'd be clear that none of the Goblinoids we've seen in the comic would feel the slightest bit guilty over humans and other species living in shit conditions
Burlew's brain and the woke ideology just can't think that far ahead
I'm 100% serious
they're stuck on "well I hope that they will realise how kind we are and treat everyone the same, then we all sit down and kumbaya together"
that's the single thread of hope that they're gambling our entire planet on
>more what Red Cloak does/did with that info
I'm only going to follow the main comic if it continues that way, because thus far it has. If the SOD shit gets into the main storyline I'm pulling the plug.

>>96326932
anon, you need to calm down
wokism hadn't even been invented yet when SoD released
villains having well-meaning motivations is an ancient trope
going about it in a wrong way is often what makes a character a villain in the first place

>People who seek to find excuses for villains to dodge accountability and blame, even if only a small % of it.
SoD goes out of its way to deconstruct Redcloak's motivation and to show that at the end of the day he's still a bad person
it points out exactly what you're complaining about, that Redcloak excuses his behaviour and never wants to admit he fucked up

yes, an argument can be made that goblins are getting somewhat excused, especially later in the main comic
but lashing out at SoD just makes you look like you're yelling at clouds

>>96326592
Awesome, thank you

>>96326932
culture war has brain rotted you so hard dude.

>>96327050
we'll see

>>96327109
when you're older you'll learn that these things matter
the seeds of today were sown long ago
unintentionally, perhaps, or even with the best of intentions, but nonetheless

>>96317398
That’s the main difference between Golden/Silver Age comics and Iron/Bronze Age comics, yes

>>96327050
I remember how the particular comics that actually went over whether or not Redcloak had a point at all when Durkon directly asked Thor what the deal was with the goblins , most of their threads had to keep being locked because plenty of people disagreed on everything until it basically became a "sins of the father" type discussion except with patron deities involved

>>96327143
I cannot wait for space colonisation to become even remotely viable (and affordable) so I can leave this planet. Next time, I am never joining the Internet. Life was so much fun when I just used the computer to play games and watch stickman animations. I never knew connecting to other real, living, sapient people from all over the planet outside of punching range would make me such a misanthrope.

>>96327219
It's not gonna happen in our lifetimes, bud. It's literally too resource-intensive to get practical. To set up on another planet, you have to expend tons of resources just moving equipment to the place first, and then years setting it up so people can live there at all. The reason that colonizing Mars is a pipe dream is because, on top of this problem, that it needs so much terraforming. What we think of as "Martian soil" is too loose to use as actual soil.

The whole endeavor is basically too costly and has too many problems. We gotta make the best of what's here, even if that sucks for now.

>>96327219
>Life was so much fun when I just used the computer to play games and watch stickman animations
That much I agree

>>96326889
>>96327007

It really is a shame Burlew seems to be pivoting to the tired "monster races are black people in the 1960s" trope, especially when Redcloak being a complete spiteful hypocrite was one of the best aspects of his character. In SoD, Redcloak actually says that his dream was of an independent nation for all Goblinoids, and he actually got this after conquering Azure City, and he still wasn't satisfied because what he REALLY wants is revenge against the Gods for not making Goblins into one of the master races.

The worst part is that now Roy and Durkon are sucking him off over it. "Ach, I hinnae been checkin' me dwarven privilege!", says the guy who grew up dirt poor without a father. And Roy was ALWAYS willing to give monster races the benefit of the doubt (it's how he and Durkon met, ffs), so hearing him piss and moan about how he was unfair to the poor oppressed Goblins rings totally hollow.

>>96327143
>when you're older you'll learn that these things matter
I'm 43, how about you?

The best stories are ones that reflect a bit on ourselves, which this does. Systematic oppression of some people is a thing, some of us benefit from that oppression without understanding it, none of us are born knowing this but eventually we all have to face it. Some of us when faced with that reality accept it and some have a mental breakdown and start yelling "woke" at things.

You want all media to have preschool level "I'm evil for no reason" villains with no nuance. You don't want to use your brain because thinking too much makes you uncomfortable. You are a mental child.

>>96327302
>You want all media to have preschool level "I'm evil for no reason" villains with no nuance
I've had enough of pandering to pure evil dressed up as "nuance", which is all that modern media is.
>You are a mental child.
The same to you.
Good day.

>>96327290
I'm not sure you're reading this correctly.

You're right, that Redcloak isn't allowing himself to be satisfied by getting what he claimed he was after. This is an important thing to note about his character. But you're missing a step, and he is actually supposed to come off as a hypocrite even if you sympathize with the goblin cause.

You're not taking into account at all that he is a living sunk cost fallacy. Redcloak has lived for so long, and personally sacrificed so much, in order to make the Dark One's plan happen. He has all of this pride that he's built up for himself, and this whole sense of needing it all to have been worth it to follow the plan. Oona even points out correctly, for the readers to consider, that he has both the desire to advance goblins and the need to be right as conflicting points of his character, and she stresses that there may be a danger when these two things are at odds.

He's not in it at this point to get revenge on the gods, that's just how the plan is written. The fact that the gods fucked the goblins over is the reason he carries the burden of his role. The personal motivation for his behavior is he's carrying so many (often self-inflicted) losses in the process of doing this that he can't help but take the idea of not completing it personally.

>>96327246
Oh yeah?! Watch me outlive you! I’ll drag out this central nervous system for as long as I damn please, its MINE. More than any other organ, the brain and the nerves connected to it are ME, I get to dedice when I die! I am not clocking out on this planet, this… monkey infested mudball. Even if I am just a brain in a jar duck-taped to a pilot seat, even if I must drag it out for 200 years, 300 years, through Alzheimer, Dementia, Cancer! I am not dying here, not dying before you! I will see this planet from space at least once. I will walk on the Moon. So i just need to live 3-4 times longer than its normal for my specie? Who cares, I will do it.

>>96327442
>t.

>>96327290
To be fair, that's kind of the basic difference between a number of good characters like Roy and Durkon vs someone like Redcloak; They have basic empathy for other people. And even then, they're far from perfect themselves as they tend to not only act like they have to shoulder the burden for others and feel guilt for shit that's not even remotely their fault, but they tend to get tunnel-visioned by said feelings of "responsibility". I imagine if Rich Burlew had someone like Belkar give his take on the matter, he'd give the equivalent of "Tough shit, look at me, I'm a fucking halfling, and society shits all over me for not being a happy singing member of the lollipop guild, where's MY handouts and boohoo sympathy for my dumb crybaby backstory?"

>>96316240
I wasn't aware Nale was hispanic. Guess it fits with the domestic violence.

>>96327456
We were all there at some point though. Everyone thinks they are gonna be the guy who stands back up after they get shot. “I just need to be properly angry about the whole thing.” “I have so much unfinished business, I’ll turn into a ghost on the spot and possess my killer’s body like its nothing!”. “Everyone dies because they lack the right amount of desperation to just barely survive!”
I don’t know. I just don’t want to die yet. I think its stupid. To die of *old age* in less than a century. I think its way too short of a timeframe. So much to read, so many games to play, so many mountains to climb, so many forms of art to try out at least once. I know I would complain about if I had 300 years of spare time anyway, because i know time is not an issue. I know 80 years is plenty of time. 50 years, 30 years, is plenty of time. But i hate time and mortality as a concept. I hate being rushed. Death is a disease. And I know enough people, far smarter than me, think the same thing. I know, even if it takes a million years, a billion years, I know, Death is only a temporary problem. Someone, someday, will cure it, permanently. And then I will have all the time I want

>>96327442
good news, YOU, yes you personally, are IMMORTAL. maybe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wK4peez9zE

>>96327641
Nice try, *clever insult that somehow perfectly nails one of your defining flaws*, I stopped watching that guy’s channel after his ant mini-series, which was the only thing I really cared about.

>>96327525
No such thing as a cure for death. Death is permanent. Best you can get is replication for replacement, but then you get to approach the philosophical question: "is a copy of me the same as me?"

If you make a copy of you as a backup in case of your demise, the body and mind you're using right now still die. The copy if you is effectively you, but it also knows that it's not the original you. It's its own separate entity that also has to face the potential to eventually perish. Whether that's a clone, an electronic copy of your mind, or whatever. Nothing is ever truly permanent.

Let's go a step further and say that science eventually beats the Hayflick limit. You no longer slowly "die of old age" because your genetics don't randomly degenerate when they replicate anymore. This is going to require humanity to also find cures for every variation of cancer, because that's how that can easily go wrong. And even if you don't age to death, you can still die for other reasons.

It's truly inescapable, in the end.

>>96328290
>The copy if you is effectively you, but it also knows that it's not the original you.
this reminds me of a cartoon I saw as a kid that fucked me up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocgFkHElzgQ

As an irony poisoned zoomer, I hate happy endings and the good guys winning and also feel the need to drag modern politics into every discussion.

>>96327346
this satire is interesting because it makes a logical error, but it's subtle and hard to pinpoint
because there IS a difference
I think it's because one type of comic is about propaganda, while other is just propaganda
the author of this article confuses verisimilitude and allegory

>>96328723
Strictly incorrect interpretation. She makes it clear that her position on this "if he has to choose, he will fuck it up for us. Therefore, I will fight so he doesn't have to choose."

Putting the cloak on would actually make it harder for Oona to help out with this, because it floods the wearer's brain with the plan in such a way that Redcloak looked like he was brainwashed at first.

>>96327352
Yes, I know about Redcloak's dedication to the sunk cost fallacy, but that's not the whole picture. It explains why he refuses to move backwards, it's not his reward for moving forward. This strip is a good example of Redcloak's thinking - he resents the PC to races and the Gods who created them deeply, and the very idea the Gods are actually AFRAID of his plan gets him off big time. It's clearly personal for him

>>96329574
Well yeah, he gets personal satisfaction out of it. He watched the people who work for other gods slaughter most of his family at the coming-of-age part of his life, then learned that he could blame those gods for deeper problems too.

It's notable in this situation though, that Durkon and Redcloak aren't on the same page at all. Redcloak hasn't been given a full, perfect understanding of the situation and the stakes, in addition to his general distrust. He's slanted in a way that makes it easy enough for him to take the situation the wrong way, for sure. But this might have still spun out differently if he'd actually gotten a grasp of the whole thing. Maybe. It's hard to say though, because again, he doesn't exactly want to trust the emissaries of other gods, especially when they come from forces that have been getting in his way for some time now. But there was likely a different way to sell this that would have connected better for someone who is so focused on trying to be logical, even if he ultimately can't live up to that. Unfortunately though, the information was presented to him in a way that gave him the opportunity to feel validated for doing what he's doing, which helps this man who can't stop digging his heels in dig those heels in.

The most telling moment of the whole scene comes later though, when he has to consider whether the potential outcome of choosing the goblins or the plan to prioritize is more important, and he chooses the plan. That action tells us that Oona has a perfect read on him.

>>96329385
Yeah but you can resist it. If a cleric in the 4thish spell level range can, surely an epic or epic adjecent ranger can as well.

>>96329638
Given Redcloak's reaction to Durkon trying to hastily fill in the initial gaps he left out, I think it's safe to say that Redcloak wouldn't have wanted to listen anyways if it didn't validate his belief that the world was against him/The Dark One. Anything less than a divine command from all the pantheons that the Goblins were now PC races and a huge secession of lands to the gobbos wouldn't have gotten through, and even then he'd probably demand further "payback" beyond conquering Azure City/Gobbtopia via being allowed to cull the other races to raise up the gobbos' general level of experience so they can curbstomp anyone who tries to kill them. Anyone whose demands are that they're owed what's "fair" is not someone you want at the bargaining table if only because their idea of "fair" is not equitable to what actually is fair, but to what they feel they're owed. Especially villains who think they're owed everything.

So as far as I can tell, there's only two ways this Xykon/Redcloak relationship goes during the story's climax

Redcloak obviously at some point reveals to Xykon that he's been manipulating Xykon and playing him for a fool for decades at this point. This may or may not be done accidentally through some kind of slipup on Redcloak's part.

What happens then is

Option A: Xykon reveals he was never really a puppet, actually knew far more than Redcloak assumed about a lot of things, and just straight murders Redcloak, Redcloak dies a tragic death where he realizes everything he worked for was futile in the end.

Option B: Xykon attacks Redcloak but Redcloak had batman levels of prep against everything Xykon could do, and utterly dismantles Xykon in the most humiliating possible way, maybe even using some epic level "control undead" spell to just turn Xykon into an actual slave. This ends Xykon arc with the realization that, actually having a brain does matter, and just being powerful isn't good enough.

The OotS then has a final epic showdown with the survivor.

>>96330346
obviously B, because there's been huge reader setup for the catharsis of watching Redcloak turn the tables hard on Xykon, particularly since Redcloak is set up as heavily sympathetic

>The OotS then has a final epic showdown with the survivor
probably will cuck out to doing a deal with Redcloak for gobbo land because war bad or whatever

>>96330346
A would be kino, especially considering Start of Darkness already established who's the butch and who's the bitch
So I can already guess B will be what happens

>>96330346
I can't help but find it unlikely that Redcloak will survive. At the same time, it's obvious that that whole ancient "Xykon dominates MITD to devour Redcloak" is gonna get a callback, and we know MITD is already a traitor.

>>96330346
I'd prefer Option C: Badass final showdown between two villains who have been preparing for this for literal decades

As Tarquin said, villain fights are always a crapshoot. That's what makes them great.

>>96329820
Yep. Redcloak heard "the gods are getting ready to destroy existence because of what you're trying to do" and all he heard was "the gods themselves are scared of you; you have leverage". Everything after that went in one ear and out the other, in no small reason because this knowledge validated everything he had done until then. All of those goblin lives snuffed out, all of the sins, the cold-blooded murder of his own brother - it was all worth it for him to be in the position that he's currently in.

>>96330346
Redcloak is gonna get owned - hard. Xykon isn't good at planning but he's extremely good at killing powerful spellcasters, is warded to the teeth and there's a zero percent chance that he isn't expecting Redcloak to stab him in the back at some point given the nature of their relationship. If and when Redcloak finally admits to himself that he's a hypocritical coward and that he has to live with that for the good of his people then Xykon jumps, if not to the top of his shit-list, then at least right below the Azurites while also being much more accessible. Then again there's the phylactery switcheroo to consider. No idea how that will shake out but I'm optimistic that we'll get to it by 2060 or so.

>>96330892
I think the phylactery switcheroo is going to come out that both Xykon and Redcloak have a fake phylactery, or that Redcloak has the real one and Xykon banishes him to a place that both of them end up stuck forever.

>>96297216
Lmfao
Roflmao even

>>96330994
how would redcloak have a fake one? he made it in the first place and has carried it around for years as his unholy symbol, so unless the sewer system just happened to have a convenient copy, he still has the real one

>>96331022
He did it during the takeover of Azure City.

>>96331022
>>96331119
And then Xykon stuck the fake one in the Astral Fortress.

>>96331119
yes, he put the real one in the bag and still has it with him. the sewer search party didn't find another identical unholy symbol necklace of the dark one that fooled redcloak

>>96331364
Oh, I'm saying that either someone intercepted the real one, or Xykon knew about the fakeout and switched them back. This comic loves shell games and double-deceptions.

>>96296347
>>96296273 (OP)

Why do you think anyone would want this though? It's a total fucking waste of time to have read let lone created, if there is an attempt at a joke I can't see it, the drawing is ugly and the premise is stupid. Presumably anyone stupid enough to want to read it goes to their faggot website already

>>96297216
>Hey no worries at all man, take care of your mental health first, I'm just happy to support such great work
I assume this garbage has a subreddit and that that is one of the comments

People say Redcloak will die, but how are they gonna seal the snarl without him? They need a prophet of the dark one. Oona would be a shoe-in, maybe, but she's a Ranger. Even if she was able to get the power of the mantle, she wouldn't be able to cast a 9th level cleric spell as necessary

>>96333845
They don't need The Dark One, they need a fourth quiddity. Banjo will save us.

>>96333845
>how are they gonna seal the snarl without him?
they won't
Snarl will be misunderstood good guy all along and you're the bigot

alternatively,
Banjulhu gets quiddity

>>96333886
>>96333887
Banjo wouldn't have a new Quiddity, he'd be in the Yellow Pantheon. Odin even wanted him.

TDO was special because of the circumstances of his ascension.

>>96334000
I reject your trips! Iä! Iä! Banjulhu fhtagn!

>>96334000
But wouldn't Banjo and his brother Giggles be their own Pantheon at this point?

>>96334152
Quiddity isn't about Pantheon. Elves have their pantheon but they have the same quiddity as the eastern gods.

TDO had an unique quiddity because, assumingly, he ascended entirely by his own. He and the goblins had zero help whatsoever from the other deities, so when they did something so big it qualified him for ascension (killing a million people in revenge for his death) he ascended as a whole new color.

Banjo and Giggles probably wouldn't count for it.

>>96334298
ALSO, Even if Banjo or Giggles did ascend, they'd still need a Cleric able of casting 9th level spells on their name. But both clerics in the good side are very strongly Nordic.

Redcloak is basically the only person who kinda can fix the snarl because of the level and deity requirements.

>>96330892
>2060
You mean the comic strip, right?!?

>>96334375
At the rate Rich writes this thing...

>>96334375
for the past 10 years, we've been advancing at a consistent rate of 2 strips a month
the airship dropped them off at the labyrinth 5 years and ~130 strips ago
IF we are even 90% done with the entire story, there's 5 years more to go

>>96333845
They actually don't need a prophet with spellcasting strength at all. A lot of people responding or chaining responses to this post is forgetting how quiddity and the whole thing with the worlds caging the Snarl work. Let me recap the situation:
>In the beginning, there were four pantheons. Each pantheon had its own quiddity, represented by a different color. There were four colors of quiddity.
>The Snarl was made using all four of these colors of quiddity, and it murdered one of the pantheons, removing one of the colors of quiddity from existence. A being whose existence is four colors of quiddity can slay a divine being made of only one color of quiddity.
>The remaining gods wove a world around the Snarl to cage it, but these worlds were only made with three colors of quiddity. The Snarl, being made of four colors, was stronger than the cages.
>The gods, to stave off the Snarl, wrapped each world in another world successively. But each time, the Snarl would tear rifts in the cage, threatening to break loose.
>Every time a new deity ascends to godhood, it is by being sponsored by the already existing gods. This causes the new god to take on the quiddity of that pantheon, so they have the same color of quiddity as that pantheon.
>The Dark One is the first time in countless worlds that anyone ascended to godhood without being sponsored by an existing pantheon. He has a color of quiddity that has never been seen before, presumably because he wasn't empowered by an already existing divine essence.
>The gods, recognizing that four colors is stronger than three, realize that collaborating with the Dark One may permit them to make a cage strong enough to hold the Snarl forever. Four colors holding four colors, not a lesser three colors trying to hold four.

>>96334596
>The Dark One, not aware of this plan, thinks he can manipulate mortal-manufactured Gates to move the rifts around and threaten the other gods to acquiesce to his demands, a task he gives to his high priest via the Crimson Mantle.
>The gods, if they think the Snarl will threaten them, will just cage this world in another world and start over again. If this happens, all gods with insufficient worship, including the Dark One, will weaken until they perish. They are willing to sacrifice this opportunity to cage the Snarl forever if they absolutely must, because they know that something like the Dark One could potentially happen again. Not all of the gods want to hit that reset button until it's absolutely sure that there's no other option, though.

So:
>The high priest of the Dark One does not have any ability to stop the problem, except by communing with their god to try to convince him to abandon the plan and help seal the Snarl instead. Otherwise, they can reject their own god's will and stop doing the plan, which will buy time for the world itself since the gods won't abandon it and start over yet, but not solve the Snarl problem on its own.
>Any characters that we've seen who might raise up as gods, including Banjo or Giggles, or whatever, won't have a new color of quiddity to contribute to solving the problem if they are raised up into an existing pantheon.

>>96334596
>They actually don't need a prophet with spellcasting strength at all.
Incorrect. They need a 9th level spell slot worth of quiddity from a priest of The Dark One and barring a truly remarkable ass-pull, Redcloak is literally the only being in the world capable of that.

>>96334596
Thor does mention that they need one level 9 spell, but if the god is strong enough he can probably just manifest a scroll or raise the cleric caster level with an artifact
Also Tarkin totally shows up in this prequel panel. This is Now Canon. LALALAICAN'THEARYOU

>>96334928
I'm pretty sure they only need that because The Dark One himself isn't willing to play ball after introductions went sour.

>>96334950
How else are they gonna channel it? I don't think TDO can just come into existence to do it himself.

>>96335087
Yeah, actually. He exists as much as the other gods do, and he can willingly wrap his quiddity with theirs if he wants to. The gods are concerned though, that since they aren't on speaking terms, that there won't be any negotiation possible. Thor is actually unwilling to approach the Dark One or advocate doing so, because he's afraid that an argument between him and anyone else will make a new two-color Snarl. It's much less risky to dip a powerful enough touch of his divine power from his high priest, if they can get that option going.

>>96335187
>It's much less risky to dip a powerful enough touch of his divine power from his high priest, if they can get that option going.
And the only person capable of that is Redcloak. I mean, can anyone else even *speak* to the Dark One to convince him? The only possible way I could see it happen would be if someone like Oona did it after dying, but that would, you know, require her to die.

>>96335223
I think that Redcloak is going to die, finally have a chat with his god and then get brought back in a more cooperative frame of mind.

>>96335278
That would be sensible, though "Villain dies, realizes their folly and comes back less retarded" feels a little too close to what Nale is doing.

>>96335278
Redcloak dying doesn't serve his arc. It would make far more sense for him to be forced to choose between his personal concept of the plan and the actual wellbeing of his fellow goblins, and for him to choose poorly and lose The Dark One's favor. Though, I say that, and that's basically Miko's entire arc.

Also where are we at with 'sexy shoeless god of war' quiddity theory?

>>96335305
>and for him to choose poorly and lose The Dark One's favor.
Okay but that still leaves us with no one to seal the Snarl. The Dark One either isn't personally looking at stuff or wasn't convinced by Durkon either. So someone has to either tell him or convince him. The only one possibly capable of doing that is Redcloak.

>>96335305
>spoiler
I hate that theory. It's such a cop-out.
>"Oh we're in trouble because we need the bad guy and his evil deity to help defeat the big bad"
>"Actually nvm one of our party members ascended for no fucking reason and can solve everything for us :)"

>>96335223
It's not like Oona knows the details of what's at stake here.

All I'm saying though is that the gods understand that it would be less immediately dangerous a choice to try to get Redcloak to agree than to try to ask the Dark One to help them directly. They've basically given up on asking him, because Redcloak is the only one who could ask him anyway. But we have also seen that the Dark One does not make any effort to commune directly with Redcloak.

>>96335305
>>96335336
That theory's been around for forever. Maybe it'll happen, who knows? It could capstone his character arc, and maybe the writing will finally tie the details together. Committing unbelievable acts of violence in front of people all over the world while calling yourself a god of war might generate enough reputation to make you a god when you martyr yourself.

I'm sure the author's intent is to portray Redcloak as being in the wrong here, but he's really not. Here's the deal that was brought to him:

"Yeah you and your race were created by the gods as nameless NPCs for clerics to slaughter and level up. You were given the shitty barren parts of the world with no good ore or farmland because your purpose as food does not require you to have more. Now this ruckus you're making about it? That's not gonna fly. You stop it right now and accept your lot in the world or the entire world is getting blown up. And if you bend the knee to our ultimatum, we'll reward you with maybe some trade deals that will certainly be reneged on or letting you hold some land that you certainly won't be allowed to keep once the immediate danger to the Gods is over."

Wouldn't you give the proverbial finger to this too? Wouldn't this insulting attempt at diplomacy require a response of "I'd rather see it all blow up then" by any rational being with even the slightest sense of pride?

>>96336065
I think Durkon's point is more
>Bro, if the gods even think you're gonna be close to succeeding your plan, they're gonna blow up the world and your deity won't survive to the next Kalpa.
Now of course, Redcloak has no reason to know this is true, but it *we* do.

>>96336100
Well if we're using reader knowledge, we can infer one more thing. If the gods blow this world up, they will 100% create goblins in the next world and do their best to engineer another Dark One scenario so they can try again at a new quiddity

>>96336065
..Pride is exactly the problem.

You'd doom yourself and your species to nonexistence, without even an afterlife, out of pride? Pride truly is the most deadly sin.

>>96336123
alright, let's optimistically assume you are in Redcloak's situation with all the knowledge of the readers. What do you do, help the gods close the rift and accept the "rewards" of:

Still being a race of nameless NPCs that are just xp fodder for player races

Holding some land that is a perfect adventure hook for player races and you certainly will be forced to give up eventually

Enter some trade deals from a position of no advantage or leverage with all the rich and powerful kingdoms and hope they won't screw you over (they obviously will)

Hope that these trade deals maybe eventually result in less racism and classism and PCism if you stick it out long enough (it won't)

Would you really accept this deal? Nothing changes if you do. You're still a shitty monster NPC, by design, and so is your whole race, and will continue to be. The ones directly responsible for this, and benefitting from it, have told you to accept it or get blown up. Do you really accept it?

If so you're a cuck, in the truest most spiritual sense

>>96336166
This is the single most unhinged argument for anything I have ever read.

>>96336186
You've never heard the concept of "I'd rather die free than live as a slave?" I bet most people have

>>96336166
In the end, it comes down to whether or not Redcloak will get ANYTHING from the PC races and the gos, or if he’ll keep doubling down because he thinks it’s “not enough” and end up with nothing. And when that point comes, you have no one to blame but yourself. Like a certain cartoon character once said;

>”Look, you won't get everything, but you'll get something. Stop with this 'fairness' crap and make some compromises. Then go home to your friends in their goofy costumes and brag about how much you got 'em! Or you can go back and go, 'Oh, we didn't get everything we wanted, so we got nothing because we're big babies.' What's it gonna be?"

>>96336166
You dipshit. If Redcloak had the same level of knowledge as the readers, he might actually consider casting a communion spell and saying "Hey, boss, you actually have huge bartering power right now, if you're willing to come to the table. But they're intending to throw the whole thing in the bin if I try to finish the plan." The Dark One can negotiate so much for goblins at the divine level right now, and doesn't even know that he has that opportunity. And he really might, because he knows for sure at that point, by having that much knowledge, that the plan literally can't succeed. He would hate having to make a concession to his very core, but giving up everything for definitively nothing is not in Redcloak's mentality.

>>96336065
>Wouldn't you give the proverbial finger to this too?
No.

>Wouldn't this insulting attempt at diplomacy require a response of "I'd rather see it all blow up then" by any rational being with even the slightest sense of pride?
No, this is specifically a failing of Redcloak's. He has every reason to be suspicious but his counter-offer of "since you can't provide a detailed solution to every single problem with this situation that has existed since the literal dawn of time I think I'll just kill you instead" is bullshit and he knows it. Redcloak is completely willing to sacrifice all goblins, everywhere, if it means validating his own actions. He refuses to believe that things could ever have been done in any other way or could be done in some other way in the future because he would have to take ownership of his past and his decisions instead of passing the buck to the "greater good" like he's been doing ever since he hooked up with Xykon.

>>96336218
Damn, you stole my reply.

>>96336193
This anon explained your problem better than I would have >>96336218

>>96336229
*all goblins everywhere AND EVEN HIS OWN GOD, WHOM HE HAS SPENT HIS ENTIRE LIFE SERVING

Forgot to edit that little tidbit back in.

>>96336065
I genuinely think you might be illiterate. You're not just missing subtext you're missing just straight-up text from the page that you posted. Other people have enumerated the ways in which you're a moron so I won't belabor those points, but christ almighty listen to yourself.

I hope to god you're 13 because if you're in your 30s with this kind of chip on your shoulder life is going to be very unpleasant for you.

Option A: Be an oppressed people who only exist to better the lives of others

Option B: everyone dies

No one here would honestly pick option A right? I sure hope not.

>>96336414
Option B: Everyone, especially you and your deity die, but the gods who made you into farm mobs are still around and will just go on doing shit again, possibly forever

>>96336414
>"I don't like that the position I favor is losing, so I'm going to repost it tagging no posts, and scrape away the context that matters and hope no one will notice."

>>96336453
so you admit option B is stupid then

>>96336453
>I don't want to admit (because i'm a coward) that I favor option A (the coward's option) so I'll dodge the question by posting a meme

>>96336512
>deliberately murdering my entire species and my god and every living thing in existence for no benefit whatsoever is "brave"

>>96336573
Yeah, death over slavery is brave. I know you don't understand that, you probably never will, sorry I guess.

>>96336573
Technically it's even more dumb than that. Even if the other gods hit the "fuck this" button, most of them will survive and the Dark One will not. They will just continue making new worlds that the Snarl will destroy until they bungle into accidentally making another ascended god that is more willing to help them. So the same gods that made the Dark One come about from the suffering of his exp fodder species will go on, and the goblins will have had little to no meaningful revenge on them.

>>96336613
I accept your concession.

Speaking of the goblins, how do you reckon the Azure City issue will be solved? Will the Azurites just accept the country being lost?

>>96336512
The guy who's too scared to direct reply doesn't really get to call people cowards, sorry. You're scared of confrontation on an anonymous image board.

>>96336684
It's really hard to tell what'll happen, but here's a thought: There's a whole damn world inside the rifts. And it still looks perfectly fine. So, what if the solution to the story is to just take all the goblins, and move them into the world in the rift? I doubt this will be the game plan, but it's interesting to consider.

>>96336414
It's more like having a genetic trait that makes your blood equivalent to the cure for AIDs, trying to barter selling a sample of it for fifteen billion dollars, and then when they offer you ten billion declaring you'll either get your fifteen billion or you'll kill yourself and they'll never ever have the cure for AIDs ever.
...Only for them to shrug and go "That sucks, but go ahead, we'd love to have the cure for AIDs right now, but there's always the chance someone else with that blood mutation comes along, we could just barter with them instead".

Does killing yourself out of spite still do anything for you in that instance, or does it just make you look like a prideful dumbass?

>>96336713
Isn't the world Inside the rift gonna be sealed in with the Snarl? And as that Psionic girl said it's utterly dead. Not a single fish in the sea. So something's wrong with it.

I don't know what the fuck you all are arguing about, but >>96336414 is automatically a faggot for trying to play coy with his faggy pseudonymised
>hurr durr option A and B
and
>sure hope not
bullshit

Redcloak is a myopic zealot with a persecution complex. As we have seen, the world is not actually rigged against the Goblins. They started out with less than other races because Fenrir hoped the hardships would make them stronger than the others, not because they were supposed to be xp fodder.

He acts like the Gods are constantly conspiring to keep the green/orange man down, but did that actually happen? The Hobgoblins took over Azure city, and while the twelve Gods were furious, they respected the divine rules of non-intervention and haven't done anything to take the city back. Moreover, the "favored" races aren't conspiring either - the human countries all stayed out of the war and the elves only sent a token force of shitters to investigate. If you think Redcloak's delusions are grounded in reality, you completely miss the point.

Btw, how come nobody ever gives Fenrir shit for neglecting his duties as creator of the Goblinoids? This whole mess is really his fault and it goes totally unremarked upon by the comic

>>96336721
so in your mind, wanting equality instead of systematic oppression is green on the order of "I want 15 billion instead of 10 million"

The saying isn't "I'd rather die free than live with 10 million dollars" it's "I'd rather die free than live a slave" which is the correct mindset to have.

>>96336117
They are gonna goblins (saaad) look like a motherfucking joke

>>96336721
so in your mind, wanting equality instead of systematic oppression is greed on the order of "I want 15 billion instead of 10 billion"

The saying isn't "I'd rather die free than live with 10 billion dollars" it's "I'd rather die free than live a slave" which is the correct mindset to have.

>>96336766
>As we have seen, the world is not actually rigged against the Goblins.
They didn't even have their own clerics or divine casters until TDO. They all started with garbage strength and were made into a target for everyone else. We literally see the "Lawful Good" paladins slaughter an entire village without any reprimand from their deities.

If you have a divine power that is taken away when you do something bad, murder an defenseless goblin child, and still have your powers, that means your deity supports goblin baby murder. And while this might be fine for the evil ones, these were the GOOD deities. The people who literally define what good means think it's okay to slaughter your people wholesale

>>96336774
Point of order, it's more like "I'd rather (literally) everyone die than live as a slave."
No comment on how easy a choice that is to make. That's getting a LOT of people, some of which might be sympathetic to a Slave's wish for liberty killed.

>>96336789
NTA but actually what you're saying is
>I'd rather wage war and kill everyone in order to get Livingroom and Our Place In The Sun than act only in self-defence
which is NOT the correct mindset to have, no

>>96336766
>The Hobgoblins took over Azure city, and while the twelve Gods were furious, they respected the divine rules of non-intervention and haven't done anything to take the city back
because they literally can't. The fact that the chance to seal up the snarl once and forever has fallen into the gods' lap and they still have to act through clerics and intermediaries rather than directly means, quite obviously you dumbfuck, that they literally can't. That restriction is somehow hardcoded into this world.

>>96336802
Also, the people who made you slaves are still alive and will probably make even more slaves so they can get your power again.

>>96336804
>act only in self-defence
goblinoids who only act in self-defense wind up dead, because that's how the world was designed. they have shit stats, shit skills, shit weapons and armor, shit food, no money, no resources, because they are intended by design to be slaughtered by adventurers.

>>96336807
well Redcloak doesn't have full knowledge of the gods' situations, but even if he knew what we readers knew, he's still making the right choice. It will hurt the gods a bit to destroy the world, some gods like Hel might not even make it to the next world. If someone's going to enslave you, beat you, make your life miserable, and threaten to kill you if you resist, you go down fighting, even if it means you know you die and he keeps living on, you go down fighting and you at least try to give him a painful scar to remember you by.

>>96336819
Yeah so somehow they are simultaneously
>so shit that they can be slaughtered by adventurers
and yet
>so strong that they are able to conquer an entire nation
?

That's bullshit. Not on your part, but on either Redcloak (Watsonian answer) or Burlew (Doylist answer).
If Redcloak's gobbos were finally strong enough to conquer the Azurites, they would have been strong enough to defend their own land at last, instead of going abroad a-conquering. Choosing the latter instead of the former is what makes them the bad guy, regardless of what is claimed about "equality" and "oppression".

>>96336836
>>so strong that they are able to conquer an entire nation
Literally only because of two factors
>Clerics of the Dark One (Most notably Redcloak)
>Xykon

The actual gobs themselves wouldn't have had a chance with just some piddly monster infantry.

>>96336713
That's basically just solving racial conflict via segregation, which would make it really funny as an ending but there's no way Rich would go for it.

>>96336805
>because they literally can't. The fact that the chance to seal up the snarl once and forever has fallen into the gods' lap and they still have to act through clerics and intermediaries rather than directly means, quite obviously you dumbfuck, that they literally can't. That restriction is somehow hardcoded into this world.

Well someone's being a prick. Here's three things to consider:

1) it's irrelevant to my point whether they're physically incapable of acting directly or merely unwilling to, because either way, the rules of the world are not being unfairly applied.
2) They probably ARE capable of acting directly if they really wanted to, as you can see from picrel. The vampire says that refusing to provide a spell is within Thor's power, and he won't do it because of MAD. So you shouldn't be calling people dumbfucks when you're wrong.
3) The Gods don't all agree that cooperation with the dark one is the best idea. Loki and Thor want it, but other Gods are conflicted because they don't trust the Dark One.

>>96336880
>That's basically just solving racial conflict via segregation
the two state solution, actually
>there's no way Rich would go for it.
don't be so sure

>>96336891
>the two state solution, actually
This won't be sustainable because the PC races will always be angry that they used to control everything and now only control half of everything. Maybe even less if the (much larger by population) monster races get a proportional share of the world.

When you're used to privilege, equality feels like oppression

>>96336907
gr8 b8 m8 8/8

>>96336883
>Well someone's being a prick
because you're pulling the ole "yeah but are the oppressed people really THAT oppressed?" bullshit. I can smell your whiteness.

>>96336684
>>96336713

My prediction is still that one of the green Gods will come back, and the four pantheons plus the dark one will perk together to actually unravel the snarl, not just imprison it. Then they'll be able to use the snarl's remains to create countless new worlds, some of which will be for goblins. Then the goblins and other races will get to associate with each other exactly as much, or as little, as they want.

>>96336907
>>96336923
>loses argument
>resorts to shitposting
many such cases

>>96336880
This is the kind of reason why I don't think that they'd do it. I just like considering the logistics of what would happen if it DID go that way.

>>96336883
It's such a funny punchline. Fuck.

>>96334596
>The gods, to stave off the Snarl, wrapped each world in another world successively.
this is incorrect
the gods don't wrap the world around the old one, they let the old one be destroyed
then wait for the snarl to calm down
then make a new world around the snarl, with the old one gone completely
the only mention of matryoshka worlds is when Durkon says there's a world inside the rift, and Thor is very surprised to hear that

>>96334604
>>The high priest of the Dark One does not have any ability to stop the problem, except by communing with their god to try to convince him to abandon the plan and help seal the Snarl instead. Otherwise, they can reject their own god's will and stop doing the plan, which will buy time for the world itself since the gods won't abandon it and start over yet, but not solve the Snarl problem on its own.
that's also wrong
once TDO has granted his priest a ninth-level spell, that priest, until the end of the day, has the ability to channel TDO's quiddity towards sealing the rifts permanently
this is real power
nothing Thor said suggested RC needs TDO's consent to channel the spell, although obviously it would still be preferable

>>96335305
>Redcloak dying doesn't serve his arc. It would make far more sense for him to be forced to choose between his personal concept of the plan and the actual wellbeing of his fellow goblins, and for him to choose poorly
those are not actually incompatible
him dying can be the result of choosing poorly
he may or may not have the time for regret as he lays bleeding

>>96336117
>If the gods blow this world up, they will 100% create goblins in the next world
even if they were completely identical, those goblins still wouldn't be the goblins Redcloak spent his life trying to save, they would be just a replica
I know Redcloak is coping, but the fact is destroying the world is objectively a complete and irreversible failure on his part
even his god wouldn't survive, so the goblins are even more deleted than other races

>>96336229
>He refuses to believe that things could ever have been done in any other way
this
with the benefit of both meta-knowledge AND hindsight, Durkon might've convinced RC if Durkon said that the quiddity *is* the plan working
that only because RC kept fighting, the Dark One has a priest strong enough to seal the gate or something like that
maybe all RC needs is the ability to tell himself he won

>>96336675
>until they bungle into accidentally making another ascended god
in fact, that makes it more likely for there to be tragedies similar to TDO's, this time deliberately engineered by the gods

>>96336684
>how do you reckon the Azure City issue will be solved? Will the Azurites just accept the country being lost?
yes, or rather, the issue is already solved
the azurites have a new land that sustains them
demanding Azure City back is playing into the same "fairness" folly RC is mired in
it's not like the idea of military conquest doesn't exist in whatever oots world is called
they may or may not go to war over it in the future, but that's just life

>>96336862
>Literally only because of two factors
>>Clerics of the Dark One (Most notably Redcloak)
>>Xykon
so? the other races and nations also have access to similar advantages
you might argue that goblins winning happens too rarely, but that particular victory is absolutely theirs

>>96336830
>If someone's going to enslave you, beat you, make your life miserable, and threaten to kill you if you resist, you go down fighting, even if it means you know you die and he keeps living on, you go down fighting and you at least try to give him a painful scar to remember you by.
the red mist in your eyes prevents you from seeing two things

one, you're describing what happens when someone is so hurt they abandon all hope and emotionally lash out, trashing like a wild animal and destroying everything around them
this is tragic, but hurts everyone including the victim, and at this point you've given up trying to improve your situation
you need some deep-seated psychological issues to want to descend into that

two, even if Durkon's terms are unacceptable by whatever is Redcloak's metric for "fair", then he still can negotiate the deal, he's in a strong position
Durkon's is only the initial proposition
there's still a world of possible deals they can reach if only Redcloak is willing to enter talks
he doesn't, because he reacts like you, which is to say like a feral victim

>>96336789
The problem is not the “systemic oppression” bit. The problem is that all of this is hinged on one single guy’s decision; Redcloak’s. And at this point the dude doesn’t have the best interests of the goblin peoples in mind cause he doesn’t know what THEY want or think. He says he’s willing to make any sacrifice of the goblin people needed to fulfill his dream…while THEY haven’t had a single say in that point themselves. Hence the example, where the person refuses to compromise or negotiate for a proper deal now that they have the ear of someone who is sympathetic to them, only to walk away with nothing. Redcloak had the ear of an adventurer who had political connections to get what he wanted, a safe haven for goblins. He could have done anything, anything to help, given himself a far better bargaining position as a literal world savior from the snarl, and come out right on top.

Instead, he quadrupled down on the idea his plan was better and kept on betting Xykon somehow won’t betray him. He threw away a realistic shot for what he wanted just to satisfy his ego. He held out for fifteen billion when he could have gotten ten or haggled for twelve if he didn’t have such a sunk cost into the fact he would rather pay the safety of the people he claims to act in the interests of again and again rather than answer to his dead brother in the mirror.

>>96336065
Redcloak didn't refuse the deal because he thought it would screw over the goblins, he refused the deal because it wasn't The Plan. If he abandons The Plan, all the goblin deaths he directly and indirectly caused while carrying it out will have been for nothing. As many others have noted many times before this, Redcloak has been huffing weapons-grade sunk cost fallacy 24/7 for decades now and he's not stopping unless he 1000% has to.

>quadrupled down
>sunk cost
OR, maybe Redcloak is a bad guy despite his ostensibly noble intentionssimple as

>>96339666
I mostly emphasized that because the dude outright killed his own brother just to protect Xykon for the sake of The Plan, ignoring his own brother's suggestion to just backstab Xykon and find a less unstable maniac to help him pull off The Plan. His obsession with saving the goblins literally cost him his kin.

>>96339611
>Redcloak didn't refuse the deal because he thought it would screw over the goblins, he refused the deal because it wasn't The Plan.
Can't it be both? Here's two quotes from Redcloak in the discussion with Durkon

>Do you think for one second that I'm not fully aware of what the Azurites will do to us to get their land back, the moment they have the strength to try? As long as the gods see us as second-class humanoids, Gobbotopia will be nothing but crusade bait
Durkon cannot refute this, and so deflects by changing topics

>And what about adventurers raiding our towns elsewhere, outside of Gobbotopia? Or goblins getting attacked on sight wherever they go?
Durkon shrugs his shoulders and says "Maybe if we (meaning you, goblins) work hard enough for long enough it will change, or maybe not"

It doesn't sound like Redcloak is just making up excuses because he doesn't want to abandon The Plan. It sounds like he genuinely sees how insulting and worthless this compromise is, he's considering these factors.

>>96338083
>in fact, that makes it more likely for there to be tragedies similar to TDO's, this time deliberately engineered by the gods
Yes, but maybe also no. Because they know that a god that hates them could make a new Snarl. They want a deity to come that is more amenable to working with them.

What they might do instead is just stop sponsoring new gods into their pantheons and keep a close eye on the people with the kinds of qualities that they normally extended godhood to.

>>96340769
Redcloak is also retreating back to his favorite negotiating position of "all or nothing" by refusing to accept that what he's done has changed anything. The gobbos are now in a better position than they ever have been in the entire history of the world, he's in a position to parlay with the gods themselves to cement and build on what he's achieved for his people so far and his response is STILL "it's not enough".

>>96340850
Yeah when your goal is equality and you're offered the position of "still being an oppressed subjugated murdered-on-sight xp farm for PCs, but slightly better off now than you were yesterday" you rightly spit in their face and say you'd rather everyone blow up than accept such insulting terms.

'Equality or nothing' is a valid line in the sand to draw. 'slightly better off slave' is never an acceptable compromise.

>>96339611
>As many others have noted many times before this, Redcloak has been huffing weapons-grade sunk cost fallacy 24/7 for decades
And that's why Rich fails as a writer here. He obviously *intends* that we read this whole situation as Redcloak being a prideful fool who should accept the deal but won't because of his tragic flaws. All the writing and all the subtext are pointing with big flashing arrows towards this intended interpretation from the author.

The problem is the author is wrong here. With the story he wrote and the information he's presented, Redcloak is correct to refuse a compromise under any of the terms so far brought to him.

>>96340897
It's a smidge more complicated than that. You're not exactly wrong, but I think your assumption that this is already badly written is presumptuous. The story is yet to play out, so there may be an angle that the author is going for that we haven't seen yet.

But in addition to this, Redcloak's refusal is actually a two-part issue. The way that information was presented to him was not ideal, for sure. But also, he was predisposed to his own biases, which made discussion and negotiations more difficult. If someone is so set in their own ways, and only wants to see things along the lines of how they are already planning, it can be difficult to get them to truly be open to a whole alternate way of approaching an issue. Durkon doesn't know Redcloak personally. He made a good moral argument, but did a very poor job of finding the right way to convince Redcloak himself to really hear everything out.

>>96340877
Yeah, nah. Redcloak's arrogance is still fucking things up. He's being unreasonable, he knows he's being unreasonable, and he's RELISHING being unreasonable. He didn't want to listen to the rest of what Durkon was going to say after he found out that the gods are shitting a brick over his plan and he's also completely invested in the idea that he, himself, will solve everything at once. Has he ever thought about what his people actually want? Do you think that he would listen if the leaders of his people came to him and said "now that we've got Azure city we'd rather take our chances with what we've got than risk being annihilated from existence for the chance at more"? Hell no. At this point he might not even listen to his own god if TDO disagreed with him. Redcloak is so wrapped up in his messiah complex that he's willing to gamble with the complete and utter annihilation of his people so long as it means that everyone else would go down with them.

This is also ignoring the fact that TDO himself has immense leverage that TDO himself presumably hasn't been informed about. You don't think that the gods would be willing to listen to him if he came to them and offered to help cage their little mistake and end the infinite cycle in exchange for concessions for his worshipers?

>>96340956
Anon you're fighting the good fight but I want you to consider why your interlocutor in particular might struggle to understand the folly of someone who refuses to re-examine their axioms and has a pathological need to be both absolutely correct and lauded as correct.

>>96341113
I can't believe xykon's teevo connects to 4chan

>>96341059
>You don't think that the gods would be willing to listen to him if he came to them and offered to help cage their little mistake and end the infinite cycle in exchange for concessions for his worshipers?
This theory was presented by Serini and Belkar and Haley are completely correct in their response. The gods, like their representative, would offer scraps and call them generous concessions, and a lot of the gods would rather just punt the world rather than be extorted into anything because they're gods.

So they give up on a permanent solution for the snarl for now and just keep making and destroying worlds. to the gods, is that really a big deal? more of a big deal than being extorted into concessions? for a god? come on now.

>>96341252
>>96341059
This raises another good point. The Dark One may not realize he has negotiating leverage because he's missing information, but (and this is important) the other gods do, and they're still choosing the "burn the world" option rather than talking to him.

The gods could just go up to The Dark One right now and say "hey, here's the whole truth about the snarl, we can fix it with your help, we'll give you Goblin Equality Forever if you help us" but they haven't done this. All of them could have done this at any time and they're not willing to. They'd rather blow up the world, obviously, clearly.

>>96341295
Thor talked about that. The issue is that if the talk with The Dark One goes even remotely poorly, it could very easily spawn a second snarl. With the latent distrust already built up and the lack of unity among the other three pantheons, it's not a surefire thing even if it's the "best" solution. Think of it like the prisoner's dilemma; working towards the optimal path means setting yourself up to be screwed over.

>>96341317
>if the talk with The Dark One goes even remotely poorly
Why would it go poorly? If the gods went to TDO and say "here's everything you want" why would that ever go poorly?

It would only go poorly if they say "here's some scraps we'll call generous concessions, you still won't have equality though".

The fact that they all assume the negotiations will break down into fighting means all the gods understand, from the get-go, that compromise with TDO is not a real option to begin with. None of them want to do this. They'd all rather blow up the world. Even if TDO realized he had leveraging power, he actuallly doesn't, because they'd still all rather blow up the world than give him what he wants.

>>96341345
I dredged up the panels I was talking about. The gods have very set ways of contacting each other and collaborating, and without a place in the accords even the promise of getting him a place in those accords could be seen as a trick.

>>96341345
>>96341378

>>96341295
The dark one cut off contact with the evil Gods and didn't offer an explanation. The other pantheons sent emissaries to open negotiations, and the dark one had them killed. Moreover, the gods know that the Dark One is currently planning to blackmailing the other pantheons with the threat of total extermination. They're reluctant to talk to him because his behavior so far has been psychotic - the divine equivalent of a rogue state. It's really on the dark one to send an unambiguous signal that he's ready for a deal at this point. If he got Redcloak to seal Kraagor's rift, that would do it, and then they could work something out before agreeing to seal the other rifts

>>96341113
>the person I'm arguing with won't admit they're wrong, they must be INSAAAANE
or maybe, they're right and you're wrong? You don't seem too open to that either. pot kettle.

>>96341378
>he has no formal place in our covenants and no vote at any godsmoot

Oh wow. He's a second class citizen even as a god. And the gods totally can't just agree to modify these rules to give TDO equal rights as a god huh? cause reasons?

Here's what's laid out in these panels of yours. The gods would still rather blow up the world than invite TDO to be a proper part of the pantheon with equal rights and votes and all that. They consider blowing up the world to be sad but not ultimately a big deal. They consider any kind of compromise that involves making TDO and the goblins "equal" to be a *very big deal*. As Belkar and Haley already stated in the pages earlier, of course they'd rather blow up the world than be extorted into concessions of any kind. Obviously. They're gods and blowing up the world isn't that big a deal.

>>96341528
>Oh wow. He's a second class citizen even as a god.
Given that he's literally unprecedented and is currently actively working towards a divine genocide, I'd say that his status is at least partially self-inflicted.

>And the gods totally can't just agree to modify these rules to give TDO equal rights as a god huh? cause reasons?
Of course they can, but that takes time and goodwill.

>Here's what's laid out in these panels of yours. The gods would still rather blow up the world than invite TDO to be a proper part of the pantheon with equal rights and votes and all that.
Given that TDO is currently on the verge of breaking into their homes and murdering them I'd say that destroying the world (and him with it) instead isn't all that unreasonable. If there's a maniac with an axe standing on your front porch and your options are to either wait for him to take down your door and kill you and your family or retreat to your panic room and burn your house down, which option is better? Yeah it sucks not having a house for a while but it beats you and your family dying.

>They consider blowing up the world to be sad but not ultimately a big deal.
It's still a pretty big deal. Hel might even croak this time around.

>They consider any kind of compromise that involves making TDO and the goblins "equal" to be a *very big deal*.
Do you think the gods give a single fuck about the goblins beyond the giant glowing purple one that's currently trying to kill them?

>As Belkar and Haley already stated in the pages earlier, of course they'd rather blow up the world than be extorted into concessions of any kind. Obviously. They're gods and blowing up the world isn't that big a deal.
Yeah, and the key word here is "extortion". The main obstacle to a potential change of course from TDO is currently Redcloak's ego, assuming that TDO isn't otherwise informed. If he is then the situation is STILL on Redcloak's shoulders because Redcloak already has the purple quiddity on tap.

>>96340877
>you're approached for diplomatic talks, but the envoy is unskilled and has the charisma of like 8 so his arguments are often awkward and he struggles to see your perspective
>still, it's clear he's trying to negotiate in good faith
>YOU SHOULD SPIT IN HIS FACE FOR DARING TO INSULT YOU
that's you
seek help

>>96342157
>but the envoy is unskilled and has the charisma of like 8 so his arguments are often awkward and he struggles to see your perspective
this is the one guy out of all the guys on earth that the gods chose to send. the gods who fucked you and your race. he doesn't deserve the charity you think he does.

>>96340811
>Yes, but maybe also no. Because they know that a god that hates them could make a new Snarl. They want a deity to come that is more amenable to working with them.
they still might try to create scenarios where the hate isn't directed at the gods
because it seems like hardship is a necessary ingredient

then again, maybe not, it's a single data point
for all they know maybe it's because TDO had a prime number of followers at the time of death and that's why he ascended
all the more reason to be super extra careful with him

>>96342211
>the gods who fucked you and your race
The gods who will be completely unaffected if you decide to throw a tantrum and nuke the world and doom your own god to starvation.

>>96342211
charity doesn't enter into the equation
it's in Redcloak's best interests to help Durkon conduct the negotiations instead of going full edgelord at him
again, you just want RC to emotionally lash out and are acting like that's the rational thing to do

>>96342211
Red Cloak frankly doesn’t “deserve” anything. If he wants to whine that he’s not getting the gods’ best, it’s on him for never seeking it in the first place

>>96342211
>this is the one guy out of all the guys on earth that the gods chose to send.
Yeah, out of the huge number of representatives of Thor who are too powerful for Redcloak to ash on sight, who are in the loop about the snarl and the gates, are personally familiar with Redcloak and Xykon, have significant personal and diplomatic ties to the various nations that would have to be brought to the table, who aren't currently vampires or dead or tied up at the Godsmoot and are currently located within spitting distance of the north pole, Durkon's name was randomly picked out of a hat and he is by no means the most qualified person to potentially open talks.

You fucking muppet.

>>96342236
Also notable, the Dark One didn't just die, his followers were so enraged by his death that they basically did a suicide run on their enemies in his honor. Not only did he have a lot of people behind him, but they had real reverence for him.

>>96342460
All of this is correct. Durkon himself is worried about not being able to make a good argument when Thor asks him to, but he's an ideal candidate for basically every possible reason other than that.

>>96343065
It should be noted, it wasn't just the fact that they did a suicide run. It was the fact that their suicide run took one million fuckin' people out. For a medieval fantasy world, that is a LOT