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Kajeesus posted:Preeetty sure that was a throwaway joke and not actually a real in-universe feat. Have you been to the OOTS forums? My Lovely Horse posted:Clearly the reference to "craft disturbing mental image" was a clue to another homebrew prestige class, but what's the best way to figure out how many levels in it Empire of Blood Office Clerk #3 has exactly? Belkar had the "shocked" expression when he talked about him in episode #759, second page, panel 5, so there's got to be something to that. I imagine there are some people who think this is humorous exaggeration. To be rigorously fair there are plenty of people who are fine and not dreadful on the OOTS forums, but they're not the ones you notice, are they? sebmojo fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Nov 8, 2013 |
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Nov 7, 2013 11:48
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I know what they think. I saw it listed in their "let's sperg out about the cast's character sheet using every single offhand comment made anywhere," but I also think they have the collective joke-getting ability of a men's rights enclave.
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Nov 7, 2013 11:52
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Clearly the reference to "craft disturbing mental image" was a clue to another homebrew prestige class, but what's the best way to figure out how many levels in it Empire of Blood Office Clerk #3 has exactly? Belkar had the "shocked" expression when he talked about him in episode #759, second page, panel 5, so there's got to be something to that.
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Nov 7, 2013 11:52
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Roland Jones posted:Really, if he thought about it for a little while, he should realize that, what with everything that's happened so far, he can't be the main villain. Main villains don't have things like this happen to them. Going by his whole narrative thing, I mean. That's only going to make him even angrier. He's literally planned his entire life, possibly since even before he was married and convincing his wife that children were a good idea, around going down in history as a legendary evil warlord. Instead: The heroes are staying a scant half-step ahead of him; one of his sons betrayed him at a key moment, which not only screwed Tarquin but proved how poorly he raised Nale by the sheer gravity of the tactical error; his forces are being whittled down slowly by heroes who seem way too on top of their game for an encounter that's supposed to crush them and drive them into hiding so they can get stronger for the ultimate showdown; the empire he built with his own two hands is in very real danger of being historically notable for thriving in spite of being ruled by a dragon so stupid she's routinely bested in contests of wits with dinners that are being handfed to her; and his son is not only perfectly willing to play second banana to someone else, he seems happier that way. Evidence is stacking up that he's just not that important. For all the hard work he's put into being the biggest badass this side of Leeky Windstaff, the payoff is to be a distraction to the wrong hero's quest.
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Nov 8, 2013 00:24
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Dr. Buttass posted:That's only going to make him even angrier. He's literally planned his entire life, possibly since even before he was married and convincing his wife that children were a good idea, around going down in history as a legendary evil warlord.  That's really well put. OOTS is shaping up to be quite the longform meditation on power, identity and control isn't it? Think about how people identify themselves by what they do or are seeking to do, how they control each other, how they manifest power. I also think Rich is going to break our heart with Belkar. Snap it in loving two. With Belkar. sebmojo fucked around with this message at 01:08 on Nov 8, 2013 |
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Nov 8, 2013 01:05
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sebmojo posted:
How could he not? He's been telling us all along he dies, gave him a new dimension to his character and spawned countless discussions about how Belkar could get out of it. How could it end any other way? It won't be tragic he died, it will be tragic because we knew all along he was going to die, and there wasn't anything that could be done about it. No gaming the system, no technicalities, just crushing inevitability.
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Nov 8, 2013 01:13
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I hope Belkar never dies. gently caress prophecies.
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Nov 8, 2013 02:54
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Yeah they suck as a narrative device in the vast majority of circumstances, including in this comic
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Nov 8, 2013 02:57
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greatn posted:Yeah they suck as a narrative device in the vast majority of circumstances, yes but quote:including in this comic what? Even ignoring every prophecy but Belkar's we have hundreds of strips of earned anticipation and dramatic irony as a result of a prophecy. How does that suck?
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Nov 8, 2013 03:03
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I really don't like prophecies either.
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Nov 8, 2013 03:36
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I only like prophecies that are vague and can be thwarted with enough effort. Absolutes are completely unsatisfying.
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Nov 8, 2013 03:38
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greatn posted:I only like prophecies that are vague and can be thwarted with enough effort. Absolutes are completely unsatisfying. So you don't think the OOTS prophecies are working dramatically? Because I'd disagree very strongly but I'd be interested in hearing your argument. sebmojo fucked around with this message at 04:09 on Nov 8, 2013 |
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Nov 8, 2013 04:03
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greatn posted:I only like prophecies that are vague and can be thwarted with enough effort. Absolutes are completely unsatisfying. I can not think of a single prophecy in fiction that is like this. Like, unless the point is that the entire prophesy is a sham.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:05
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greatn posted:I only like prophecies that are vague and can be thwarted with enough effort. Absolutes are completely unsatisfying. There's an entire genre of tragedy that centers on the inevitability of fate, and the nevertheless noble (if doomed) struggle to try and escape it. Prophecies are only really unsatisfying if the characters in question give in and accept it, and thus lose agency.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:06
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sebmojo posted:Even ignoring every prophecy but Belkar's we have hundreds of strips of earned anticipation and dramatic irony as a result of a prophecy. How does that suck? Example - If you remove the prophecy poo poo from the Malack fight, do you fear less or more for Belkar? That sense of apprehension comes from the powerful opponent, not the fact a prophecy looms over him. The prophecy adds little more than a sense of immerse breaking and a bunch of internet arguments. I'll take more 'oh gently caress is Belker going to die?' out of nowhere and less 'Oh, is this where Rich finally kills him?' as another encounter rolls by.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:10
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Spiderdrake posted:You mean the tension that he might die, coming from situations where he might die, because things might kill him? Shockingly, the prophecy adds very little to that, beyond creating a dice roll in your head to determine if it's gone on long enough that 'well his time must be up now'. It's more the character change actually. Plus the irony of how Belkar survived the Malack encounter when he really shouldn't have, plus the relationship with Mr Scruffy, 'we're gonna make it out, you and me', plus the way we saw how the party responded to his death in the illusionary dream, plus the knowledge that he's going to die and they're not going to rez him, plus the way he's getting his fondest dream with the dinosaur... All of that stuff, even if it doesn't depend on the prophecy, gains richness from the fact that the prophecy exists. I mean if you're just autistically noting the threat level in each strip and checking whether the bit BELKAR_IS_DEAD has flipped yet, sure there's not much added. But I think you can go a bit deeper.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:16
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Yeah the fact that we know for a fact that Belkar is doomed is what is making this character development he's getting a bit more dramatic. He's finally starting to improve as a person, when it's too late.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:19
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There was no survival based drama before the prophecy either. In the normal course of events I'd assume the PCs had plot armor. The question isn't "is this where they die?" but "I wonder how they'll get out of this one?" Even when Roy died there was no question that he'd be resurrected eventually, and now that we've seen that I wouldn't expect to see another PC die because it has been done. Belkar's plot armor is gone. Replaced by dramatically equivalent plot anti-armor.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:24
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Angela Christine posted:There was no survival based drama before the prophecy either. In the normal course of events I'd assume the PCs had plot armor. The question isn't "is this where they die?" but "I wonder how they'll get out of this one?" Even when Roy died there was no question that he'd be resurrected eventually, and now that we've seen that I wouldn't expect to see another PC die because it has been done. That's well put. You could also cf Elan's prophecy - it will end well for him. Of course we already knew the baddies weren't going to win, nearly every book ever written has that as an unspoken prophecy; but by promising us that Elan (and probably Haley) are going to survive, it puts everyone else in implicit jeopardy in a very sly way.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:36
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"Yes - for you, at least" is pretty explicit, though still sly.
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Nov 8, 2013 04:41
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I'm trying to imagine Elan being happy without his best buddy Roy.
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Nov 8, 2013 05:31
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ikanreed posted:I'm trying to imagine Elan being happy without his best buddy Roy. A happy ending for Elan doesn't necessarily need Elan to be alive to enjoy it.
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Nov 8, 2013 05:42
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Belkar might be becoming a better person but he's also becoming a far less funny one, by this point I am okay with him dieing.
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Nov 8, 2013 07:56
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Cliff Racer posted:Belkar might be becoming a better person but he's also becoming a far less funny one, by this point I am okay with him dieing. If you have a problem with someone who named their dinosaur Bloodfeast the Extreme-inator, you may as well be dead inside and I don't know what else to say to you.
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Nov 8, 2013 08:28
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Point of order about prophecies: Durkon is, as of not long ago in the grand scheme of things, free to go home at any point.
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Nov 8, 2013 08:32
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Dr. Buttass posted:He's literally planned his entire life, possibly since even before he was married and convincing his wife that children were a good idea, around going down in history as a legendary evil warlord.
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Nov 8, 2013 08:48
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My Lovely Horse posted:The rest of your analysis is spot on, but I don't think he quite has. What he's planned his life around is being the bad guy who lives the high life at the top of an empire for years, until some hero comes along and defeats him but as he himself puts it, that's a few minutes of unpleasantness right at the end against decades of power, luxury and multiple wives. Going down in history as a legend is something he only realized would work out when Elan showed up on his doorstep. Now, though, he's gotten far too hung up on that to go back, and he can't imagine there might be a bigger story around than his. For all his talk about long-term plans and legendmaking Tarquin's downfall is coming because he doesn't think big enough. I'm not sure you really appreciate the scope of Tarquin's ego. Or his genre savvy.
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Nov 8, 2013 12:56
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Raposa posted:A happy ending for Elan doesn't necessarily need Elan to be alive to enjoy it. He really seems like a guy who needs "...lived happily ever after" at the end of his story.
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Nov 8, 2013 13:02
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Dr. Buttass posted:I'm not sure you really appreciate the scope of Tarquin's ego. Or his genre savvy.
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Nov 8, 2013 13:15
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Dr. Buttass posted:I'm not sure you really appreciate the scope of Tarquin's ego. Or his genre savvy. His genre savvy is wasted here because of that ego - he's gravely mistaken about whose story it is. He isn't the main villain, no matter how much he thinks he is. This is Roy's story, and Xykon is the main villain. Tarquin's just a side boss that's gotten too big for his britches, and the moment he realizes this it will all come crashing down.
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Nov 8, 2013 13:51
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Robviously posted:If you have a problem with someone who named their dinosaur Bloodfeast the Extreme-inator, you may as well be dead inside and I don't know what else to say to you. He might have named his tyrannosaur that but he also used it to save two annoying plot railroaders who were thirty seconds away from arrow induced, audience pleasing death.
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Nov 8, 2013 17:27
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Man, I'm on the other end. I hated Belkar early on and have only started to appreciate the character as he develops and his plot moves along. When the prophecy first said he would die my opinion was pretty much "I can't wait." While I'm still not a huge fan because he reminds me of too many bad PCs I've played with, Rich has succeeded in actually making me care a little by this point, and I was biting my nails at the vampire sequence.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:23
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Mind over Matter posted:Man, I'm on the other end. I hated Belkar early on and have only started to appreciate the character as he develops and his plot moves along. When the prophecy first said he would die my opinion was pretty much "I can't wait." While I'm still not a huge fan because he reminds me of too many bad PCs I've played with, Rich has succeeded in actually making me care a little by this point, and I was biting my nails at the vampire sequence. I was the same. I hated playing with these PCs, since I enjoy classic heroics, and couldn't wait for him to die. Now I'll be sad, since the guy actually has some nuance.
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Nov 8, 2013 18:34
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Cliff Racer posted:He might have named his tyrannosaur that but he also used it to save two annoying plot railroaders who were thirty seconds away from arrow induced, audience pleasing death. What are you talking about.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:09
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Dr Pepper posted:What are you talking about. Please do not engage the Cliff Racer, you will only find suffering there.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:14
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Cliff Racer posted:He might have named his tyrannosaur that but he also used it to save two annoying plot railroaders who were thirty seconds away from arrow induced, audience pleasing death. Are you seriously using railroad plot as a thing in a non-interactive narrative?
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Nov 8, 2013 19:19
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Burlew is all about awesome twists, so I still can't shake the feeling that Belkar's prophesied death is a red herring. It will happen, but it could happen after the story proper is all wrapped up. I'm not sure how many in-universe months left he has, but conceivably the plot could wrap up before then and Belkar's death could be part of the denouement, or even after that. It sets up the potential for a really awesome scene where it looks like he's killed during the final battle with Xykon, everyone cries because we all saw it coming, then at the critical moment, BAM he strikes out of nowhere for the victory. Sort of a reverse-Gollum.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:20
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Dr Pepper posted:What are you talking about. The bit where Belkar freed the dinosaur in the arena.
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Nov 8, 2013 19:39
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ZnCu posted:I'm not sure how many in-universe months left he has
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Nov 8, 2013 19:50
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My Lovely Horse posted:Think weeks. When Roy was freshly resurrected, he calculated around three weeks before the prophecy had to come true. But then, something like the last 100 comics happened in a single day so there's a bit of a discrepancy between "time actually passed" and "time we think has to have passed". Seven weeks, not three. At the time, he also thinks they can beat Xykon by then, but of course that was before the whole Tarquin arc started.
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Nov 8, 2013 20:03
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