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A.o.D. posted:So I guess demons are just misunderstood in your campaign? Are you suggesting that roaches in our world, unintelligent insects, are equivalent to these obviously sentient and intelligent roaches? Because that's the context in which I was raising concerns, I'm not really interested in discussing Christian theology.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:13
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Rich found out about our tendency for using Goblins to derail the thread I guess.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:17
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Absurd Alhazred posted:Are you suggesting that roaches in our world, unintelligent insects, are equivalent to these obviously sentient and intelligent roaches? Because that's the context in which I was raising concerns, I'm not really interested in discussing Christian theology. How about dungeons and dragons cosmology? That's the one where demons are not made of matter but coalesced evil. They dont need food and drink to survive, but instead have to cause suffering and destruction to exist. They don't have independant agency to not do this. They aren't roaches that just happen to have sapience. They are malevolent extra dimensional spirits that just happen to look like roaches. If you can't handle a cosmology where literal Evil and literal Good are things that exist then hoo boy DnD isn't for you. I'm not saying a nuanced approach to how an adversary is portrayed is bad or wrong. Hell, that's what the whole narrative arc with the goblins is about. I'm saying that it doesn't apply to the demonic comedy muses in this particular work. A.o.D. fucked around with this message at 20:19 on Aug 24, 2020 |
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Aug 24, 2020 20:17
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A.o.D. posted:How about dungeons and dragons cosmology? That's the one where demons are not made of matter but coalesced evil. They dont need food and drink to survive, but instead have to cause suffering and destruction to exist. They don't have independant agency to not do this. They aren't roaches that just happen to have sapience. They are malevolent extra dimensional spirits that just happen to look like roaches. quote:If you can't handle a cosmology where literal Evil and literal Good are things that exist then hoo boy DnD isn't for you. Trust me, I know full well that most D&D cosmologies aren't for me. Fortunately you don't need them to run D&D. Nor do you have to run D&D to run fantasy roleplaying. So I'm good!
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Aug 24, 2020 20:21
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Absurd Alhazred posted:None of that compares to treating demon roaches the same as roaches you're breeding for your pet lizard. What. God damnit I took the bait like a sucker.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:22
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Absurd Alhazred posted:Are you suggesting that roaches in our world, unintelligent insects, are equivalent to these obviously sentient and intelligent roaches? Because that's the context in which I was raising concerns, I'm not really interested in discussing Christian theology. You are either an absolute loony, or are intentionally arguing in bad faith to troll.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:23
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Looking forward to the tangent where Doomguy is the real villain.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:27
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Johnny Aztec posted:You are either an absolute loony, or are intentionally arguing in bad faith to troll. I was responding to this: goblin week posted:i do worse things to roaches by virtue of having two pet geckos but i don’t think it makes me an irredeemable person that’s about to install fascism in my single person household 
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Aug 24, 2020 20:27
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It's like you monsters haven't seen Joe's Apartment
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Aug 24, 2020 20:29
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Eifert Posting posted:Rich found out about our tendency for using Goblins to derail the thread I guess. I groaned.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:35
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Eifert Posting posted:Rich found out about our tendency for using Goblins to derail the thread I guess. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kAEoCHANYY
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Aug 24, 2020 20:41
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The good Goblins comic's most recent strip feels fairly pertinent.
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Aug 24, 2020 20:45
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Eifert Posting posted:Rich found out about our tendency for using Goblins to derail the thread I guess. Holy poo poo
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Aug 24, 2020 20:56
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Absurd Alhazred posted:None of that compares to treating demon roaches the same as roaches you're breeding for your pet lizard. If anything feeding regular roaches to a gecko is infinitely worse than stomping on a demon roach because the former results in death and the latter results in having to stay in their home plane for a little bit.
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Aug 24, 2020 21:48
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I think the main way that this isn't analogous to institutional oppression of minorities in the modern world is that there really aren't guaranteed rights, and even if there were, goblins don't appear to be governed by any sovereign power but their own, and there's not really a limit on what sovereign powers can do. Certainly Redcloak has already implied that he would feel no obligation to be peaceful even if his demands were met, because D&D pastiche worlds are filled with violence irrespective of any sense of cosmic justice. While stories are often improved by being directly analogous to the real world, I feel like Redcloak is more like one of those death cults so dedicated to their ideology that they will discard evidence to the contrary and march their followers to their demise.
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Aug 24, 2020 21:57
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Who What Now posted:If anything feeding regular roaches to a gecko is infinitely worse than stomping on a demon roach because the former results in death and the latter results in having to stay in their home plane for a little bit. On the other hand, crickets are soulless monsters and feeding them to my other pets increases the amount of cosmic good in the universe. Absurd Alhazred posted:Trust me, I know full well that most D&D cosmologies aren't for me. Fortunately you don't need them to run D&D. Nor do you have to run D&D to run fantasy roleplaying. So I'm good! Oots takes place using regular D&D as like, the thing it is references and contrasting itself with, specifically. You know that's the anthropic principle here right? Sure someone can do a fantasy roleplaying campaign that has nothing to do with any D&D cosmology (I'm not exactly how you'd do this, since D&D cosmology also references real world religions like the Hellenic and Sumerian pantheons; and things like Angels and Demons, so you'd also have to reject those, so you'd have a fantasy roleplaying setting without religion at all?); but that would be a grand non-sequitor in terms of discussing the strip or the themes and issues that deal with D&D editions we all are familiar with and typically enjoy playing and interacting with.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:04
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It seems odd to me to say that it is instantly bad to tell a story where an oppressed group leads a just revolution but also the revolution has serious moral failings. Isn't that kind of situation very common throughout history? Colonialism is dogshit and enlightenment ideals are pretty good, but that doesn't mean America's hands are clean. It's still a nation founded on genocide and slavery. I get preferring a story where the revolutionaries are 100% in the right, but I don't think it's inherently a failure of OotS to not be that kind of story.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:26
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It's a much more interesting story if the movement itself has a righteous cause but are led by someone who is morally compromised.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:33
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Wittgen posted:It seems odd to me to say that it is instantly bad to tell a story where an oppressed group leads a just revolution but also the revolution has serious moral failings. Isn't that kind of situation very common throughout history? Colonialism is dogshit and enlightenment ideals are pretty good, but that doesn't mean America's hands are clean. It's still a nation founded on genocide and slavery. Yeah, this has been extremely true throughout history, the French revolution in particular, the October Revolution is another notable example; the Xinhua Revolution of 1911 led to Chiang Kai Shek and Mao, the Meiji Restoration/Revolution led to Japan's militerism and the invasion of China; there's only a couple of exceptions but the majority have been incredibly flawed and mainly led to things being better only for a different group at the expense of other groups. It seems weird to criticize Rich for writing a story that is fundamentally deeply relatable to real world historical events. Glass of Milk posted:It's a much more interesting story if the movement itself has a righteous cause but are led by someone who is morally compromised. Yeah think of Liber8 from the TV series Continuum.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:45
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Absurd Alhazred posted:It's unfortunate that the goblinoids are incapable of generating a leadership that is not fundamentally corrupt and incapable of truly improving their lot. Good thing a handful of human and demi-human saviors are here to take care of them. Right-Eye wasn't a ruler or anything, but his village got on pretty well until Redcloak ruined it.
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Aug 24, 2020 22:51
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Acerbatus posted:Right-Eye wasn't a ruler or anything, but his village got on pretty well until Redcloak ruined it. That is true, but I don't think it's unreasonable to set your goals higher than "can eke out a comfortable existence in a swamp so long as you don't catch the attention of the genocide patrol."
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Aug 24, 2020 23:21
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oobey posted:Don't know when the last time they spoke was, but they're seen hanging out next to the MitD as recently as 1189. In 833 we see one roach being left behind with Jirix. It says "remember to dress warmly!" And the other (speaking for the other 3 roaches we see on-panel, two of which are headed for the portal) replies "we'll write every day!" So I feel like it's pretty clear that one or more stayed behind (and were squished by Jirix) and the bulk of them continued to follow Xykon as they have been since Start of Darkness.
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Aug 24, 2020 23:22
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The Order of the Stick: Come for the D&D Webcomic, Stay for the Debates On Killing Roaches
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Aug 24, 2020 23:35
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Recloak is basically saying "I choose to use violence to get equality for goblinoids, rather than accept your peaceful deal, because I don't trust that these peaceful methods will actually work and that those who have historically oppressed us won't turn around and backstab us, too. I know that this path is risky, and that goblinoids may die, but I think it's a better chance than trusting our oppressors." Honestly, that seems like a reasonable position, to to have it be portrayed as evil is kind of problematic. I think the problem isn't so much the fact that Redcloak is a flawed revolutionary leader, and more the fact that Durkon and Minrah are "white savior" types who know better than the actual oppressed people. What Durkon and Minrah remind me of, in the last few pages, is the way white liberals in America criticize Malcolm X for being too violent (and used to say the same about Martin Luther King Jr.), or blame "rioters" for the destruction of property rather than blame the police who started it by killing unarmed black people. "We passed the Civil Rights act, isn't that good enough for you people?" That's not a good place for the sympathetic heroes to be. On page 1209, Durkon says "will ye help us save the goblins?" Or in other words, "will you take the crumbs we're offering you and stop making a fuss?" gently caress you, Durkon; Redcloak is trying to save the goblins from YOU. Redcloak's reaction (Implosion) seems pretty justified to me. Now, I know that in the extremely contrived situation that this comic has put forth, assuming Thor is a reliable narrator, Durkon and Minrah are nevertheless correct about the flaws in Redcloak's plan. But the fact that Burlew chose to contrive a situation where the "white saviors" are objectively correct makes me a little uncomfortable. I still like OotS and am not going to scream "#cancelrichburlew" or anything, I just think that it's a meaningful negative criticism of the work.
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Aug 24, 2020 23:47
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Minrah's takedown of Redcloak is music to my... uh, eyes. He's needed a dressing down for ages, but there's never been anyone around who could realistically do it. And maybe that's kind of the problem? Last time he faced any kind of equal verbal sparring partner was O-Chul, and I am just realising that was over the exact same kind of mistake. Redcloak had formed his pet theory, and he was going to stick to it despite all evidence and arguments to the contrary. Redcloak's plan has sort of become its own end for him. It sustains itself. He's made it so core to his identity -- and why wouldn't he, it's almost literally the only thing that's kept him going for so long, what with the longevity of the red cloak and all not to mention he's literally named after it -- that any challenge to it becomes a challenge against Redcloak himself. And as he's, I think it's fair to say, kind of an arrogant egotist, he obviously won't stand for that. His "I won't have earned the win if I don't kill you myself" transfers to the plan at large. Even if all of his goals are accomplished, unless it's by his hand, in his way, it doesn't count to him. He's completely lost his ability to separate himself from his cause -- or rather, his own narrow interpretation of it. Redcloak is a grand illustration of "never forget what exactly it is you're fighting for" and against carrying on "the fight" just for the sake of continuing the fighting.
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Aug 24, 2020 23:49
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A.o.D. posted:How about dungeons and dragons cosmology? That's the one where demons are not made of matter but coalesced evil. They dont need food and drink to survive, but instead have to cause suffering and destruction to exist. They don't have independant agency to not do this. They aren't roaches that just happen to have sapience. They are malevolent extra dimensional spirits that just happen to look like roaches. Is this how OotS actually handles demons/other outsiders though? Sabine has independent agency, and she's not entirely motivated by evil; she also cares about Nale, and wants good things for him, irrespective of whether those things are evil or not for other people. And she already helped the Order do good once (albeit for revenge reasons), and seems like she might be in a position to help them out again (V still has two more brownouts to go). So she cuts against the idea that demons (or possibly devils? who remembers) are just coalesced evil that has no moral choice but to do evil stuff. More broadly, I feel like one of the big themes of OotS is that alignment is a really reductive way of conceptualizing morality, and that sentient beings are always way more complicated and interesting than a simple label can sum up. But if that reductivist perspective is definitionally true in some cases, then it undercuts the whole message in a way that doesn't seem meaningful or likely.
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Aug 24, 2020 23:50
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For some reason lately when reading Redcloak in the comic, I'm reminded a lot of Miko, and particularly Soon's final lines to Miko.
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Aug 24, 2020 23:55
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I hope Belkar will be the one who talks "sense" into Redcloak help save the world, and all of the goblins. Also the demon roaches more than outstayed their welcome by hundreds of strips and sending them back to  (please don't actually fight me my 1 level of commoner with several one digit stats isn't good at it)
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Aug 24, 2020 23:56
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DontMockMySmock posted:Recloak is basically saying "I choose to use violence to get equality for goblinoids, rather than accept your peaceful deal, because I don't trust that these peaceful methods will actually work and that those who have historically oppressed us won't turn around and backstab us, too. I know that this path is risky, and that goblinoids may die, but I think it's a better chance than trusting our oppressors." Honestly, that seems like a reasonable position, to to have it be portrayed as evil is kind of problematic. Your argument falls apart when you define what Redcloak is doing as "using violence to get equality." Redcloak using violence to get equality is *at worst* portrayed as neutral. The story is in fact pretty blunt about the fact that it's a net positive for him and it was never expressed as something that needs to stop. This is not a case of "The Goblins are UNJUST SAVAGES who need to be civilized." They are already civilized. Civilized does include "murder, torture and conquest" but we have been given plenty of examples in-setting that that is not exclusive to Goblins. Goblins just got crapped on by the gods so they don't get to be treated similarly *despite* being the same as anyone else. Redcloak's failing isn't using violence to liberate his people because the story never criticizes him for that. His failing is that at the end of the day he's unwilling to look at any other path. You can argue he's right to distrust Durkon but it isn't the only time this has come up. Redcloak has The Plan and he will stick to The Plan come hell or high water. Redcloak just happens to be the only person in the entire world who *could* make this decision and so it is him, not Goblins, that Durkon is trying to get through to and that includes his flaws. It is one Cleric to another, not a "white savior" coming to a "savage." If the story was like "how dare those Goblins not sit down and be polite" then you might have a point but it isn't. This is not a series where violence is shown to be ineffective or the wrong answer, nor one that judges the Goblins for rising up against the people who slaughtered them.
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Aug 25, 2020 00:02
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Yeah, we really haven't seen much of the worldwide hatred and disdain for goblins in the comic. Gobbotopia managed to get international recognition as a state. I'm not entirely sure what "equal rights for goblins" would entail that they don't already have some access to. That's not a term that particularly means much in a medieval pastiche. And I also don't think Redcloak personally has much of an idea of what it would mean either, hence why he never had a plan or idea of what bargaining would even be like in the first place. The plan has a lot of ??? between releasing the Snarl and profit.
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Aug 25, 2020 00:20
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My read has always been that Redcloak's fundamental problem is that killing a Goblin is inherently a good deed per the laws of the world. Having a recognised state doesn't fix that problem; even if you're a big enough deal on the world stage that less people are willing to take the risk of burning down a goblin village for the sake of righteousness, it would still be the case that it is righteous. Gobbotopia could never hope to be more than an evil empire, whose collapse is a self-evidently good thing no matter what they are actually doing. This is where Durkon went wrong in his negotiations. He tried to propose addressing the surface effects of the problem, in helping Gobbotopia to obtain that independent statehood, but didn't consider the root cause making it a problem in the first place. It plays in further to that whole "white saviour" thing, but it doesn't paint him in a good light for doing it. Redcloak agreed to talk terms; Durkon failed to demonstrate that he even had the capacity to understand what the goblins want. The end goal, of removing that "always evil" designation from the goblins, is achievable through the gods that have control of those levers. Even if for whatever reason they can't change the metaphysics of the world in runtime to do that, the Good gods can still communicate to their followers that they no longer recognise killing a goblin as a good deed inherently.
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Aug 25, 2020 00:30
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Regalingualius posted:The Order of the Stick: Come for the D&D Webcomic, Stay for the Debates On Killing Roaches At least it's not another alignment argument.
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Aug 25, 2020 00:49
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SKULL.GIF posted:For some reason lately when reading Redcloak in the comic, I'm reminded a lot of Miko, and particularly Soon's final lines to Miko. If Redcloak gets stripped of class powers because The Dark One doesn't approve of his behavior (attacking someone who offers to broker a peace deal), I will be pretty disappointed in Rich. Paladins losing their powers is a standard bit of lore but clerics losing powers is much more extreme. D20SRD says "A cleric who grossly violates the code of conduct required by his god" so I can't see Redcloak blundering into it. The only thing I can imagine Redcloak doing that would be enough of a betrayal to be immediately stripped of powers would be to accept Durkon's deal and pull The Dark One's quiddity into a rift-sealing spell.
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Aug 25, 2020 01:03
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I could see the thing that Jirix left out of his visit with The Dark One (still banking on the theory that every crayon drawing is somewhere in between a bald-faced lie or a story that's been so warped by Telephone Game retellings that it barely resembles the truth) being that The Dark One is at death's door, deifically speaking. I'm torn between it being an attempt by Jirix to spare Redcloak's feelings and what appears to be mortals not precisely remembering what happened in the Afterlife.
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Aug 25, 2020 01:37
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SlothfulCobra posted:Yeah, we really haven't seen much of the worldwide hatred and disdain for goblins in the comic. Gobbotopia managed to get international recognition as a state. I'm not entirely sure what "equal rights for goblins" would entail that they don't already have some access to. That's not a term that particularly means much in a medieval pastiche. That's a fair point. Most of the events that set up Redcloak's side here are in Start of Darkness, to the point where I'd call it required reading as we go into Redcloak's endgame.
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Aug 25, 2020 01:54
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Wanderer posted:That's a fair point. Most of the events that set up Redcloak's side here are in Start of Darkness, to the point where I'd call it required reading as we go into Redcloak's endgame. Link to $12 pdf for anyone who hasn't read it. Rich's SEO is, unsurprisingly, low key; a google just turns up lovely pirate links. In fact, I'll buy this for the first three people to quote this post bc I love this story so much.
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Aug 25, 2020 02:00
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Tenebrais posted:My read has always been that Redcloak's fundamental problem is that killing a Goblin is inherently a good deed per the laws of the world. Having a recognised state doesn't fix that problem; even if you're a big enough deal on the world stage that less people are willing to take the risk of burning down a goblin village for the sake of righteousness, it would still be the case that it is righteous. Gobbotopia could never hope to be more than an evil empire, whose collapse is a self-evidently good thing no matter what they are actually doing. Part of the problem here, as Durkon made sure to point out, is that he couldn't promise that the rules of reality could be rewritten right off the bat; but they could use it to take it as a starting point to take back to Thor to get the other Gods eventually on board and begin a complicated process. It isn't I think merely a matter of Durkon not grasping the fundamental problem, though there is definitely that possibility especially to his eagerness in some panels to be like, "aha, so its just a matter of good land then?"; but there are other considerations that make it difficult if not impossible to concretely give Redcloak what he wants; but part of the problem is more he got bogged down trying to chase down rabbit holes of what he could offer Redcloak now versus about instead trying to build some kind of diplomatic relationship with Redcloak to get on the same level of understanding. Basically he tried too hard to find a solution instead of trying to get Redcloak to trust him that he's interested into finding said solution.
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Aug 25, 2020 02:09
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Tenebrais posted:My read has always been that Redcloak's fundamental problem is that killing a Goblin is inherently a good deed per the laws of the world. Having a recognised state doesn't fix that problem; even if you're a big enough deal on the world stage that less people are willing to take the risk of burning down a goblin village for the sake of righteousness, it would still be the case that it is righteous. Gobbotopia could never hope to be more than an evil empire, whose collapse is a self-evidently good thing no matter what they are actually doing. In fairness, Durkon, by himself, cannot guarantee the gods remove that designation, and both he and Redcloak know that. It's not unexpected that the first meeting didn't solve everything all in one go. At best, this was always going to be a starting point for further negotiations. It seems a little unfair to be criticizing Durkon for not offering what he has no power to guarantee.
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Aug 25, 2020 02:16
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sebmojo posted:Link to $12 pdf for anyone who hasn't read it. I've been meaning to but it for years but never had, so I'd love to take you up on it.
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Aug 25, 2020 02:17
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:In fairness, Durkon, by himself, cannot guarantee the gods remove that designation, and both he and Redcloak know that. It's not unexpected that the first meeting didn't solve everything all in one go. At best, this was always going to be a starting point for further negotiations. It seems a little unfair to be criticizing Durkon for not offering what he has no power to guarantee. He could have at least tried to bring it to the gods and treated Redcloak’s demand with some amount of respect. Instead, he basically ignored the demand entirely and tried to bludgeon him over the head with threats of the gods ending the world and all goblins dying.
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Aug 25, 2020 02:25
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