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skaianDestiny posted:He just calls her Alice when she says her name is Alice-Un (Allison), y'know, like Yis-Un. I personally like to call her "al YISUN" but that isn't as well supported by the text. Also, while Zoss is probably not a reliable narrator, I think he's likely to prove more accurate than Jagganoth. Jaggs by his own account still doesn't understand or remember everything about the cycle he's stuck in and we have no reason to take his assertion that Zoss and Metatron are in cahoots as truth. I can see why Jagg believes it, but he's viewing everything from inside the wheel, as opposed to Zoss's standpoint somewhat alongside it. fake edit: why does anyone think Zaid would be the successor anyways? He hasn't gotten much screen time or development, but he's basically an early 20s jerk with no noticable traits. All of Allison's roomies think he's a jerk and she's essentially using him to lose her virginity at the start of the story precisely because he's a pushy jerk. actual edit: Huh, I just realized that Allison is a gold star lesbian. Thanks for the save, Zoss!
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Nov 30, 2021 14:03
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habeasdorkus posted:fake edit: why does anyone think Zaid would be the successor anyways? He hasn't gotten much screen time or development, but he's basically an early 20s jerk with no noticable traits. All of Allison's roomies think he's a jerk and she's essentially using him to lose her virginity at the start of the story precisely because he's a pushy jerk. Jadis told them so.
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Nov 30, 2021 14:15
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Zaid seems like a pretty mediocre guy, but he did call out Solomon David as a tyrant to his face basically the first time we see him conscious in the comic. Even as Solomon was doing the whole "You, make protagonist, are destined to be Zoss's heir and also, I'm looking for someone to take over my empire, hint hint..." From that, I could see, if Zoss gave Zaid the Key, him immediately setting to righting injustices and fighting the demiurges, but lacking the self-doubts and inner struggles we've seen with Allison. So he'd just recreate the failed path and get chumped by Jagganoth. I think if Zaid was just a crappy jerk, it'd undermine what makes Alison remarkable. It's not that Zoss needed to find a better sort of person to use his power rightly, he needs someone who isn't a better hero, he needs someone who's not really hero material at all! I still think Allison got the key by mistake, but Zoss is realizing that makes giving her his key an act of trust and actually letting go of control, something he hasn't tried before with his handpicked heirs.
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Nov 30, 2021 15:40
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habeasdorkus posted:fake edit: why does anyone think Zaid would be the successor anyways? He hasn't gotten much screen time or development, but he's basically an early 20s jerk with no noticable traits. All of Allison's roomies think he's a jerk and she's essentially using him to lose her virginity at the start of the story precisely because he's a pushy jerk. According to one version of the story Zoss bullied his way into Heaven and swirlied the angels until they coughed up their lunch money, so a pushy jerk sounds like a pretty good place to start looking for a successor. And, well, Zaid probably isn't the worst guy that fits that description.
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Nov 30, 2021 17:42
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Zaid is plausibly the kind of dude that punches hell of suckers on the mouth and tells girls straight up that he likes them, a shoe-in to become a king and therefore exactly what Zoss is looking for in an heir, which of course is why it'd never work.
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Nov 30, 2021 20:17
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Bongo Bill posted:Zaid is plausibly the kind of dude that punches hell of suckers on the mouth and tells girls straight up that he likes them, a shoe-in to become a king and therefore exactly what Zoss is looking for in an heir, which of course is why it'd never work. Amazing he turned out like that after presumably going through school.
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Nov 30, 2021 21:07
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Bongo Bill posted:Zaid is plausibly the kind of dude that punches hell of suckers on the mouth and tells girls straight up that he likes them, a shoe-in to become a king and therefore exactly what Zoss is looking for in an heir, which of course is why it'd never work. I think Abaddon said somewhere that Zaid was basically as much of an awkward virgin as Allison so that's probably out. TBH Allison was a pretty unremarkable person to begin with too, and Zoss has a whole multiverse to choose his chosen one from so I'm guessing it's nothing exceptional about the person's character that is the deciding factor.
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Nov 30, 2021 21:13
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YaketySass posted:I think Abaddon said somewhere that Zaid was basically as much of an awkward virgin as Allison so that's probably out. TBH Allison was a pretty unremarkable person to begin with too, and Zoss has a whole multiverse to choose his chosen one from so I'm guessing it's nothing exceptional about the person's character that is the deciding factor. i so far think that no one actually deserves the power more or less than anyone else so there is no deserving heir there's just people who get it
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Nov 30, 2021 21:17
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habeasdorkus posted:
Preeetty sure Allison’s not a TERF, so she wouldn’t think that.
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Nov 30, 2021 21:37
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habeasdorkus posted:actual edit: Huh, I just realized that Allison is a gold star lesbian. Thanks for the save, Zoss! This is bi erasure, prepare to be cancelled
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Nov 30, 2021 22:57
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Shugojin posted:i so far think that no one actually deserves the power more or less than anyone else so there is no deserving heir there's just people who get it Yeah, everything with the Keys feels more like a musing on power itself rather than a morality tale of good and bad people. Mottom was a likely abused wife who killed her monstrous husband, basically out of fear, and inherited his power, his title, and his monstrosity. Solomon was a man who lost everything and went to avenge his family and homeland, to rebuild Rayuba, and became a tyrant in the process. The other five seem to have less noble intentions (though they're also the only two we really get detail on the specifics of "How they became a demiurge"), but those two could easily have been the backstories of much more righteous individuals. That, and seeing the scene where Allison slaps Mottom she's got a line about her role that feels really significant: "It shouldn't be me. But it is. This is me." There's nothing about Allison's character that marks her better or worse for power, or makes her part of some ancient kung-fu wizard's grand plan, she's just the person who happened to get the Key and, hopefully, rises to the occasion. Also, I thing I'm noting on reread is how Solomon David is just the smallest loving guy. Like the alt text notes he always shows up better dressed to the final duel of the Circle of Strength. It's the pettiest loving thing, that the God Emperor wears a fancier gi than the one he clearly supplied to his challenger. It's not even "slightly better dressed" he's got a pure white robe on with embroidered flowers while White Chain's is slightly more gray and has no embroidery. It kinda gets at how hollow the whole thing is, that Solomon knows nobody can actual beat him, and yet he still has to give them a ding at the start. Or how he tells his sons at the start of Book Four, "My crown was won with blood" but leaves out that he had the power to take the crown in the first place because he begged the monks of Ki Rata to take him in or else he'd commit suicide. He learned Ki Rata not by being the hardest man alive, but by begging! And now he looks down on everyone else who didn't learn Ki Rata even though he's the reason nobody can learn Ki Rata anymore!
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Nov 30, 2021 23:58
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Solomon Two Scoops David
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Dec 1, 2021 00:11
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Solomon, Mottom, and Incubus all have arcs that have very easily seen them being the heroic protagonist we are rooting for in a story.
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Dec 1, 2021 00:38
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Mammon was the protagonist of a business tycoon game that got way out of hand.
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Dec 1, 2021 00:44
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GlyphGryph posted:Solomon, Mottom, and Incubus all have arcs that have very easily seen them being the heroic protagonist we are rooting for in a story. This is really the crucial element: They're all 'heroic' individuals who fought incredible odds to achieve cosmic power. So is Jagganoth! (And so is Maya) They're also all deeply stagnant, taking their traumas out on an entire universe, and cannot solve problems without the overwhelming exercise of force because that was the only way they could get to where they are now. They are all supremely poisoned by the sword, Jagganoth is just the most poisoned by the sword.
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Dec 1, 2021 00:57
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I see Allison as kind of like Frodo with the Ring in that the key of kings is this kind of artifact that would bring out the worst in a person with any real ambition, but Allison wants nothing it can give her. That makes her an ideal person to do with it what should be done with it. I expect that will mean destroying or otherwise neutralizing it in the end.
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Dec 1, 2021 01:47
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If Zoss has really been choosing the same exact kinda guy over and over for countless cycles then he deserves this whole tormented slave to the wheel thing. Grow a single creative bone in your body, man.
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Dec 1, 2021 07:50
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Pigbuster posted:If Zoss has really been choosing the same exact kinda guy over and over for countless cycles then he deserves this whole tormented slave to the wheel thing. Grow a single creative bone in your body, man. I suspect it's meant to be at least somewhat metaphorical, rather than literal, in depiction. We see a lot of Zaid-looking guys, but the core meaning of that might be 'people hand-picked by Zoss, who will therefore reflect Zoss' sense of who will be most suited to this.' Allison being more or less a randomly chosen heir, a repressed dork who's been denying her own basic personality for years, seems like she wasn't chosen for any reason at all, while many varieties of heroes, killers, and saints could have been chosen before. I do think that the Tolkien comparison is interesting, but has some crucial issues - for one, I don't think this is a comic that is actually against either ambition or the Will to Power exactly. Remember that the original prototype for Zoss was Literally Friedrich Nietzsche, so while I would be surprised if Zoss hasn't branched away from that a bunch I don't think Abaddon is going to abandon some Nietzschean themes. But, I think that the desire for absolute vindication and certainty is part of what's being criticized as stagnant. And Allison in particular isn't actually without ambition! She has grasped for power, because she feels that being powerless is unbearable. But violence is not the path to self-actualization, to the kind of power the comic is interested in approaching - strength beyond strength, as Zoss put it.
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Dec 1, 2021 08:27
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What even IS 'Strength beyond Strength'
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Dec 1, 2021 15:27
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Grouchio posted:What even IS 'Strength beyond Strength' 
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Dec 1, 2021 15:43
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Grouchio posted:What even IS 'Strength beyond Strength' Friendship, of course.
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Dec 1, 2021 15:46
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When the average person in KSBD has the vitality of a mayfly, I kinda doubt a socialist revolution is going to attack and dethrone Jags UNLESS it was worms
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Dec 1, 2021 15:47
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Grouchio posted:What even IS 'Strength beyond Strength' Allison's had a consistent line for the past few books of "I want/need to get stronger," but she never really investigates what she thinks "stronger" means. She says "I don't want to feel helpless," which leads her to do really ill-conceived things like cutting deals with Incubus and letting her survival instincts run wild, isolating her and nearly killing her in Mammon's vault. She, like the demiurges, pursues "strength," but her conception of strength means her pursuit of it is in vain. It's sort of like the Diogenes quote, "If you learned to flatter the king, you wouldn't have to eat lentils"/"If you learned to eat lentils, you wouldn't have to flatter the king." Characters in bad situations (monstrous husband, desperate poverty, lifetime of servitude, worms) seek power through violence to get out of that bad situation, but that violence necessitates that they seek more power through more violence until they find themselves at the peak of their strength and totally ruled by their insecurities. Mottom bewails that her glamorous life is a prison, Mammon's high priestess sympathizes with her trapped god, and White Chain throws it in Solomon's face while under his boot. If they had sought the serenity to accept the things they cannot change, the courage to change the things they can, and the wisdom to know the difference, they'd be in a much better place than their current strategy of seeking to dominate the entire universe so nothing can threaten them again. Because that path only led to millennia of miserable terror and endless violence upon everyone beneath them, while the former can lead to compassion, enlightenment, and growth. Strength beyond strength is looking to grow strong in a way outside the narrow definition of strength. Zoss keeps seeking the right person to inherit his key, but that just means he keeps poisoning his heir with his own conception of Royalty, which always leads to the same end. Allison doesn't like feeling helpless, but what she needs isn't to rush the stadium and try to sucker punch Solomon, it's to put trust in White Chain, her friend and mentor. It's to ask Cio for help and value her as a partner, it's to stop being ruled by her self doubts, but also, to accept the things beyond her control.
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Dec 1, 2021 16:11
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Grouchio posted:What even IS 'Strength beyond Strength' I thought you got it with the Sword of Omens but I guess that's just sight beyond sight
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Dec 1, 2021 18:05
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TwoPair posted:I thought you got it with the Sword of Omens but I guess that's just sight beyond sight Right?? What the hell childhood memories. Next youre going to tell me that Ultra Magnus wasn't pulled apart by energy lassos by the Sweeps and they just shot him to death.
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Dec 1, 2021 18:08
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Phy posted:Right?? What the hell childhood memories. Next youre going to tell me that Ultra Magnus wasn't pulled apart by energy lassos by the Sweeps and they just shot him to death. If only those storyboards had become reality
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Dec 1, 2021 18:18
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Hmm, the boilermaker union I once belonged to skipped over the turning into a horrifying flesh amalgam part. Maybe that's why it folded? it's because they became corrupt and stopped training apprentices, so when the old guard retired there was noone left World Famous W fucked around with this message at 19:52 on Dec 1, 2021 |
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Dec 1, 2021 19:49
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World Famous W posted:Hmm, the boilermaker union I once belonged to skipped over the turning into a horrifying flesh amalgam part. Maybe that's why it folded? Man, everyone says they wanna form Voltron but people keep backing out when they find out how it works
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Dec 1, 2021 19:54
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'Strength beyond strength' seems fairly straightforward. It's power and endurance beyond the generally-accepted measures of power and endurance. Jagganoth, for example, is an obvious pinnacle of strength - immortal and invulnerable with an unbreakable will and unstoppable might - but his strength is all of the world. He cannot transcend it, and is trapped just like everyone else. Strength beyond strength is what can break the rules that determine strength. Probably the best manifestation we've seen so far was White Chain's awakening, where she managed to change the rules of a hopeless game and win by an entirely new measure.
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Dec 1, 2021 21:30
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I think an important part is also just... accepting that other people are going to have agency, and dealing with them as such. Not expending every waking moment of your life in an intense and vicious game to stay Protagonist Of Reality.
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Dec 1, 2021 21:34
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Or maybe it's an empty loving platitude from an old man who failed.
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Dec 1, 2021 22:36
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Reclaimer posted:Or maybe it's an empty loving platitude from an old man who failed. As Yisun says, the best way to follow their teachings is to kindly ignore all their answers.
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Dec 1, 2021 23:09
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it's a Tarot thing but we still haven't got Allison wrestling a lion
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Dec 1, 2021 23:51
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YaketySass posted:it's a Tarot thing but we still haven't got Allison wrestling a lion that's just Strength. Strength Beyond Strength is Allison sharing a joint with a lion.
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Dec 2, 2021 00:01
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Reclaimer posted:Or maybe it's an empty loving platitude from an old man who failed. Thanks for the input, Incubus.
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Dec 2, 2021 03:18
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Looks like things are getting pretty close to wrapping up on the War for Rayuba discord. Sounds like there's been some really phenomenal comics in the contest, but it's been kind of challenging actually navigating it to find them. Ah well, hopefully there will be some kind of compilation in an easier to read format later on.
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Dec 2, 2021 06:56
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"Strength beyond strength" is just the strength to reject structures of worldly strength, or more exactly the rejection of the self-legitimising foundation of power as the first and final ideology, as was represented in Solomon and to varying degrees all of the demiurges. It is also very foolish, but that's part of the point of why it's heroic and a form of "strength". There were probably tens of thousands of "White Chains" that heroically went up against Stale Doritos, fully recognising their imminent deaths, and thereupon got chunked into fleshy/stony salsa. They knew their weakness, but had the courage or idiocy to accept death regardless for the barest chance of victory and something better, and White Chain's survival and flash transition was the culmination of this Royal will to self-possessed, self-sacrificing strength beyond strength. White Chain, as the de facto inheritor to an entire disgraced race and ideology of self-sacrifice and rebirth, is also a messianic figure and saviour for the faceless dead and her angelic forebears that struggled against the strength of evil and the evil of strength; she paid justice to them and validated the endless cycle of struggle by the weak against the strong with her karmic success against impossible odds, built upon the countless sacrifices of her Ring of Power predecessors and her literal prior incarnations, and thereby proved the final strength beyond strength of the meek and downtrodden, the final proof of the righteousness of her long struggle against the world and its evils. She did not fall to the corruption or apathy of her fellow angels, she lived to her ideals up to the point of once more embracing death, and her diligence was vindicated.
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Dec 6, 2021 00:27
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Strength Beyond Strength is a rarely used ability of the Sword of Omens, granting Lion-O the ability to perform exceptional feats of physical prowess.
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Dec 6, 2021 03:07
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Who What Now posted:Strength Beyond Strength is a rarely used ability of the Sword of Omens, granting Lion-O the ability to perform exceptional feats of physical prowess. This whole comic has actually been a backdoor pilot for Abaddon's Thundercats fanfic
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Dec 6, 2021 04:01
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Jagganoth is more a Mon*star analogue so it's obviously ThunderCats/Silver Hawks slash.
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Dec 6, 2021 07:27
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