I bet Roy will win by kicking some sand in Thog’s face.
<Elan looks horrified at what Roy did>
Tarquin: <looks at the horrified Elan> “Ah ha! Finally someone I can kill whose death will make you happy! Guards…”
<Elan looks more horrified>
nm
- Nale springs his trap.
Tsukiko will kill her if she tries anything…
- Thog beats Roy, but Elan calls down to him not to kill Roy, and Thog obeys out of friendship for Not-Nale.
Thog is something else. He is the exact opposite of Roy. Roy is extremely Lawful Good. Thog is Chaotic Evil. Thog and Elan can relate, but Thog is everything Roy detests.
Edit: Good point, Peter. Thog’s been killing people while Roy’s been dead. Thog may be a level up on our heroes now.
Unless the nemesis level-up mechanism works both ways.
Quoth Miller:
Elan and Thog’s mini-adventure should serve as evidence that Thog can do good, when he’s away from the bad influence of Nale and Sabine, and Elan’s had plenty of time by now to tell Roy all about that. And yes, Roy detests Big Dumb Fighters, but one of the things he detests about them is the inclination to think first of violence when solving problems. In short, Thog is redeemable, Roy knows it, and Roy is the type to value redemption where possible.
I’m sure Elan told Roy all about his adventures. But what are the odds Roy was listening when he did it?
Also, what good deeds did Thog do when he was running around with Elan?
I don’t remember Thog doing any good with Elan - he just did what Elan told him to do. If Elan had told him to kill a bunch of innocent people, he would have done it just as happily.
He can’t be saved because there’s essentially nothing there to save. Thog doesn’t have the mental capacity to be good.
He doesn’t have the mental capacity to be evil either. He basically does whatever he’s told. He has, unfortunately, fallen under the command of Nale who uses him as a tool for evil purposes. If he worked for Roy, he could do good instead.
He has shown capacity for kindness, though. He wants to save Nale when he thinks Nale is lost without a trail of breadcrumbs. When Nale kidnapped the blacksmith, Thog thinks he’s taking care of a puppy, and doesn’t understand he’s hurting a real person. If he were to increase his intelligence, and realise how he’s hurting innocent people, he’d stop the violence in an instant.
In fact he did kill innocent people. I can’t find it, but he offhandedly kills a friendly female (a slyph or some such IIRC) in mid-sentence just out of sight of Elan.
You’re probably thinking of this strip, when Thog was acting on Nale’s plan.
Thog may technically be Chaotic Evil, but in the practical sense he’s Chaotic Has-The-Mind-Of-A-Five-Year-Old. He doesn’t know any better.
Thog’s approach to things seems to be to figure out who’s in charge and do whatever they say. Wouldn’t that make him technically lawful neutral?
I don’t think so - anyone who can change allegiances that quickly and easily isn’t really “lawful,” in my book. True neutral, maybe - he’s genuinely unconcerned with good or evil, law or chaos. He just goes whichever way the wind is blowing him at the time.
But I’d still say neutral evil or chaotic evil. If you’re running around butchering innocent people by the bushel, you’re evil, full stop. Even if you’ve got a charmingly child-like demeanor while you do it.
There’s also the matter that he likes killing. “Yay! Resisting arrest is fun!”. And even Nale and Sabine have some fear of him, as evidenced by their worry about running out of ice cream to keep him (semi-)pacified. There’s no doubt that, as he is right now, he’s evil.
Don’t tell me that Nale fooled you with that lame frame-up! Actually, you’re even worse off than the Cliffport authorities; they only imprisoned Elan for that crime because they thought Elan was Nale, not because they actually thought Elan murdered anybody.
Chaotic Neutral? No thought for consequences, can be looking for puppies one minute and chopping someone in half the next…