We’ve also never seen Thog go into a rage before this, so he might have had it all along, and never used it until now.
Nah, there’s no way this isn’t a barbarian rage. He even turned a darker green color, to make the “hulking out” association stronger. While the call back to 114 is certainly intentional, Roy getting pissed off and throwing a (relatively easy to grapple) spell caster through a portal isn’t quite the same thing as what we’re seeing Thog do here.
We have, actually. Albeit briefly.
prison changed thog.
He’s also raged before, in the Arena. You can tell, because his pants are already purple at the start of the fight with Roy.
Thog was only in there for 40 minutes.
prison change thog quickly.
Quote of the day: “super-advanced flying stealth dinosaur”
Heh. I wonder if Burlew has been conferring with Ryan North.
Now, that’s a pity. A line like that getting uttered, and Elan’s not even there to hear it.
And a familiar of a wizard of V’s level should have an Int of 13 (i.e., noticeably above average), while an imp is around 10 (average). So Blackwing outsmarting Qarr is to be expected.
Interesting to note that the three fiends plans for V apparently require V to be morally compromised, to the extent that they’re actively trying to whack his familiar for giving him good advice. It seems there may be more to it than simply seizing control of V’s body at an [in]opportune time.
Update on the books:
So if Roy’s leg moved, is he at 0 HP and can’t do much else? I guess a person can twitch or even speak at 0 HP and still be alive or at least Crystal could. Or is he maybe playing possum?
No he wasn’t. thog was barely paying attention while they were talking, and he still seemed to be holding his own. Roy’s an optimized build when it comes to talking down to people, less so for actually fighting
I think that was just thog’s regular old Greater Rage, (11th level barbarian ability, +6 to Str and Con, +3 to Will Saves) no prestige classes needed. He’s mellow and rarely fights challenging opponents, he’s probably never raged onscreen except for the prison break.
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Deliberately building an ineffective character does not, in and of itself, constitute proof of your awesome roleplaying skills.
Where the heck do we think Durkon is right now? I don’t recall him being around since way back in #764, 33 strips ago. Was there dialog about his whereabouts since the gladiator match began?
He was mentioned in 775: “He indicated that he wished to finalize his research, in the event that we depart presently.”
0 HP is the simplest explanation: A person at 0 can just lie there indefinitely, or they can attempt to take a single action, but if that action doesn’t restore any HP, then they’ll drop to -1 and start dying.
Then again, though, Roy has a ton of HP (any warrior-type of his level does), and it’d take rather a while for even a raging barbarian to wear him down completely. And while he looks rather the worse for wear, he doesn’t really look all that bad, in the grand scheme of things. For comparison, Hinjo probably has about the same number of HP as Roy, and he’s looked much worse without being killed. So it might just be a bluff on Roy’s part, to wait out Thog’s rage.
Of course not. Awesome roleplaying comes into play when trying to justify the most extreme of cheese 
ETA: also, where does Qarr get off, calling Blackwing a “glorified class feature” ? Isn’t he one too ?
Actually, yes. The best roleplaying I’ve ever done was with a character whose history and personality were developed around a rather ridiculous build.
Nope. A pre-familiar Qarr was still a sapient being who lured a high level mage into making a deal with the devils. A pre-familiar Blackwing was just a bird.
One of my favorite characters ever was in 3rd edition (I think) and was a gnome illusionist/monk. Another I liked a lot was a halfling barbarian. Extremely fun to play.
Totally ridiculous. But totally fun.
So he’s kicking people in the shins while laughing as they ineffectually swing for the illusory chin of his 6’-tall image?