From this comic. The demon roach dialogue in the 8th panel.
Are you sure? Check out the scene at the Azure City Gate when Xykon attacked. Look at the second panel of the second page. Who was that hooded figure present when a Gate was under attack?
That was just the paladin in the doo-rag in the third panel with his hood up.
Thanks! My old eyes could barely read that.
No, you can see do-rag paladin and hooded paladin lying next to each other in the final panel.
But I don’t think hooded paladin was anything other than a paladin with his hood up. Like this jerk.
It’s possible. But notice that the hooded character is not wearing a Sapphire Guard uniform (they’re all a different shade of blue). And the hooded character is one of the few people in the room who wasn’t affected by Xykon’s spell. And all the other characters either went crazy or followed O’Chul’s orders to attack Xykon.
So the hooded character does seem to stand out from the crowd for some reason which isn’t apparent. And it would not be out of character for Burlew to make a glancing reference to some important plotline that will only become clear in retrospect a couple of thousand strips later.
Maaaaybe. The Sapphire Guard uniform doesn’t seem to always involve the same shade of blue. Do-rag paladin’s cloak appears to be the same color as hooded guy. The samurai stabbing hooded guy doesn’t have any blue on at all, hardly. Likewise, in the second page, as O-chul is running up the steps to the throne, there’s a paladin wearing a white cloak standing next to the stairs. Neither does the woman killing herself after all the other paladins are dead have much blue on (fun note: symbol of insanity is a permanent effect, so she was never driven crazy by the spell: she’s killing herself out of grief over killing enough of her friends that she survived.) The “uniform” of the sapphire guards isn’t all that uniform. I suspect that guy just wears a different shade of blue for his cloak, and Rich drew him with the hood up because it was an easy way to distinguish him from all the other paladins.
Also, if you look at the page before that, when Xykon shows up in the throne room, you can see hooded guy in the crowd of paladins. Presumably, in however long they were all standing there, waiting for the throne room to be attacked, someone would have noticed, “Hey, I don’t remember you from the Sapphire Guard Christmas party…”
So, I think we can agree, who ever hooded guy is, he’s probably a jerk.
And it’s only to be expected that there’d be a few paladins who weren’t affected by the spell: That just means that they made their saving throws. If anything, it’s surprising that more didn’t save: Will is a good save for paladins, they usually have at least a half-decent Wisdom (since they use it for casting spells), and they also get to add their Charisma to their saving throws. Yeah, most of them would still probably fail a save against one of Xykon’s high-level spells, but I’d expect it to be a smaller proportion than what’s shown.
We do see several paladins who either made their saving throw or weren’t hit by Xykon’s spell. But all the unaffected paladins are doing something; either fighting or trying to destroy the Gate. Why was the hooded character just standing there?
I’m not saying this proves the hooded character is a member of some mysterious secret organization. But I do stand by my belief that this character is not just another paladin in the crowd.
He is just a guy in a hood. He may be some sort of special Paladin class, or a multi-classed Paladin-magic user. In the panel you linked to he is being killed, so not just standing there. He is standing with the sapphire guard when they attack Xykon. The Sapphire guard would not allow an agent of a cult that opposed them to wander freely. The “Holey brotherhood” was a one off joke. We’re more likely to see a return to the elemental plane of ranch dressing than the Holey brotherhood.
New Comic: #1045: Studying Up
It’s quite the power boost to be able to summon the green flame effect at will. I wonder if making it ranged would take too much.
… Or for narrative purposes, it would be hilarious if Roy had to take a level of Wizard to unlock the ranged abilities.
I can’t remember. Was there a promise that he wouldn’t come back to haunt Roy? Or am I just manufacturing a memory?
No, he promised not to look up Roy or his family if/when he got beyond the golden gates into the “real” afterlife.
Yeah, that’s probably what I’m (mis-) remembering.
Oddly quiet around here. Guess there’s not much to say? We already discussed weapons of legacy, I guess.
I for one liked that we got to read the book for once.
Well, it’s nice that Papa Greenhilt is presumably here to help / castigate Roy about using will with magic items or whatever. The plot, it oozes. I lurv Berlew, but so slow.