I think my favourite settings are 2nd ed. - Planescape, Ravenloft and Dark Sun are all of that era. Never really got into Spelljammer, though.
Data point: in Blood Runs in the Family, in the introduction to “Round 2: Face the Nation” (which starts at strip 699), Rich Burlew says:
I agree with this. I thought the same. Except that Redcloak’s motivation is the Sunk Costs Fallacy. He’s invested too much into the plan to abandon it.
I can’t imagine that the Dark One would bother with the Crimson Mantle and ritual to move the Gates, etc if his same goals could be accomplished by just getting a bunch of goblins in one spot and adding a couple high level commanders.
The Dark One doesn’t want to just capture a city or kingdom – those can be reclaimed by getting enough of someone else in one spot and adding a couple high level commanders. The Dark One wants to force his permanent seat at the table that he was denied when the world was made.
Which is not at all an unreasonable goal on his part, seeing as how he and the goblin people really are an oppressed minority based on history.
Infodump #1
I do like the fact that the “infield fly rule” and “sha-na-na” are ideas that don’t matter.
Let me correct that: Sha-na-na is an idea no one remembers.
Note that the ideas that became places are the outer planes located pretty much in the same place as in the standard diagram. The words written around them could be thought of as their slogans.
That splash panel (am I webcomic nouning right?) is my new favorite explanation of alignment.
Props for “you can’t tell me what to do,” being written around a square, too.
Clearly a comic written by someone who’s thought about this stuff so much that it’s no longer at all complicated to him. Allows him to make it simple for everyone.
Nice–I hadn’t noticed that.
Oooo.
The big ideas are opposing on the color wheel, too.
Black/White
Orange/Blue
Green/Red
It’s one of the best strips he’s written for this comic. Really gets back to the roots of what OOTS was: a vehicle for deconstructing D&D and the inconsistencies that make up its world, while making us laugh, and along the way turning into one hell of a fantasy epic.
The splash panel for the alignment wheel is the best treatment of it I’ve ever seen. Not that it will stop people from arguing about alignment.
Are silver cords no longer a thing on the Astral Plane?
“No one lives here except for a few trademarked creatures that know better than to bother us.” LOL There’s a bunch of great one liners in this strip.
“No one lives here except for a few trademarked creatures that know better than to bother us.”
MITD hint?
Only one way to tell. Let’s argue for another 500 pages.
I have a question that this comic brought up: What exactly was Durkoff?
Thor talks in this comic about how Durkon feels nauseous because of all his memories shoved together. But Durkon was around for all of it. He was imprisoned, but he could still see. He could still experience. So all those memories he’s now carrying around wouldn’t necessarily be new ones, just doubled up.
Unless the vampire in his mind was a completely separate entity. If so…where did it come from? Did it have a life prior to controlling Durkon? Was it originally inside Malack? Was it a soul that was drawn from Hel?
It was an elemental spirit that Hel planted in Durkon when Malach turned into a vampire. If I’m following the story correctly, these elemental spirits move in naturally to anyone who’s turned into a vampire and absorb their memories. The only difference with Durkon was that his elemental spirit was already committed to serving Hel.
While Durkon and Durkula were sharing one body, they still maintained two separate mental existences. They could observe what each other was doing and Durkula could summon Durkon’s memories to observe them. But Durkon and Durkula could not tell what the other one was thinking. So they could keep secrets from each other a long as they never mentioned them out loud.
So Durkon already had memories of everything Durkula said and did but it was as an outside observer. Now he has memories of those same events as Durkula experienced them, including the feelings Durkula had at the time.
Reference to the Githyanki/Githzerai which are on the “Product Identity List” for WotC and are considered trademarked properties. Early on in the comic they did a joke about the Mind Flayer and Beholder being on the same list (and introduced the two lawyers who whisked away the Mind Flayer as not allowed to be in the comic).
Silver cords connect a living person’s body to their astral form. None of the characters in this comic have living bodies.
“Why are you eating him?? I am a wizard! A delectable 18 Intelligence right before you!”
“Would you feel better if one of us ate your brain?”
“No, it just wouldn’t be the same.” sigh