Order of the Stick - 1105

Against

>giantitp.com/comics/oots0999.html

>forgetting Trump 2016

I really doubt the order will include two dwarf clerics, even temporarily. Either something horrible will happen to the new one, or Hilga (Hilgya, whatever her name was) will be rejected.

>Turn undead
>NOT rebuke undead
H-m-m-m-m-m-m. Really makes you think.

So, uh.
I guess the parentage isn't really in question.

>complaining about glacial updating and pacing.

Oots has been updating pretty frequently though as of the past few.. I wana say year? It feels like something must of happened because it's been 2017 and he's just been a regular little work horse which I love, I think we all love it.

Especially because all too often you get webcomic artists who become popular (and good, practice n' all that) and then they just cold-turkey drop their project and do something else now that they've got a platform.

It's because he finished that 100+ page, incredible How the Paladin Got His Scar comic, which was where most of his time was focused. Ever since that came out, his efforts and time have been on the main comic.

DUN DUN DUUUUN

I wonder how the plot will turn out now, I'm glad they finally brought her back

What's the AC on infant armor?

>the baby has stubble

Based. Or maybe "Dwarf Fortress'd"?

+5 against Good, Lawful and Neutral

>Wearing a baby into battle
Did she switch from worshipping Loki to Armok?

Fuck, that's a callback to more than 1000 strips ago.

My exact thinking when I first saw the baby.
I had completely forgotten that Durkon has gotten canonically laid.

At least it's not a callback in the epilogue to something that was only ever mentioned once, in the prologue.

We're not at that level of callback yet.

Not tgat surprised about Whatshername, but the baby I didn't expect.

>dwarf warrior chick caring baby to battle
Just like in Dwarf Fortress

This is the longest I've seen an oots thread go without a thog

Not really. She's the evil opposite of Durkon. Sort of like how the kobolds that Nale picks up, as Belkar's opposite, are either good or at worst neutral. Hilgya was an evil Cleric of Loki until such time as Durkon became Durkula, at which point something (and we'll probably find out in the next strip or two) happened to her to make her switch churches to a good deity, probably whichever one is most associated with life and fertility. Baldr, Frigg, or maybe Freyr (depending on how closely Burlew sticks to actual Norse deity attributes) are her most likely patrons now.

Wait what?

Wow, I forgot she existed. That's pretty neat

She's probably still Loki, but Loki's kinda invested in keeping the world around at the moment and doesn't want Hel fucking everything up.
Loki can be both Thor AND Hel's opposite, after all.

One of the kickstarter rewards was a comic promising to explain O-Chul's backstory and he really outdid himself. For comparison's sake, Belkar's was 12 pages, and Therkla's was 16. O-Chul's was 95 pages long and it obviously ate up a lot of his time because after it came out the updates picked up in pace since he wasn't splitting his attention between them.

basically this, the story discusses Canonical Rivals earlier on with Haley's arc. They sort of just mirror the main crew.

>people seriously doubted Rich Burlew's DEEPEST LORE callback skills

"Oh, I forgot about her" my fucking ass

This is incredible.

That's kinda Loki's shtick. He's a prankster but not a villain and just tends to fall in with a bad crowd.

95 fucking pages?
Will he ever publish them in book form? I'm vehemently against buying in PDF format.

Why?

13 years waiting for this moment!

Unlikely that she's still worshiping Loki. Presumably, he's a CE deity, and we just saw her turn (not rebuke) undead. Even if she was a CN alignment herself, neutral clerics of evil deities rebuke undead. Unless of course Burlew is playing fast and loose with the D&D rules, which I admit is a possibility.

But I still think the designated rival thing is the more likely explanation, given how dramatics also seem to be an ironclad law in this universe.

Deities and Demigods lists Loki as CE. It's technically 3.0, but it wasn't overridden by any 3.5 books so it's still relevant.

It also has this as his portrait.

This. Rivals are tied to the main cast in always being opposed in alignment and on par in levels. It's canon.

>protect from evil on belkar
what actually happens when it's cast on an evil creature? belkar seems mildly irritated

Everyone is mixing two in-universe themes. Personal Rivals =/= Evil Opposites.

Hilgya was originally Durkon's evil opposite, but is no longer a member of the Linear Guild, so has no reason to be following any sort of theme to oppose Durkon. Just because Durkon changed gods doesn't mean she has to have also.
Personal rivals have no bearing on alignment or gods or even themes. The only "mechanical" rule they follow is that they're always at or above your level to ensure a difficult fight.

That makes the assumption that it is linear guild membership that makes someone conform to the evil opposite trope, rather than the guild recruiting evil opposites (or as close as they can get), to fill their ranks.

Given how Pompey very barely fell into the evil opposite for V, I'm guessing it's the latter, not the former. Hilgya is some sort of evil (good) opposite to Durkon, and will remain as such, which yes, is distinct from being a personal rival.

I'm a touch fuzzy on the mechanics of rivals, but wouldn't she be at least as high a level as Durkon with his current level adjustment for being a vampire?

If the kid is Durkon's, what kind of luck stat does the man have?

That's more of a narrative rule than a mechanical one, I'd say. Less hard and fast and more dependent on dramatic potential.

>kid's already sprouting a beard

The "Evil Opposite" thing is definitely something Nale came up with for shits and giggles. My point was that while she was a fitting opposite when she was recruited, she has no reason to be restricted to that criteria now. Unless they're cosmically linked to forever be parallels, she can be whatever.

Yeah I only said "mechanical" because it gave Crystal a direct gameplay change. It operates off drama more than mechanics.

>It'll never work

I'm not so sure that it was simply for "Shits and giggles". Remember, Nale is an overcomplicating bard. He does have a certain feel for the dramatically necessary, even if he can't quite articulate it. I think that them being cosmically linked to be in parallel is actually pretty likely.

...

a -8 modifier
poor durkon, most underrated OOTS member

Isn't she a cleric of Loki?

Why isn't she the natural ally of Vampires? Doesn't she Rebuke Undead rather than Turn them?

...

I wonder who was behind this

Thog.

Loki and Hel are not on very good terms, if you remember. Kinda the whole point of ...the past two years or so? When did this arc start?

Because Loki does not like Hel? And is currently her biggest opponent?

Burlew might not Ben using that. Could Loki be CN?

Could be opposite on the Law/Chaos axis instead?

That wasn't even the longest brick joke in 8 bit, because clevinger is legit insane. It was the best, though

Is this arc the boat of OOTS?

lolno
That was the arc with Tarquin. Or the one where they were split and Roy was dead. Shit's actually happening in this one.

And to think they never found the armor,
either.

Oh my god the Roy's Dead arc. That was interminable.

Some good moments, though.

Like this panel. It alone justifies all of OOTS, IMO.

>reading that comic to the Pirates of the Caribbean theme

youtube.com/watch?v=27mB8verLK8

Elan wailing in vowels is my new favorite thog meme.

OOOOOOH SHIT!!!

>mfw Loki called her up and told her to go help the Order

>yo boss man
>I heard your speech

Yeah, Loki here is legit CN.

Remind me who this bitch is?

Had a 1 night fling with Durkon waaaay back. Somehow they didn't notice that they were clerics of opposing gods.

Love knows no bounds.

I think the justification was "well, we are both exiled dwarves, I guess".

Also, they were working together at the time IIRC it was the first time the linear guild got introduced.

So this is how Dorkon is going to fuck over Dorkula? Just show the HOT DWARF SEX scenes and leave out all context so he commits some sort of tactical blunder?

Can I buy the pdf anywhere?

Durkon even says he would probably be worried about her prayers if he ever put ranks in Knowledge - Religion, so yeah

Not yet. I think he wants to keep it exclusive to the Kickstarter backers for a while, as a thank you for them sticking with him and being patient with him for so long. He even included a personal request for it not to be shared.

But, the Belkar and Haleo&Juliean stories are up on his Gumroad, so he will sell it eventually.

>mfw reading that story
O-Chul is the best example of a paladin I've ever seen in D&D. Burlew seriously outdid himself.

>That was the arc with Tarquin.
But I liked it.

As did I, but it did drag on a lot and took a long time to get to anywhere near the main story.

As he says in his books, it's better on print than with weeks between updates

>h o o r u g i r l
Slayed me

>Tfw no more 8-bit Theater ever, and normie boyfriends hate Black Mage
Is there anything else like it, anons?

He's definitely losing it now, to judge by his twitter. I know he always hated Alabama, but how could someone so clever have voted Hillary?

>aê aê aê aê, nóis
Are you a HUEHUE, user?

>brown baby

You know, that might not be Durkon's baby. Durkon did tell her to go back to her husband, maybe she's in the dwarven lands because she really did

Why is he brown?
Why were there random black dwarves anyway?

Wouldn't that be Haley's a racist?

Her husband in strip 83 is pretty light-skinned.

giantitp.com/comics/oots0083.html

harder to see underground, good evolutionary trait

>Why is he brown?
Strangely enough that is roughly the colour of Durkon. Never realised it before, but he's pretty swarthy.

Good point.
I thought Burlew was emulating Nickelodian levels of cuck porn

>Why is he brown?
Because Durkon is brown.

Why would he not be?

Thoughts on the Linear Guild? Which iteration was the best one, and will the Vector Legion be a worhty replacement?