OoTS #373!

[2WS-Steve]

Xykon might have let her escape because he knows that she'll go back and interfere with the OoTS -- who would try to stop him, then he can go about his nefarious deeds while paladins and OoTS are battling each other.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Yeah, "Forcecage doesn't work that way", is pretty much what ran through my head. It's a cute escape, but a little annoying.

Ahem-hem-hem-hem.

Booyah!

 

[Elemental]

I must confess to being utterly confused by all the Miko-hateing that goes on around here... :\

She's been coming off a lot better in the recent strips, maybe because she's interacting and fighting with the villains, rather than established heroic characters.

 

[drscott46]

Stupid villains worsen the enjoyment of the strip, IMO. Why Xykon didn't immediately kill her is beyond me. Doesn't he know heroes always escape from captivity? He can bring the dead thing back later.

Uh, it seems like some of you guys are taking a parodic comic strip a little seriously.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

What like stupid villains in almost every film and book ever scripted you mean? After all, that's why this http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html is funny

I like that site. I've tried to memorize the rules, too. It's funny like a Darwin Awards. I know OotS is a humor strip, but when major plotlines occur because the villain is a moron *sigh*

So I guess Xykon is a sorcerer?

I do not see Miko escaping with her goodness intact.

It's a massive risk. Not a problem by itself, but if Miko survives, she'll warn the rest of the paladins, and then Xykon's in trouble. Or at least slowed down a bit.

Uh, it seems like some of you guys are taking a parodic comic strip a little seriously.

It doesn't seem to be parodying a DnD game at that point.

 

[wingsandsword]

I must confess to being utterly confused by all the Miko-hateing that goes on around here... :\

Okay, reasons Miko is so hated:

1. She's the epitome of many bad stereotypes at once. She's the "I'm a paladin so I'm always right, and anybody who opposes me for any reason is Evil" Paladin, she's the "I'm a Paladin so you all have to do as I say because my God says so" Paladin, and as first introduced she was the "I'm a character from an asian setting in an otherwise normal D&D game, so of course I have to be uber".

2. She's a walking epitome of railroading and obnoxious DMPC's. She's utterly invincible whenever the DM wants her to be, and far more powerful than the PC's can ever be (even when they all gang up on her at once, she beats them all down, it was easier for the OOTS to deal with Xylon's armies and hordes of monsters en masse than Miko alone, think about that!).

3. In many people's eyes, she's barely a Paladin or should have long since been stripped of her Paladinhood for an alignment shift to Lawful Neutral. Rich even said on the OOTS forums that in her fight with Belkar she was on the edge of a complete psychotic break. She was moments from going Blackguard there. Xylon may have failed to turn her, but she's got enough anger and hatred in her that her zeal can be turned to outright evil very easily.

Miko is the sort of character that reminds us that Paladins aren't always the good guys and Lawful Good doesn't mean "good guy". I learned that lesson quite a while back in other D&D campaigns, nothing like watching Paladins hate each other and duel to the death because they came from religions which hated each other to the point of waging continent-wide wars over it.

 

[MarkB]

I like that site. I've tried to memorize the rules, too. It's funny like a Darwin Awards. I know OotS is a humor strip, but when major plotlines occur because the villain is a moron *sigh*

Xykon is hampered by being a parody of both cinematic and D&D evil masterminds, and thus he has to endure the worst of both stereotypes. Of course he has to leave Miko in an easily-escapable deathtrap while he goes off and does other things - she's a proper named character and everything, so she can't just get killed. Heck, if he'd really been serious, he'd have used the "windowless cell" version of the cage, and taunted her in sign language while she suffocated.

Xykon's probably simply smart enough to know that stepping in the path of narrative imperative is likely to get him run over one way or another. Miko has unresolved plot issues, and isn't likely to get killed while that's the case.

 

[Vocenoctum]

She's been coming off a lot better in the recent strips, maybe because she's interacting and fighting with the villains, rather than established heroic characters.

::ahem:: rather than Player Characters... they're not exactly "heroic" a lot of times...

They ARE adventurers afterall.

 

[Corsair]

Xykon brings out the best in everyone, I think we can agree.

 

[LoneWolf23]

There's still the fact she harbors so much hate for the Order of the Stick that she automatically assumes them to be in league with Xykon, rather then the more obvious "Then the Order only thought they killed Xykon".

Her hatred of the Order of the Stick will lead to her fall.. Or her death.