OotS 452

[Sejs]

Personally if I were in charge of a city whose nobles abandoned it in the face of the enemy, if I won, those nobles would be in for a surprise when they tried to return home.

Such as a nice dose of "Guess what YOU arn't, any more!" for starters.

 

[Falkus]

Personally if I were in charge of a city whose nobles abandoned it in the face of the enemy, if I won, those nobles would be in for a surprise when they tried to return home.

Of course, that's rather dependent on you, the leader, having a superior military force to that of the nobles.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Certainly, regardless of how Mr. Burlew is portraying the paladins and soldiers, the nobles don't come off favorably. They refuse to use their personal forces to help their own city, they take most of the boats to save themselves, they continue to try to assassinate the only person capable of leading the whole city, etc. If the nobles had sided with the Sapphire Guard and the regular forces, Azure City might have stood a chance, and they could have had an evacuation plan in place, but as things stand the city is going to fall. Not to mention all the problems caused by Shojo having to evade so many assassination attempts.

It isn't a stretch to say that Azure City is going to fall simply because of the corruption within its nobility. This strip just continues to reinforce that point.

By the way, I am also of the opinion that author's intention plays a very strong role in a text, and that it is highly problematic trying to add in too much subjective opinion that can't be supported by the text. Various attempts by my professors to say otherwise always strike me as either ridiculous or politically motivated.

 

[Corsair]

Regarding the literary interpretation debate:

I am completely against literary interpretation, especially in the case where an author is still alive and kicking an able to answer the questions as to what he actually intended. Of course you're still free to make your own interpretations.


They would just be wrong.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I did. "Hey guys, let's die for no reason to appease our egos. The hell with our families!"

They don't die for no reason. They attempt to hold the line for as long as possible - with the hope that they will either get reinforcements, or that they will buy enough time for the other defenders to build a new defensive line. They are doomed. They know they are doomed. But if they manage to delay the enemy for long enough, their sacrifice might have helped save the city.

When U.S. forces landed on Omaha Beach, Iwo Jima, and many other coasts in WWII, the odds of survival for the guys in the front were also horrendous. But if they hadn't faced the enemy, the losses of their side would have been much greater still. So they didn't fight "for no reason" - and neither do the guys in the strip.

 

[Machiavelli]

Dying in combat is not "losing" the battle. Combat as a whole does not hinge on the survival of those individuals who participate, but rather on the survival of the structure of command and support.

As such, fighting a completely "lost" battle can be more effective than not fighting at all.

 

[Darklone]

Dying in combat is not "losing" the battle. Combat as a whole does not hinge on the survival of those individuals who participate, but rather on the survival of the structure of command and support.

As such, fighting a completely "lost" battle can be more effective than not fighting at all.

History knows many "lost" battles who were won in the end simply because the relevant soldiers refused to stop fighting and dying.

 

[shilsen]

Regarding the literary interpretation debate:

I am completely against literary interpretation, especially in the case where an author is still alive and kicking an able to answer the questions as to what he actually intended. Of course you're still free to make your own interpretations.


They would just be wrong.

The above would be true in a perfect world, where authors were completely aware about every influence on themselves, totally correct about every motivation (subconscious and conscious), absolutely uncaring about all criticism and thus able to be completely honest about the motivations and intentions they are aware of, etc. Since that's not the case in our world, I say that authorial intention is an important factor in interpreting a text, but hardly the only one.

 

[F5]

This strip has a 300 feel to it.

I thought the same thing when I read it.

"For SPARTAAAAAAA!"

Um...ahem.

I mean...

"FOR AZUUUUUURE CITYYYYYYYY!"

 

[jcfiala]

I think it says more about V's purchasing habits. Honestly, what high level wizard doesn't have a few dozen wands for emergencies? Or even a staff? Seriously, one decent wand/staff with fireball, a fly spell, a wall of force, and another dose of invisibility/protection from arrows would turn this whole crisis around.

The Order of the Stick seems to be a low-magic campaign world. There's not really been any scenes in magic shops (other than one time where V was buying scrolls), and none of the characters refer to anything like one. It may be that V's never come across a wand, or staff, for sale that they could cast. And apparently they don't like to scribe scrolls. (Or it's possible that they do, and they've just used them all up.)