OotS #466

[Pbartender]

That said, it seems like it will be a while before we to see get Roy raised or resurrected, just because Rich seems to have a lot of other story elements he wants to deal with first enjoy dragging out an unusual plot development far, far past when its narrative interest, dramatic usefulness and/or effective humor are used up.

I fixed that for you.

Honestly, its my single complaint about the comic strip... Rich doesn't always seem to know when to end a sub-plot.

I think Roy will almost certainly be brought back from the dead, but I'd be awfully surprised if we saw it happen before the end of the year.

He'll be able to get an awful lot of mileage out of Roy and his Dad, the OotS trying to manage without his leadership, and not to mention a whole side-quest to get the expensive diamond component required for Durkon to Raise Roy. Plus, he'll have cameos by Miko and Windstriker in the afterlife, Xykon and Redcloak heading for the next gate, Nale and the Linear Guild heading for the next gate, and Hinjo dealing with the remains of Azure City and the returning nobles.

He could have Roy up and running in a week or two, but he'll sit on it a while, I think.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

edit: I must admit, I was happy when it was confirmed that Roy died. Not because I dislike the character, but because Rich was showing that he wasn't afraid of killing off a main character. Letting Roy cool his heels in the afterlife would reinforce this idea.

I was happy because I dislike roy. Then he killed Miko too, and it was like my birthday early but with dead humans.

Edit : I actually really dislike the "showing he's not afraid" aspect... I don't want to be thinking about what the author will do, because that is the opposite of suspension of disbelief, without which the 'plot' becomes meaningless to me. A lot of folks praise Rich for being unpredicatable, but I find it to be unpleasantly arbitrary, and he shoves the hand of the author in my face far too often for me to retain any sort of tension wrt the outcome. :\

 

[Anguish]

I think Roy will almost certainly be brought back from the dead, but I'd be awfully surprised if we saw it happen before the end of the year.

<MUNCH>

He could have Roy up and running in a week or two, but he'll sit on it a while, I think.

<pseudospoiler warning>

I'd have to agree here, only I'm suspecting something ultra-sneaky. I just got finished reading the physical books and in No Cure for the Paladin Blues, Rich comments that he has plans that someone will have permanent, fundamental changes to the way they're drawn.

It's my opinion that Roy will not have raise dead cast on him. He won't have true resurrection cast on him either. I'm guessing he'll be the recipient of a reincarnate spell. He's coming back as something else, likely something we haven't seen to date. We've got humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, half-orcs, half-elves... I don't know what Rich is up to, but I predict Roy's coming back as an Aasimaar or Kobold something unexpected.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

<pseudospoiler warning>

I'd have to agree here, only I'm suspecting something ultra-sneaky. I just got finished reading the physical books and in No Cure for the Paladin Blues, Rich comments that he has plans that someone will have permanent, fundamental changes to the way they're drawn.

It's my opinion that Roy will not have raise dead cast on him. He won't have true resurrection cast on him either. I'm guessing he'll be the recipient of a reincarnate spell. He's coming back as something else, likely something we haven't seen to date. We've got humans, elves, dwarves, halflings, half-orcs, half-elves... I don't know what Rich is up to, but I predict Roy's coming back as an Aasimaar or Kobold something unexpected.

Aside from the "possibility" that Shojo's cat was really the druid with the forest gate in a long term wildshape, how would it be easier to get a reincarnate on him than a raise?

(don't get me wrong it could be fun, but it would require yet another arbitrary "you thought this was the situation but HA HA!" type twist.)

 

[Piratecat]

(don't get me wrong it could be fun, but it would require yet another arbitrary "you thought this was the situation but HA HA!" type twist.)

Seriously. I far prefer the story to be boring and predictable.

I suspect our tastes just differ.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

Seriously. I far prefer the story to be boring and predictable.

I suspect our tastes just differ.

Our abilities to get away with strawmanning probably do, so I won't compete.

 

[Piratecat]

Oooh, where's that darn ... <grin>

Seriously, my point was originally intended to be that it's interesting how different people are getting different things out of the comic, and all of those opinions are equally valid. I shouldn't have framed it to sound derogatory and sarcastic. I apologize for that.

Pbartender finds the side stories tiresome, for instance, and it sounds like you find the plot twists a little far-fetched. In my case, the pacing and story-telling really appeal to me, but it doesn't mean that either one of us are "wrong." It just means that we have different preferences.

Except for people who don't love the Belkster, of course. What's up with that?

 

[Mouseferatu]

I just got finished reading the physical books and in No Cure for the Paladin Blues, Rich comments that he has plans that someone will have permanent, fundamental changes to the way they're drawn.

I figured we'd already seen that with Elan's (presumably) permanent change of wardrobe.

 

[Pbartender]

Pbartender finds the side stories tiresome, for instance...

Not all of them... Not even all of some of them...

But the ones that I now find tiresome just seemed to go much, much longer than necessary -- Haley's aphasia, for example, lasted from #245 until #393, almost 150 strips (there's no dates on the strips, but at 3 comics per week on average, that's about a year's worth of Haley speaking in code). I thought it was kind of neat to begin with, having to puzzle out the code when she spoke. It only became tiresome after months went by with no end in sight.

The side stories don't start out tiresome -- and a lot of them Rich gets just right -- but for me they quickly become so once they begin overshadowing the primary stories.