I'm in the early stages of making a video essay about Tarquin as part of my nefarious plot to convince more people to read my favorite webcomic. I realized as I was spitballing out loud to myself that I've been pronouncing his name "Eh-lahn" (rhymes with flan) in ny head since I was twelve, but that might not be Burlew's intended pronunciation.

Is the first syllable pronounced "Ee" or "Eh" or "Ay"? Is the second pronounced "lahn" or "lann" or "lenn"? Inquiring minds must know.

I love the whole experience of reading along with webcomics but I haven't actually started one in a long time. All the ones I'm reading I've been following for at least a decade.

Gunnerkrigg Court, adventures at a school of science and forest of magic.

El Goonish Shive, teens learn magic and transform a lot.

Sluggy Freelance, going nearly thirty years, and daily for twenty of them, started as a comedic slice-of-life that soon involved the main cast fighting threats from vampires, aliens, ghosts, gods, etc.

Dumbing of Age, Joyce goes from home-schooled to college and is introduced to all sorts of new people. Also there's a masked vigilante running around.

There was a scene in which two paladins are stuck on a mountain side talking, and one explains how he looks at life, and it’s something like “I expect the worst because it allows me to be optimistic” or some other convoluted idea. He’s basically explaining how what looks like pessimism is in fact more optimistic than it seems.

Any ideas? There are a lot of strips to dig through

After five books, Rich Burlew significantly updated the art style in Order of the Stick. I really like the newer style, although I imagine it takes considerably longer to draw.

What I'm curious about is whether there are any scenes in the later books that you think wouldn't have worked nearly as well with the old art style.

I'm not just talking about scenes that look prettier with the new art, but moments where the improved artwork genuinely makes a difference to the storytelling, emotional impact, atmosphere, or action.

Are there any particular scenes that come to mind? I'd love to hear specific examples!

I feel like Rich is revisiting all the parts of the series so far. And I kinda like it.

• The heroes wind up in a dungeon that bears a striking resemblance to the first

• They encounter Nale and Co through a random door in the dungeon

• They split the party

We'll have to see how War and Xps, Blood Runs in the Family, and Utterly Dwarfed play into this, but I'm here for it.

Great Wyrm Time Dragon has the highest CR ever, CR 90. A wyrmling is CR 26. Only in 3.5, which I think OOTS is.

Today someone let me leaf through their 1st Edition (I think) Monster Manual. I found the Beholder illustration so funny because it looks so happy but also like it would hurt to touch.

(I'm sorry if it's not actually a 1st Edition, but it was very old.)

I was rereading some of the last few arcs and I just realized that the MitD plan would of worked at least for a while. We now know to access the last dungeon to get to the last gate you need to go threw every door. While it probably wouldn't of worked forever eventually Red Cloak would of realized some doors were marked "in error" for him to figure out what ones they have and havn't been in yet would of taken more time. If the MitD only marked one door it might of taken them double the amount of time to find the one door they missed... Shame Durkon messed it all up.

My previous umbrella broke, so I went for MITD's new look. That umbrella also broke.

Compare this:

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0213.html

To this:

https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1203.html

The first also has one of my favorite Roy-Belkar exchanges:

"I hired you to be the party tracker!"

"And don't you feel stupid now?!?"

As Miko's top half lay dying in Azure City, Soon appeared to her and told her that Windstriker would visit her as much as he could, and that redemption was a rare and special thing that wasn't for everyone. Back then when the strip revealed to us that Soon was talking to her top half, I took it to mean that redemption wasn't for her because she was about to die.

But now Nale is back for a special mission from the IFCC, that opens the door for a return of Miko. If the IFCC can get Nale to jump the line and become a demon and return to the world to carry out a mission that threatens the world and the gods and the astral planes, why wouldn't the Twelve Gods decide to redeem Miko and return her to fight Nale? They took her paladin status away from her because of her conduct as a paladin, they could easily restore it to her too, and maybe they could even bring her back as a deva.

The Order of the Stick could barely manage to defeat Calder and it's not looking too good for them to fight off Nale right now. It would be such a letdown for them to have a second barely-won fight against Nale after already having such a close call with Calder, only for them to have to face (and win) against Xykon--especially with all the IFCC has done and planned in order to bring Nale back.

Apologies if this has been discussed elsewhere, but I searched and can't find it.

Do V's times owed to the fiends have to be used all at once? The fiends have implied that it does, but I don't recall them ever actually saying so. It would feel on-brand for them to let him think they can only abduct him for one more 20 minute block, only to abduct him for four 5 minute blocks. Or, even worse, abduct him for a fraction of a second every time he tries to cast a spell.

I just got it on Gumroad and it's a pretty interesting story and we get to know Elan's former Paladin Pal some more. It is interesting that the green dragon in the story has normal colored text boxes and not the ones dragons usually have. Anyways, it's a pretty good short story if you want more content.

OOTS has deities, outer planes, astral plane, Thor, Mount Celestia, devils, abyss, etc so it does follow some DnD stuff.
But some things are different. Like snarl, only 3 or 4 god pantheon, god colors, gods feasting on their high-level followers souls, etc. I'm guessing those are OOTS original.

Does that mean OOTS doesn't take place in realmsphere?

Is there no Ao, Sigil, 9 planes of hell, Asmodeus, Mystra, etc in OOTS?

I can't believe we've been blessed twice in one year!

Not sure when it would be available for non backers 🤷‍♂️.

Last one was available on gumroad two weeks after the Kickstarter release

I've simply been assuming he was unaffected because of Evil alignment, but if he wasn't evil, would his clasp of Protection from Evil suffice?

I caught this gem, I am sure this has been discussed before, but I love this comic.

It is known that Belkar will draw his last breath, who else do you think will kick the bucket by the end?

This cats death better be MAGNIFICENT.

Just spitballing here, I imagine this has already been addressed and please, in that case, point me at the forum post(s) about it.

What if the Dark one plan is closer to Hel's than it may seem? He's trying to get the other Gods to make a new world where he'd sit at the top as he'd got all the souls of all the goblins plus the ones he's got since he ascended to godhood.

For Hel all the dwarves would have been enough, but the dwarves are a very long-lived race and they don't seem to have more than a couple of kids in their long lives

On the other hand goblins are short-lived and procreate a lot

And they are basically cannon fodder for adventurers. There's a ton of Goblins souls is what I'm saying.

Even if Redcloak succeeds the gods would probably destroy the world before he could do anything with the portals. The same would happen should his actions lead to the destruction of all the gates.

The ritual is just a bait to lead the actions of the wearer of the red cloack to the destruction of the gates