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We've been pretty much guaranteed that whatever happens, Elan will at least be obligated to return to take down Tarquin in an epilogue, but also since the Order is kinda obligated to do something to stop the Snarl it's easy to see Tarquin become relevant again because he lives on top of a rift.
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Apr 28, 2021 18:51
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SlothfulCobra posted:We've been pretty much guaranteed that whatever happens, Elan will at least be obligated to return to take down Tarquin in an epilogue, but also since the Order is kinda obligated to do something to stop the Snarl it's easy to see Tarquin become relevant again because he lives on top of a rift. No Elan already set up some other people that Tarquin does not care about to take down Tarquin.
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Apr 28, 2021 19:22
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Taciturn Tactician posted:What? Tarquin is the fighter, or at least some fighter adjacent class like "warlord" or something, we've seen that his main profiencies are in a variety of weapons and he's a frontline fighter. If you mean the dude in that flashback who doesn't have a name, I feel like it's more likely that he's an anti-paladin or blackguard or something. I think rich said traquin is just straight 20 in fighter or something. Absurd Alhazred posted:It's just going to be a loose end. It happens in the best of fiction. blood runs in the family commentary mentioned it was something the order might think about dealing with after the comic is over, if the other adventuring band with the lizard mercs don't just deal with it. It's not important anymore either way.
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Apr 28, 2021 19:35
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Absurd Alhazred posted:It's just going to be a loose end. It happens in the best of fiction. It's not a loose end. It got all the resolution it needed. The Linear Guild is defeated and Elan's issues with his family are resolved.
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Apr 28, 2021 19:41
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Acerbatus posted:I think rich said traquin is just straight 20 in fighter or something. I think his "warlord" aspects are just a joke about how in older editions the character advancement for fighters was them accumulating their own small army.
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Apr 28, 2021 20:01
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Yeah, Tarquin being dealt with off-screen by those minor characters Elan set up is basically guaranteed, it’s the best revenge against him. Julio Scoundrel, on the other hand...
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Apr 28, 2021 20:21
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I think being a warlord fits because a lot of the warlord class is the support aspects of bards but without the singing, and it'd fit with how Nale built some kind of ridiculous multiclass setup to be basically a bard without being a bard. I don't think Tarquin actually did any supporting or controlling during battle though, he just did damage personally.MonsterEnvy posted:No Elan already set up some other people that Tarquin does not care about to take down Tarquin. In the illusion, he said that he felt obligated to go back and do something about Tarquin, so at the very least, he'll go and check. Especially since his probably future father in law is in charge of taking down Tarquin. He's not going to just free him and leave him.
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Apr 28, 2021 20:35
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Yeah, from just the Tarquin stuff alone I wouldn't think that Tarquin would come back for another appearance. The question is what Sabine is up to. Last time we saw them, the three fiends strongly implied that Sabine was finding a way to mix her own personal goals with the business tasks given to her by the fiends. But she never really got along with anyone besides Nale, and she never really did anything besides help Nale with his schemes. Now that Nale's not around anymore, we don't know of any personal business she might have other than revenge on the person who murdered Nale.
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Apr 28, 2021 21:04
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Tarquin is a Fighter. He regularly references how he's basically a holdover from the AD&D days, what with his monologues about Unearthed Arcana.
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Apr 28, 2021 21:17
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ultrafilter posted:It's not a loose end. It got all the resolution it needed. The Linear Guild is defeated and Elan's issues with his family are resolved. The loose end is the "Sabine's revenge" bit, which involves Tarquin and did not in fact get any resolution.
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Apr 28, 2021 21:40
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GlyphGryph posted:The loose end is the "Sabine's revenge" bit, which involves Tarquin and did not in fact get any resolution. Sabine is not a character for whom a character motivation qualifies as a "loose end" is sort of the point.
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Apr 28, 2021 21:44
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V's soul selling is obviously going to come up again and that's when Sabine will come up again.
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Apr 28, 2021 21:57
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Plus the Fiends straight up said in the Utterly Dwarfed wrap up that they were going to take an active villain role at some point. They and Sabine are definitely gonna show up again. Tarquin's story is told and over, but Sabine's is not, and it seems like he'd figure somewhere in the latter, given that he's the only remaining character to whom she has any kind of personal relation.
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Apr 28, 2021 22:30
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SlothfulCobra posted:In the illusion, he said that he felt obligated to go back and do something about Tarquin, so at the very least, he'll go and check. Especially since his probably future father in law is in charge of taking down Tarquin. He's not going to just free him and leave him. They mention later they're definitely going to do it:  If the world still exists and everything I wouldn't be surprised to see getting ready to head off on that quest in the epilogue.
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Apr 29, 2021 00:31
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It's honestly an open question how much of the Order will even survive this book: Belkar is marked for death, Elan, Haley, and Durkon will most likely live, but everyone else is completely up in the air.
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Apr 29, 2021 01:29
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I don't think Elan can get a happy ending unless Roy is alive.
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Apr 29, 2021 01:46
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I always interpreted Elan's happy ending as being the Draketooth phantasm.
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Apr 29, 2021 01:51
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Apropos of nothing: If and when the Order gets amnesia-potioned into forgetting all its character growth, I feel like it's going to affect some party members and not others. Like, Roy reverting to "suspicious, controlling, kind of hates Elan and distrusts his team" is a lot more interesting narratively when he's dealing (or trying to deal with) the competent present Elan, a Belkar who isn't just trying to kill people for no reason, etc., rather than a team that's fully and collectively reset to factory settings. Not sure how I'd divide it up -- maybe amnesia for Haley (who hasn't gotten a ton of character moments recently since Crystal) and Vaarsuvius (who has the clearest Before/After in characterization by dint of their Soul Splice), along with Roy, and Elan, Belkar, Durkon and Minrah have to pick up the slack?
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Apr 29, 2021 01:59
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Strawberry Pyramid posted:It's honestly an open question how much of the Order will even survive this book: Belkar is marked for death, Elan, Haley, and Durkon will most likely live, but everyone else is completely up in the air. I think V actually has a fair shot at surviving, though the reason for it is actually almost completely meta: V living to the end lets the comic avoid answering the question of where they're going when they die. Them going to a Neutral or Good afterlife would have a lot of people questioning how they could make up for their horrific act of slaughter (plus a bunch of other stuff, like their treatment of the dominated Yukyuk, and them being rather unpleasant in general for a long time), particularly in such a short amount of time. On the other hand, them going to an Evil afterlife would have people upset that V's been damned despite genuinely trying to improve after realizing the magnitude of their actions, plus it's a big downer for one of the main characters to end the comic trapped in eternal suffering and all that. Even moreso if Blackwing gets dragged down there with them. About the only way for their death to avoid this that I can see is them dying after directly putting themself in danger trying to protect others or save the world or whatever, with this selfless act being what ends up being what tipping them over into a Neutral afterlife and avoiding eternal damnation, but I still don't think that's that likely. Rather, what I think is going to happen is that V will survive, then dedicate the remainder of their long, long elven life to trying to make amends for their actions and serving others with humility. It would reflect serious growth on their part and leave open the possibility for redemption, without having to directly answer whether one can actually make up for crimes of such magnitude. Not quite a happy ending for them, but an appropriate one I think. Assuming that there isn't a big downer ending for the comic as a whole, the world doesn't get unmade and wipe out (almost) everyone, or something like that, I mean. If Rich goes that route then everything's up in the air. Roland Jones fucked around with this message at 02:28 on Apr 29, 2021 |
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Apr 29, 2021 02:25
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Gwyneth Palpate posted:I always interpreted Elan's happy ending as being the Draketooth phantasm. Same, I am also going to guess Belkar will save Hinjo's life again by saving the world.
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Apr 29, 2021 02:26
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Strawberry Pyramid posted:It's honestly an open question how much of the Order will even survive this book: Belkar is marked for death, Elan, Haley, and Durkon will most likely live, but everyone else is completely up in the air. Roy's already died once, I don't really see how him dying again would mean anything narratively. If he dies in a normal way, he'll just get revived again, because he's not the kind of person to just give on life once he fufils his blood oath. And him dying in some more permanent way doesn't seem like it would complete any kind of arc for him- he's already shown that he's willing to be selfless to some extent from things like jumping in front of arrows so that they woudn't hit Elan and his general willingness to put himself in harm's way to try to do good. Him sacrificing his life wouldn't be a meaningful character progression or completion, and him just randomly getting sniped and dying permanently wouldn't really be a tragic downfall foreshadowed by flaws. It's not impossible that he dies, but I don't think the story has set anything up for it. Way back around the second gate I would have said him being killed by a seemingly irrelevant NPC would be a tragic downfall based on his flaws but I feel like he's mostly gotten over the NPC thing.
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Apr 29, 2021 02:52
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I feel like that bit at the end of the desert arc, where the Snarl suddenly went nuts, has yet to have a payoff. If we see Tarquin and his buddies again, it'll have something to do with that.
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Apr 29, 2021 05:01
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Tarquin being a loose end is the perfect ending to his story, because he is adamant he is the main villain of the story. Defeating him in an epilogue kinda validates him in his belief of being the Big Bad who'd dealt with last. Have it be done off-screen or by minor characters.
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Apr 29, 2021 05:56
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nimby posted:Tarquin being a loose end is the perfect ending to his story, because he is adamant he is the main villain of the story. Nah, Tarquin knows that Xyxon and/or the Snarl are the main villains. He's an optional sub-boss. 
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Apr 29, 2021 06:25
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Gynovore posted:Nah, Tarquin knows that Xyxon and/or the Snarl are the main villains. He's an optional sub-boss. No, he just thinks that the party needs to beat all their Act 2 enemies before coming around to defeat him for the climax of Act 3. He wants them to deal with him last because he's the final boss in his mind. And any other adventures Elan has in the meantime are simply to help prepare him for that confrontation.
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Apr 29, 2021 06:48
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nimby posted:Tarquin being a loose end is the perfect ending to his story, because he is adamant he is the main villain of the story. Defeating him in an epilogue kinda validates him in his belief of being the Big Bad who'd dealt with last. I don't think they'll defeat him in the epilogue so much as the epilogue will mention them planning to head that way and finish knocking him over next, in a kind of minor afterthought way.
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Apr 29, 2021 09:40
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I don't think they'll even get to be an afterthought; I imagine the epilogue would be Haley visiting her old man and hearing the tale of how he managed to topple an empire, and even that wouldn't be about Tarquin so much as figuring how to do build something that won't be the next evil empire afterwards. And that's if they aren't dealt with in this book as a subplot of whatever roles the Snarl and the Fiends end up playing.
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Apr 29, 2021 10:04
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My goodness Tarquin was expressly defeated by being disregarded and we still have people thinking "this is when Tarquin will return to the story."
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Apr 29, 2021 18:00
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I mean he's still keeping millions under despotic dictatorships and someone should really do something about it.
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Apr 29, 2021 18:06
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Could easily just have Sabine turn up for the plot at some point carrying Tarquin's head with her. Maybe she could use it for something, I don't know.
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Apr 29, 2021 18:09
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SuperKlaus posted:My goodness Tarquin was expressly defeated by being disregarded and we still have people thinking "this is when Tarquin will return to the story." A villain who wants to be the center of attention just lets the story move on without him? If he's calm and collected he'll realize showing up for revenge in the denouement is the worst idea and he'll be defeated effortlessly to show how far the heroes have come, but if he thinks he's doing a final twist sequel hook he might fool himself into doing it anyways.
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Apr 29, 2021 18:10
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Tenebrais posted:Could easily just have Sabine turn up for the plot at some point carrying Tarquin's head with her. Maybe she could use it for something, I don't know. That I like. Doesn't ignore the whole point, still recognizes that Sabine is out there.
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Apr 29, 2021 18:27
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Who What Now posted:I mean he's still keeping millions under despotic dictatorships and someone should really do something about it. Good news: There are four somebodies (along with the remnants of a city-state's special forces) who are getting on that, and they even have a plan for it.
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Apr 29, 2021 19:37
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Acerbatus posted:Good news: There are four somebodies (along with the remnants of a city-state's special forces) who are getting on that, and they even have a plan for it.  How's he going to convince anyone the cat's eaten it?
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Apr 29, 2021 19:49
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Wanderer posted:I feel like that bit at the end of the desert arc, where the Snarl suddenly went nuts, has yet to have a payoff. If we see Tarquin and his buddies again, it'll have something to do with that. I suspect the "payoff" is the confirmation that the Snarl exists, is still active, and is every bit as dangerous as the audience was told. The whole "apparent world in the rift" thing is almost certain to be a big deal, but I don't think the desert scene specifically is all that relevant. Having Laurin casually offed by the Snarl even ties into the whole "Tarquin (and his team) didn't really matter that much in the long run" notion.
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Apr 29, 2021 20:52
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MikeJF posted:They mention later they're definitely going to do it: That happened before they set up another group to take Tarquin down.
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Apr 29, 2021 21:07
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Gnoman posted:Having Laurin casually offed by the Snarl even ties into the whole "Tarquin (and his team) didn't really matter that much in the long run" notion. Point of order - while Laurin was definitely distracted in #945, it doesn't look like she was actually impaled:  Pulled away at the last second, unlike helmeted guard on the left.
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Apr 29, 2021 23:11
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S.D. posted:Point of order - while Laurin was definitely distracted in #945, it doesn't look like she was actually impaled: And given that both have the ability to teleport and are high level (and mostly unharmed), they probably lived.
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Apr 29, 2021 23:34
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Gwyneth Palpate posted:And given that both have the ability to teleport and are high level (and mostly unharmed), they probably lived. We don't know how the snarl works, of course. Certainly killing a top rank deity with a surprise round implies an absurd threat level where "high level" means nothing(asides about gods being more vulnerable aside)
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Apr 30, 2021 00:32
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The Snarl doesn't kill you, it UNMAKES you. It doesn't matter if you were level 1 or level 30. The Snarl, as explained by Thor, is MORE REAL than anyone, and anything, on that planet. As the Snarl is composed of makings from 4 Sets of Gods, as opposed to the current 3 Sets.
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Apr 30, 2021 01:10
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