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You know when Xykon talks about avoiding the big fire below? Is that only during his fight with V? I thought he monologued on it a bit more but that's all I can find. If anyone knows where he extrapolates on it that would be great; I want to rip it off for tonights D&D game.
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May 20, 2021 09:08
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It's in https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0652.html, when V tells him they are channelling the raw power of two of the mightiest casters to ever be sent to eternal suffering in Hell/The Abyss/other lower planes. Xykon correctly spots that there's some massive selection-bias going on in that statement (Specifically, the opposite of the survivorship bias effect).
Slashrat fucked around with this message at 10:16 on May 20, 2021 |
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May 20, 2021 10:10
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Wasn't there also a bit along those lines at the end of Start of Darkness, when he's talking to Redcloak after killing Dorukon and Redcloak's initial refusal to reanimate Right-Eye's corpse as an undead minion? I'm at work, so I can't check my copy at the moment.
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May 20, 2021 12:35
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Slashrat posted:It's in https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0652.html, when V tells him they are channelling the raw power of two of the mightiest casters to ever be sent to eternal suffering in Hell/The Abyss/other lower planes. Xykon correctly spots that there's some massive selection-bias going on in that statement (Specifically, the opposite of the survivorship bias effect). Thanks for this, that's what I was able to find (did you know someone has transcribed the entirity of this text-heavy comic?). I thought he expanded on it somewhere. W.T. Fits posted:Wasn't there also a bit along those lines at the end of Start of Darkness, when he's talking to Redcloak after killing Dorukon and Redcloak's initial refusal to reanimate Right-Eye's corpse as an undead minion? I'm at work, so I can't check my copy at the moment. That's what I thought, I could have sworn it was a coffee shop moment but I can't find it. Sanford fucked around with this message at 12:57 on May 20, 2021 |
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May 20, 2021 12:54
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Sanford posted:(did you know someone has transcribed the entirity of this text-heavy comic?) I mean, if they've been doing it as a regular project that's like five minutes a month.
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May 20, 2021 13:42
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Sanford posted:(did you know someone has transcribed the entirity of this text-heavy comic?). In the oots fandom? Shock. Them like counting things.
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May 20, 2021 15:16
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He has a bit at the very end where he says Redcloak is a spineless bitch who claims his evil ends serve better means, and will never measure up to Xykon who indulges his own depravity and chose to surrender his last vestige of humanity rather than admit defeat. Also the whole "just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't pay attention" bit. It's not explicitly about the big fire below, but it has the same energy. I think it's the last conversation he and Redcloak have in the book.
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May 20, 2021 21:42
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More than just that, he says that Redcloak is on the hook to work with him forever, because the alternative is admitting to himself that he killed his brother for nothing, and he isn’t capable of being that kind of Evil.
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May 20, 2021 22:12
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Yeah, the lines I was thinking about are "As a reward for your honesty there, I'll let you in on a little evil secret. What I said up there to Dorukan about overwhelming force? That's only part of Colonel Xykon's secret recipe for winning. It's not just about raw power, it's also about how far you're willing to debase yourself before feeling bad. And me? I ripped off my own living flesh so that I wouldn't have to admit weakness. You're strictly little league compared to that." (For the sake of context, the lines in italics are whispered.) As Zulily said, pretty much the same kind of energy his comments to V about the soul splices being two losers who didn't have what it took to avoid getting got, and how power that's borrowed isn't worth having in the first place because it's not really yours.
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May 20, 2021 22:19
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Since we're talking about the other books again, I recently read On the Origin of PCs and Good Deeds Gone Unpunished: First of all, the name of the book is totally misleading. The good deeds in that book absolutely get punished; just not in the book itself. O'Chul's actions directly lead to the downfall of Sapphire City. He gave Xykon the hobgoblin army, the only reason that they were able to invade the city; without it swamping the city's defenses, they would have stood no chance of making it to the inner sanctum. If he had just let the paladins invade the hobgoblin settlement when they believed it was right to do so, instead of forcing them into a position where they no longer have a justification fitting their alignment, so many innocent lives would have been saved. Yes, they would have launched retaliatory attacks on the populace, but far fewer people would have died in the long run. The plot of the story when the book came out directly undercuts O'Chul's philosophy. The only difference between him and the paladin he got killed is that he was haughty and arrogant, and O'Chul is lowborn and kind-hearted. The book has the premise that it is detailing O'Chul's backstory and motivations, making him an even more sympathetic character, but I kind of like him less after reading it -- not just because, as someone who knows the whole story, I know he was wrong, and even worse, no one in the comic ever acknowledges this. No one from Sapphire City ever points out -- hey wait a minute, those are the hobgoblins you had us spare. Don't you feel even a little bit bad about all the people whose deaths are now on your hands because of the lengths you went to to prevent a petty regional conflict? Aren't you not really any better than the paladin you challenged if you protest that you didn't know it was going to lead to this? But no -- no one so much as mentions it passingly, because of course it's a side story and it isn't referenced in the main comic. The fact that it's just kind of swept under the rug when it was this whole big ethical and philosophical flashpoint in the book bothers me more than anything.
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May 20, 2021 22:35
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Cup Runneth Over posted:Since we're talking about the other books again, I recently read On the Origin of PCs and Good Deeds Gone Unpunished: Honestly that sounds like the kind of thing that'll get mentioned in this current book, if O-Chul and Serini get to talk again.
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May 20, 2021 22:42
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Cup Runneth Over posted:Since we're talking about the other books again, I recently read On the Origin of PCs and Good Deeds Gone Unpunished: You are effectively talking about a pre-emptive war to wipe an otherwise (generally) peaceful village off the face of the map and trigger goblin attacks all throughout Azurite lands just because they might attack later. That would be, in my opinion, a pretty hosed up thing to do. I do kind of wish someone would ask O-Chul how he felt about it, though, just so he could inevitably say that he regrets nothing, since it was still the right/good thing to do.
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May 20, 2021 22:45
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AnoHito posted:You are effectively talking about a pre-emptive war to wipe an otherwise (generally) peaceful village off the face of the map and trigger goblin attacks all throughout Azurite lands just because they might attack later. That would be, in my opinion, a pretty hosed up thing to do. I do kind of wish someone would ask O-Chul how he felt about it, though, just so he could inevitably say that he regrets nothing, since it was still the right/good thing to do. No, the village was attacking the surrounding lands and the paladins plausibly believed that it contained the mantle they were looking for which would stop the goblin menace. They were wrong, but they had good justification to launch a raid until O'Chul inserted himself into the conflict. That decision cost many more lives than would have been lost otherwise. He has never faced any kind of reckoning for that -- and if his response is simply "I don't care how many people died because of it, I didn't know that would happen at the time, and I still think it was the right thing to do," then I would lose even more respect for him, because he would be no better than the paladin lord who said he didn't know for sure that the hobgoblins would raid villages in retribution so those deaths weren't on his hands. O'Chul NEEDS to accept some culpability for what happened to Sapphire City. I believe it is not above his character to recognize his role in that tragedy. Regretting nothing would be the absolute worst thing that could come of it, and would completely undermine the entire moral argument of the side book.
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May 20, 2021 22:59
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Cup Runneth Over posted:No, the village was attacking the surrounding lands and the paladins plausibly believed that it contained the mantle they were looking for which would stop the goblin menace. They were wrong, but they had good justification to launch a raid until O'Chul inserted himself into the conflict. That decision cost many more lives than would have been lost otherwise. He has never faced any kind of reckoning for that -- and if his response is simply "I don't care how many people died because of it, I didn't know that would happen at the time, and I still think it was the right thing to do," then I would lose even more respect for him, because he would be no better than the paladin lord who said he didn't know for sure that the hobgoblins would raid villages in retribution so those deaths weren't on his hands. I disagree, because that's way too consequentialist of an argument. The paladin lord was making a hasty assumption that was directly relevant to the moral dilemma at hand, but the benefit of the doubt O-chul was giving the hobgoblins, is too many steps removed from their involvement in the siege to hold him accountable for the ethics of his decision to save the hobgoblins. The paladin lord had grounds for suspicion, but he chose to act without confirming his suspicions thoroughly, and he was held accountable for that. But in O-chul's case, you would essentially be holding him accountable for a lack of prescience. They're not comparable situations at all. Would Xykon have found a different army if the hobgoblins had been wiped out? Would Redcloak have found a different way to enact his revenge, independent of the fate of the hobgoblins? Even if you're being consequentialist, there are many factors outside of the hobgoblins' existence themselves that led to the siege, that it's not even fair to assume that it wouldn't have happened without the hobgoblins. O-chul's decision potentially, indirectly leading to the fall of Sapphire City is a worthy subject for the comic to explore, but holding him accountable for it is a step too far. Like, if you save a child from drowning, and that child later grows up to be a serial killer, are you then accountable for the murders they commit? Come on now.
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May 20, 2021 23:58
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god, if only this character had gone along with a war crime, how much nicer things would be
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May 21, 2021 00:02
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Yes I'm sure O-Chul lies awake at night, thinking to himself how much peachier life could have been if he had only done a genocide. You've nailed the reading of that character. What's that old saying about two wrongs making a right?
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May 21, 2021 00:06
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Cup Runneth Over posted:No, the village was attacking the surrounding lands and the paladins plausibly believed that it contained the mantle they were looking for which would stop the goblin menace. They were wrong, but they had good justification to launch a raid until O'Chul inserted himself into the conflict. That decision cost many more lives than would have been lost otherwise. He has never faced any kind of reckoning for that -- and if his response is simply "I don't care how many people died because of it, I didn't know that would happen at the time, and I still think it was the right thing to do," then I would lose even more respect for him, because he would be no better than the paladin lord who said he didn't know for sure that the hobgoblins would raid villages in retribution so those deaths weren't on his hands. This is incredibly gross How in the gently caress are you arguing someone should feel culpable for something because they didn't participate in a pre-emptive genocide? Like what the actual hell. Zore fucked around with this message at 00:10 on May 21, 2021 |
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May 21, 2021 00:07
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Do remember that the hobgoblins attacked not because they were spared, but because their leadership was suborned by someone who wanted the azurites dead. There's no getting around why the army existed, but why it attacked azure city specifically was entirely 100% redcloak. If someone powerful enough to seize control of an entire army quite literally single handedly wants to invade you, do you think it really matters that there are demi humans around? He and Xykon could have just as easily went with trying to get the dragon nation to invade over existing political disputes, against an azure city weakened by constant guerilla war.
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May 21, 2021 00:11
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BSS: Batman's Scrappy Sidekick › The Order of the Stick: Do not look at this thread either
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May 21, 2021 00:12
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Cup Runneth Over posted:Since we're talking about the other books again, I recently read On the Origin of PCs and Good Deeds Gone Unpunished: The Familicide defender has logged on.
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May 21, 2021 00:47
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ikanreed posted:Do remember that the hobgoblins attacked not because they were spared, but because their leadership was suborned by someone who wanted the azurites dead. The hobgoblins attacked out of opportunistic revenge. The books make quite clear the chief has no intention of going to war with the Azurites (because he knows he would lose and die), he just wants to appear strong by threatening it. ikanreed posted:There's no getting around why the army existed, but why it attacked azure city specifically was entirely 100% redcloak. I didn't say it was entirely O'Chul's fault that it happened. I said that it wouldn't have happened without his direct interference, so he should reckon with his culpability in that, and it bothers me that the story just... doesn't address it. If he were to simply go "couldn't have foreseen that, not my problem, don't care," he isn't any better than the paladin villain in that book, who did the exact same thing. I don't think he would do that. But simply never addressing it isn't any better, because the whole point of the book is that that paladin's logic is obviously immoral. ikanreed posted:If someone powerful enough to seize control of an entire army quite literally single handedly wants to invade you, do you think it really matters that there are demi humans around? Yes, absolutely!! Xykon lost the fight against the Sapphire Guard, he wouldn't have been in a better position if he had no hobgoblins. I'm not talking about Xykon and the Gate here, necessarily; I'm talking about the innocent lives and the lives of the soldiers lost in the invasion. The (enormous, bigger than Azure City) hobgoblin army went under control of Xykon because O'Chul enabled the leaders' ambitions, which he made quite clear in the book were mutually beneficial for the time being, but not friendly. That hobgoblin army would not exist if the previous leader were still in control of the settlement, which he likely would be if O'Chul had not intervened. ikanreed posted:He and Xykon could have just as easily went with trying to get the dragon nation to invade over existing political disputes, against an azure city weakened by constant guerilla war. Azure City would have been much better prepared to fight a conventional enemy they already knew, even with undead assistance. Plus, they probably had spies in the Dragon Nation that could have warned them of an oncoming attack, whereas Xykon struck without warning with the hobgoblins. Zore posted:This is incredibly gross It's a loving fantasy webcomic. Hobgoblins are not real. We are discussing the impact of a story's writing, not people's real lives. Calm down.
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May 21, 2021 00:49
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Zore posted:This is incredibly gross Doing a genocide might not even have helped once the necromancers get involved. The site of a massacre is rich with raw resources. Instead of hobgoblin soldiers there would be an army of undead hobgoblins. It's probably a wash.
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May 21, 2021 00:51
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Strawberry Pyramid posted:The Familicide defender has logged on. V's Familicide spell had unintended and severe consequences. O'Chul's interference with the paladins had unintended and severe consequences. Both of these are narrative tools to hammer home the morality of the character's actions. One of them is intentional; the other, I think, is sending the wrong message, and I want to see that addressed. Facebook Aunt posted:Doing a genocide might not even have helped once the necromancers get involved. The site of a massacre is rich with raw resources. Instead of hobgoblin soldiers there would be an army of undead hobgoblins. It's probably a wash. No, the events of the book took place many years before the invasion, and the hobgoblins went on to multiply tenfold as a result because the new leader focused on growth.
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May 21, 2021 00:51
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Cup Runneth Over posted:It's a loving fantasy webcomic. Hobgoblins are not real. We are discussing the impact of a story's writing, not people's real lives. Calm down. participating in genocide is bad, cup runneth over
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May 21, 2021 00:51
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I sure hope Rich is OK.
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May 21, 2021 00:52
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Doing evil for a good cause is still doing evil.
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May 21, 2021 00:52
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Facebook Aunt posted:Doing evil for a good cause is still doing evil. Depending on the acts in question I believe this averages out to neutral.
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May 21, 2021 00:54
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Raenir Salazar posted:Depending on the acts in question I believe this averages out to neutral. CRO appears to be arguing the opposite of Kant: "Intentions don't matter, only results" as well as absolute numbers of lives being the final word in morality tallying.
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May 21, 2021 00:59
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Actually one of the hobgoblins found the cure for fantasy cancer and saved even more people than the number of dead Azurites, so O-chul did a Good thing
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May 21, 2021 01:03
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Strawberry Pyramid posted:CRO appears to be arguing the opposite of Kant: "Intentions don't matter, only results" as well as absolute numbers of lives being the final word in morality tallying. No, I'm arguing that the book undermines its own ethical argument which is the focal point of its conflict by placing O'Chul in a starkly similar position, only his actions led to an even greater loss of life, and then never bringing that up ever again.
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May 21, 2021 01:05
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I feel fairly certain that this is a webcomic where NOT committing genocide will NOT be a mistake.
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May 21, 2021 01:05
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What do you think the invasion of Azure City was if not a hobgoblin genocide of the Azurites
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May 21, 2021 01:10
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Cup Runneth Over posted:No, I'm arguing that the book undermines its own ethical argument which is the focal point of its conflict by placing O'Chul in a starkly similar position, only his actions led to an even greater loss of life, and then never bringing that up ever again. Correct, you were in fact arguing what that poster said you were arguing. O-chul is not in a starkly similar position because the ethical argument regarding the paladin lord's orders isn't about the loss of life the hobgoblins could hypothetically bring, but because he was acting on unconfirmed suspicions blinded by his own hatred. It is insane to base morality of a decisions based on the possible consequences in the far future.
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May 21, 2021 01:16
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Cup Runneth Over posted:No, I'm arguing that the book undermines its own ethical argument which is the focal point of its conflict by placing O'Chul in a starkly similar position, only his actions led to an even greater loss of life, and then never bringing that up ever again. No, you're arguing that "fantasy" genocide is totally cool because maybe, possibly, one day someone will do some bad from that group and O'Chul should be sad he didn't bathe in the blood of the foreigners. And if they did wipe out the hobgoblins and so Xykon never took Sapphire City, should they feel bad because they killed off an entire group for no reason since no one would have known what could have happened otherwise? If not, well, then that says they should always slaughter anything that might if you squint hard enough be a threat one day since you can just assume there totally was going to be a problem one day you guys. I don't know how you could possibly read this webcomic and take away the "mass murder is great!" message, but just stop. You are absolutely reading it wrong. EDIT: Cup Runneth Over posted:What do you think the invasion of Azure City was if not a hobgoblin genocide of the Azurites
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May 21, 2021 01:17
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Cup Runneth Over posted:What do you think the invasion of Azure City was if not a hobgoblin genocide of the Azurites You are still making the completely insane argument of "If someone might do something bad in the future you should feel guilty about not killing them."
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May 21, 2021 01:17
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Can a mod please cast postercide on this thread, banning everyone who's ever posted here, as well as anyone who's posted in the same thread as people who posted here. It's the only way to ensure these horrific posts do not continue.
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May 21, 2021 01:17
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sirtommygunn posted:Can a mod please cast postercide on this thread, banning everyone who's ever posted here, as well as anyone who's posted in the same thread as people who posted here. It's the only way to ensure these horrific posts do not continue.
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May 21, 2021 01:19
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ImpAtom posted:You are still making the completely insane argument of "If someone might do something bad in the future you should feel guilty about not killing them." O'Chul didn't just not kill them, he went out of his way to intercede on their behalf, which led directly to the demise of untold numbers of Azurites and the fall of his home city. It seems to me like he ought to at least dwell on that for a second, and it's a glaring omission that Rich never touches on it again.
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May 21, 2021 01:19
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This is where you should be saying "Right, I was trying to play the devil's advocate, but went way too far and didn't consider the full implications of my argument, sorry for that" Otherwise, keep digging, once you get past the Earth's core you can get out of the hole!
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May 21, 2021 01:22
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Cup Runneth Over posted:What do you think the invasion of Azure City was if not a hobgoblin genocide of the Azurites Well all the Azurite civilians had already left the city so it was only soldiers. So it was just a plain old war. Also if you want to throw blame. You can just as easily say the Order is to blame because they did not kill Redcloak and so he took over the Hobgoblins and attacked the city with it.
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May 21, 2021 01:22
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