WMG / The Order of the Stick

• Jossed Theories
• Confirmed Theories
• Theories on the Order
• Theories on Team Evil
• Theories on the Linear Guild
• Theories on Divine Beings

---

Please put latest guesses at the end if they don't fit in the above categories.

Elves are hermaphrodites.

Vaarsuvius' gender is a big mystery, and in the incident with Girl-Roy s/he only noticed the fake wig, not the sex change. This'd make sense if elves don't have sexes, so they wouldn't really understand them in other races.

• We know that elves reproduce, and even half-elf half-humans like Pompey are possible. Therefore, to fit with this theory, elves must be hermaphrodites of ambiguous gender somehow interfertile with humans. Which would hardly be the oddest thing in this setting. This explains why Pompey is so aggressively lecherous — he knows about his elf father/mother and is overcompensating.
• Or V is the author's way of sneaking a gay/lesbian character into the series (that's what the "my mate" comments, and the adopted children, bring to mind.)
  • Considering that Haley is canonically and blatantly stated to be bisexual, I can't see why he would feel the need to sneak a gay character into the story.
• Notably, the only elves in The Order of the Stick with known binary genders (and not following the -ius name pattern) are Zz'dtri (who, as a drow, may not count) and Lirian.
  • In last arc is new character of elven cleric, Veldrina, which is explicitly reffered to as female.

The Next Prequel Book...

...which Rich has already alluded to, will be about The Order of the Scribble. Whether or not it will be told in crayon remains to be seen.

• No, no, no! It'll be about the Linear Guild!
  • You're both wrong, even though one of you is me! After SoD, there's no way it's not about the Sapphire Guard!
    • All wrong! It will be about that Guy with a Halberd!
    • Well, since the Sapphire Guard were founded by a member of the Order of the Scribble, there's no reason it can't be about both of them. I predict that at one point, the Order of the Scribble will face their evil duplicates, the Doodle Guild! And the Guy with the Halberd can have a cameo.
    • Their rivals are the Holey Order.
    • What about Baron Pineapple?
    • You're all wrong! It'll be about Trigak the chimera!
    • You're all wrong! It's going to be about Tarquin's adventuring group, the Vector Legion. So much of their backstory is left ambiguous, especially because what information we get is from Tarquin. We don't really know why Nale has a grudge against Malack, or who Shoulderpads Guy is, and a story about the Vector Legion would also tie into the formation of the Linear Guild. And it would probably have fewer spoilers for the current storyline than a story about the Scribblers. To be fair, a story about the Scribblers would be cool...
• More seriously, we have the third prequel now. It's about Azure City, as a compilation of several stories - one for Daigo and Kazumi (more of a "midquel"), one for Mr. Scruffy, one for Therkla and Sangwaan, one for Lien, and a much longer one for O-Chul and Hinjo.

The Kobold Oracle wasn't always a Kobold.

Kobolds are classified as mini-dragon/lizard creatures. In The Start of Darkness, the Oracle talks about getting to Second Base with his date, which wouldn't really be possible with a reptile. In this comic, he talks about his balls, when reptiles don't really have external testicles.Perhaps he wasn't always a Kobold and at one point he was a humanoid of some kind. Maybe he was turned into a Kobold in exchange for his prophecy powers, perhaps in an unpleasant deal or with odd wording. He occasionally slips up though, and forgets what exactly Kobolds have. It could also be that he's so surly about dealing with the customers because he's jealous about them being humanoid. He could also use the mind-wiping charm in the Sunken Valley so that any old friends won't find him.

• I dunno, he seems genuinely disgusted by the notion of mammal breeding tendencies, and second base for reptiles may not be the same for mammals. Also, I get the idea that The Dark One greatly exaggerates the whole evil humanoid short-end-of-the-stick bit.
• The village name Lickmyinternalgenitaliahalfling wouldn't quite fit on the sign, and he knew it wouldn't because he's, well, the Oracle. So he came up with something shorter.
  • Though suckmyorangecloacahalfling would be an equally horrifying final sentiment...
• Reptiles' internal testicles were mentioned in this comic "While you're at it, you can look up 'hemipenes'. because you can suck both of my-"
• Nope. Hemipenes is specifically two -*cough*- "Rods of Lordly Might." He's basically saying "suck my dick(s)," not "suck my balls."

Shojo planned for Hinjo to battle devils in some capacity.

The flashback in this strip shows Hinjo having to get his mount's teeth filled due to Shojo feeding him a "20-lb. bucket of strawberry frosting". Normal, wacky Shojo antics, right?... Wrong. Remember, Shojo was not senile; he was actually a Chessmaster with Obfuscating Stupidity, and everything he did in his "dementia" was actually to serve a purpose that he wouldn't be able to get the paladins to go along with if he were completely honest (or to amuse himself, but that's just Comedic Sociopathy at work). Shojo wanted to make sure his nephew had another weapon in his arsenal that he could use against demonsdevils, and he did this by making sure that his mount would end up with multiple cavities that would need to be filled with silver. Whether he was actually planning an offensive against demonicdiabolic forces, or merely ensuring a strong defense against them, will have to wait for a later date. Also, I have apparently forgotten the difference between demons and devils since I hung up my GM screen.

• If he was planning ahead by doing that, I doubt he was expecting anything specific, just being Crazy-Prepared. Demons are something high-level paladins fight fairly often.
• Perhaps Shojo even got a few early warnings of the Great Fiendish Conspiracy, and hedged his bets.

Daigo will, letter by letter, reveal his last name. Then, he will die.

Compare 501 to 589. Like an cosmic game of H-O-R-S-E, he'll continue this joke until he runs out of letters and thus dies. And, giving the fact that Daigo is saving his last name to use as an emergency death-prevention, it'd be deliciously tragic if the reason he became a Mauve Shirt ends up being the impetus for his death.

• Additionally, his last name will be excruciatingly long. Perhaps so long that he'll be an old man dying at his wife's side surrounded by his grandchildren by the time he completes it.
• Alternately, his name will be Daigo Daigo.
• Alternately, Daigo will reveal his surname before officially "settling down" from adventuring, then die.

The Shojo in Belkar's hallucination wasn't actually a hallucination - it was Shojo himself.

Shojo's spirit returned to Belkar's mind to give him advice at the right moment to recover properly. It has to be a spirit, as the Shojo in Belkar's head talks about things that happened after he died. To do this, he would need a focus to return to the material world as a ghost-spirit, and that focus is quite clearly Mr. Scruffy.

• Additionally, the spirit readily identifies himself as Lord Shojo while Belkar always calls him 'wacky old dude.'

Redcloak (and maybe the rest of Xykon's crew) will visit the Oracle for information on the next gate.

Sure, torturing O-Chul will stall Xykon, but he's going to need some idea of the illusions they'll face. The Oracle is within walking distance of Azure City. While the Oracle is a jackass, (and probably not too sympathetic to his cause, given how he tried to tell Roy about their real target) he's a good source of information...provided you phrase the question right.

• Confirmed... sort of. Yes, Xykon went to the Oracle for his own reasons, but the Oracle was noticeably absent.

Julia (Roy's sister) will get married to Redcloak

A Crack Pairing to end all crack pairings, Julia's wizarding school will close. As she has no living family members, she will set out on her own, and somehow end up being captured by Xykon's forces. She and Redcloak will meet/fall in love/etc, egged on by The Monster in Darkness, who wants some Happily Ever After. Roy will eventually find out and approve, despite some reservations. The happy couple will elope, making another Happily Married couple in the Order of the Stick universe. Eugene will then attempt to rip Roy's vocal cords out.

• Possibly a reason for Redcloak to resurrect Roy, as mentioned above?

Soon's wife Mijung is not an Azurite.

Completely based off the fact that her sash is red. I have no clue why this would affect anyone in any way, but there you go.

The Ancient Black Dragon is working for the IIFC.

Her question to the Oracle actually was: "Who would be willing to revive my son?". He answered to go to the archfiend, who made a deal: she would be reunited with her son if she made all the scene she did to V. Then, V would have the deal with the IIFC and the dragon would have escaped. The thing she didn't know was that she would be killed and reunited with her son in death.

Rich Burlew is pimping the CMOA section.

Seriously, that damn thing gets a new entry for every goddamn action, and even a friggin' inaction. It's undergoing CMOA inflation.

• Alright, I'm just bitching.

Shojo didn't die.

He transferred his soul into Mr. Scruffy's body. Belkar's hallucination was Shojo communicating with him via magic.

• So Shojo is Marianne the Flash from Code Geass, Mr. Scruffy is Anya the, uh, Ayanami, Miko is V.V. and Belkar is C.C.? Uh, wow. The gender flips are the best part.
• Shojo is a 14th level aristocrat and doesn't know about magic.
  • Shojo knows about magic well enough. It's knowing how to do magic he doesn't get.

Haerta will find a host and join Xykon.

And inevitably betray him when it becomes necessary.

There is an epic-level monster in the abandoned fortress.

V merely assumed the only monsters present were weak enough to be destroyed by the Azure City refugees. He could leave before they're attacked, then teleport some or all of the scattered team and/or his family back to find everyone but a few (named) characters slaughtered, and permanently imperil his soul, mind, elven status, etc. from guilt.

Thog and Therkla are brother and sister.

• They are the only half-orcs we've seen.
• They both wear purple.
• They both have names that start with "Th."
• Thog has never discussed his parentage; we don't know he doesn't have siblings.
• It would give Thog a reason to get all angsty.
  • Considering that Thog wasn't even literate until he took those two levels of fighter, it's probable he can't even spell "angst", let alone experience it.
  • Considering his limited vocabulary, it's even more probable he doesn't know the word.
• I'd support this. Thog's too kooky to have been brought about the usual half-orc method.
• Both had improbably strong relationships with Elan. Maybe he reminds them of their human parent?

The necromancer's first act of evil was killing off her own family.

Since Familicide means killing one's own family, it seems to make more sense this way. This could also be her Start of Darkness, and this would make sense of why the spell leaves the target alive.

• Who says the spell leaves the target alive? The dragon's head was already dead when V cast the spell.
  • No, the head had been reanimated. If it killed the target, V wouldn't have needed to disintegrate it after the fact.
  • It was reanimated as an undead. Therefore, it was already dead, so a spell that causes Death wouldn't affect it.
    • Also, how would creating an epic level spell be the first evil thing she's done? You've gotta build up to stuff like that.
    • If you don't build up, it just might kill you...
    • Maybe the spell doesn't leave the target alive and that's why the necromancer's dead now.

Everyone dies.

The world is saved, (or maybe not) by a third party (maybe Hinjo?). The last panel is exactly the same as the first, as the Order gets to continue their adventuring well into the afterlife. Happily ever after, and leads to an interesting paradox about always being on a continual loop in time and space. Edited for grammar, and umm... sense-making.

• That's not the most depressing ending, as they get a happy ending despite the Stable Time Loop. Your theory says that they wanted to continue their journey, so they had the options of going to whatever Heaven their alignment would dictate; having the option to be adventurers forever is way better than some of the other possible endings.
  • Remember that in Elan's "Oh Buddy Roy" song he lamented the fact that he & Roy would go to separate afterlives due to their separate alignments and not be able to see each other. The Order will choose to adventure forever rather than being separated in different heavens.

Everyone lives...

...for a while. In Xykon's dungeon. Well, except for the named Azurites. All gates but the one in Azure City are destroyed, Xykon makes a deal with the gods that they each make him an epic-level cleric in exchange for not letting the Azure City gate open any more than it already has, he uses his new powers to capture the Order from afar and puts them in solitary confinement, and the last page shows them getting progressively less hopeful- Vaarsuvius, still soul-spliced, joining with Xykon voluntarily. The last panel is Xykon, with the burning world superimposed across his image, holding a gazing sphere showing the remaining Order dying of old age, and going to their own, separate afterlives, except for Durkon. Or not. Hopefully not.

The Neutral afterlife is to act as a monster and/or sex slave in one of the Good afterlives.

The archons are companion spirits, of course, but where do they get the women for the "bars of endless one-night stands" or the enemies for the "dungeons with monsters just strong enough to challenge you"? Presumably they're not Evil, or Hell wouldn't be much use. It would make the most sense for them to be Neutral, either from the respective afterlife or just shuffled around by assignment (since there would doubtlessly be a greater demand in the enlightenment-free Chaotic Good zone); sure, it's a bit harsh, but in a cosmos where evil adventuring parties periodically ransack Heaven...

• As sentient constructs. Using unfiltered divine power to make illusions just strong enough to be defeated by the ghosts of warriors shouldn't be that difficult, and the "bars of endless one-night stands" could easily be every dead person in history taking advantage of the impossibility of violating the whole "'til death do us part" thing and being whatever age they feel.
  • Yeah, that sounds really harsh for someone who's Neutral, especially considering the vast majority of people (most non-adventurers and non-villains anyway) would identify as Neutral. No doubt there's a set of Neutral afterlives not too dissimilar from the Good one we've seen.
    • As an additional perk, considering she was Lawful Neutral at the time of her death, that would indicate Miko was in this kind of situation. You'd have people moving to the Evil afterlives just to get away from her.
    • Just because she fell as a Paladin doesn't mean Miko's alignment shifted. Paladins have to abide by must stricter standards than other classes; most alignment-based class restrictions require an actual alignment change to kick in, which usually takes more than just a single act that's inconsistent with your current alignment. But a single Evil act is enough for a Paladin to fall. A lifetime of being Lawful Good (albeit in a delusional way) doesn't go away simply by doing one Evil thing. Most likely, Miko was still Lawful Good when she died.
    • Considering how Roy's interview implied that his occasional, very mild Jerkass behavior towards his fellow party members could've been enough to keep him out, Miko's got no chance in Hell of entering the Heavens. She was as big a Jerkass at her best, so might not have gotten in even without Shojo's murder.
    • Except as shown before, the standards for being a paladin are stricter than those of just being lawful good. If she maintained her status as a paladin for most of her life then she was by definition lawful good enough to get into the Heavens. We have to balance out the antagonistic behaviour and one murder done out of confusion and paranoia vs a lifetime of good deeds, meaning she may still be lawful good.
    • Except Soon outright says she won't be going to the Lawful Good heaven, or at least where she expected to go (and where else would she?) because she wasn't fully redeemed. Tabletop rules aside, she seems to have fallen out of Burlew's definition of "lawful good."
    • No, Soon says she won't be a paladin again, not that she won't go to the LG afterlife. In fact, he says that he personally will escort her to her afterlife, and that her celestial mount will be able to visit her. Both of those things imply pretty strongly that she's still going to a LG afterlife. If it's a standard DnD cosmology, she may be going to Arcadia (between LN and LG) instead of Celestia (pure LG). Arcadia would fit thematically, as it's populated by good and lawful warriors.

Miko Miyazaki is either on Last-Name Basis with the Order, or everyone just calls her "Barkeep".

• Last-Name Basis: Miko is her family name. Her parents just had a really weird idea of personal naming conventions, and she prefers a Last-Name Basis because it's more formal.
• Miko is her occupation, like Chef Victor or Samurai Jack. Since Miko aren't nuns, she can also act as a Paladin(Class)/Samurai(fighting style/day job). Considering she was being sent away on months-long journeys just to stop annoying the rest of the Azure Guard, it's not unlikely that she was given a "special dispensation" to go ahead and fight for the Azure Gard, since she wouldn't quit and would probably try to do the whole ritual suicide thing if she lost her status at the Azure City temple.
• The last name (Miko) could, in fact, be an Artifact Surname, like "Miller" or "Cartwright" in the west. Of course, this all goes out the window if there was an official explanation given in the comic or an official explanation (and not Bellisario's Maxim invocation) by Word of God.
  • The "official" explanation, if there is one, was basically, "Wait, is Miko your surname? In feudal Japan..." "What is Japan?" "Oh, right." Short version: The linguistic rules don't necessarily apply, and her name is just "Miko Miyazaki".
    • Tropers: Kazumi Kato. Discuss.
    • Okay: Their family name is now "Kato." That, and the fact that Daigo explicitly referred to his second name (which keeps getting cut off when he tries to say it) as his surname, ought to put this whole thing to bed, don't you think?

Xykon will fuse with the Snarl

So O-Chul is about to throw the phylactery into the tear in reality (or V's familiar carries it in, whatever). When it enters the rip, the phylactery will shatter and Xykon's soul will be released. What happens when a creature that is a tangle of reality encounters a soul? Nothing good, to be sure. But I imagine that either: Xykon will fuse with it somehow, or his soul will cause the snarl to at least get more powerful/irritable.

• The Snarl destroys anything created by the pantheon of gods. Souls of beings that inhabit creation had to have been created by the gods, therefore, the Snarl would destroy Xykon's soul if O-Chul manages to throw the phylactery into the spacial rip. This is why the people who were killed by the Snarl before it was sealed cannot be rezzed or enter the afterlife.
  • Xykon's soul is not currently inside the Phylactery. Until he gets destroyed, Xykon's soul is in him (speculation based on SoD).
  • But he also completely flipped a shit when Soon's ghost said he would instruct the next human to destroy it during the siege. I think Xykon was probably just blowing smoke to manipulate Redcloak.
    • He was about to be defeated by an Epic Paladin... ghost thing. And his phylactery was about to be blasted as well. A certain amount of panic is to be expected.
  • Another result could be that Xykon becomes "mortal" again, which means that he can't regenerate again. Kind of like Voldemort after the Horcruxes were destroyed.
  • There actually was a book way back in second edition that went into detail about liches (including explaining how a character actually becomes one, which is useful flavor for DMs), and it explained that a phylactery isn't like a Horcrux—it contains no part of the lich's soul, it's just a sort of anchor that keeps that soul on the Prime Material. So assuming Rich Burlew knows about Van Richten's Book of the Lich, Xykon wasn't bluffing. On the other hand, a lich can only ever make ONE phylactery. If that one's destroyed, he's essentially mortal again, just undead. So it's understandable he'd panic at the idea of someone destroying it.

The Stone that stores Lirian and Dorukon's souls will be made into jewelry...

...And given by Elan to Haley. Possibly as an engagement ring, assuming we ignore that fact it's black and the size of Xykon's whole hand. I don't know why it would be mentioned in Start of Darkness at all if it didn't make an appearance eventually. Plus it would be a Heartwarming Moment for all involved.

• I assumed it was blown up with the rest of the castle.
• Putting the stone that imprisons two people's souls into jewelery for a gift is a Heartwarming Moment? Maybe if Lirian and Dorukon were freed first, but if they're still there, then no.

Even if/when Roy defeats Xykon, Eugene will not get into Lawful Good heaven

Even in life, Eugene seemed like a self-centered jerk, but in death he's even more so, possibly slipping into Lawful Neutral or even True Neutral territory. The most recent strip, where he indicates that he wouldn't care if Roy sold his soul or fell to evil, provided he defeated Xykon kind of clinches it for me. When Roy kills Xykon, Eugene will indeed move on, but to the LN or TN afterlife.

• My judgment may be skewed, but it seems Eugene was saying that if Roy had been willing to do whatever needed to be done to ensure Xykon's destruction, we'd all be in a lot better shape. I can't say I disagree.
  • Whatever needed to be done up to and including making a deal with demons for power. I'd say that disqualifies him as good, even if it might have worked (the moment you're ready to make a proverbial deal with the devil for power you're not qualified as good anymore, no matter your intentions)
  • True, true. Then again, it wouldn't surprise me if Eugene wan't LG. It seems Julia takes after him quite a bit, maybe she inherited her alignment from him, and is just more honest about it.
  • Made far more likely as of 664. My guess is that he'll be warned by an archon just as he's looking forward to Xykon's death and getting into LG heaven, and then try to stall.
    • Wouldn't be all that surprising. I'm pretty sure the gods of Law and Good would make an exception to their "only your deeds while you were alive matter" rule when dealing with an individual who endangered the entire multiverse by willfully withholding information about dealings with fiends from all three major Lower Planes, especially if said threat to the multiverse is purposefully ignored in favor of petty pride.
  • Roy's archon mentions that he thinks that it's "technically past the point where this would be a possibility" re: Eugene going to Hell. Also, afterlives are all about the actions one takes during one's life. Plus, Eugene was already completely judged and found worthy except for the Oath of Vengeance.
• Is it possible that the angel is trying to see if he meant any of that stuff about giving the oath up for family and his showing that to be a lie could sentence him to a non hell but not lawful good heaven, or the angel would respond that the problem is not just that you gave up the oath but that you gave up your supposed reason for giving up the oath just as easily. If his actions now are not supposed to matter why would a third parties?
• Another less morally ambiguous reason: the Blood Oath Eugene swore goes as follows: "I, Eugene Greenhilt, swear on the blood that flows from my wounds this day that I shall not rest, in this life or any other, until I or my heirs have enacted horrible vengeance on those that have slighted me, named here as Xykon the sorcerer." But this assumes Roy is the one who actually destroys Xykon...so the Oath technically will not be fulfilled if he is destroyed at the hands of anyone or heck, anyTHING (like the Snarl), other than Roy. Roy could still get into heaven for at least TRYING to fulfill the Oath, as he has done once before, but Eugene will have to stew in Limbo forever.

Kraagor the Barbarian and Serini Toormuck of the Order of the Scribble had a relationship, and possibly a child.

This just comes from me thinking how broken up Serini is over Kraagor's death and how she chose to guard her gate based off of him and his physical strength. Perhaps when we get to his gate, the child (if there is one) will be there, as an additional guardian, or something, a legacy character.

• This would be a good twist, but I think it's more likely Serini and Girard. It seems that there is a Scribble member for each Stick member (whoa, that came out wrong), and Serini is almost certainly Elan, and Haley is probably Girard. Besides, knowing Elan, he'd probably spend a year in mourning for anyone who hadn't tried to kill him, so Serini's probably the same.
  • Proof: She drew hearts around Girard's name.
  • I see that as more of an Oh Em Gee He's Pretty kinda crush, because it is her diary. Note that the only other person to get an actual note other than Dorukan's "new kid" is Kraagor (Mean! Grr!). Since Dorukan is said to be new, I'd say that it was early in their travels.
    • Also, I don't think there is a direct 1 to 1 correspondence of Scribble to Stick. That's kind of the point of the Linear Guild.
    • If anything, there are multiple Scribblers to each Stick member and vice versa. For example, Dorukan is a wizard (V) who has a "relationship" (Elan) with Lirian (Haley) who's an elven (V) druid (Durkon).

The Oracle's comments about not funding an IRA are merely him offhandedly predicting the real world stock market down turn

While it is another Belkar that will draw his last breath ever.

When the oracle said that Belkar should savor his next birthday cake, shouldn't fund his IRA, and that he'll draw his last breath before the end of the year, he meant that Belkar will die.

Radical theory, I know, but bear with me. You see, birthday cakes are enjoyed through being consumed, which is an action that requires chemical activity in the brain (producing the delicious sensation) as well as motor activity of the muscles around the mouth and jaw. In other words, life.

Birthdays themselves are also celebrations of life. So therefore, if Belkar is told to savor his next birthday cake, that hints—rather subtly, to be sure—that he may not receive another one, which symbolizes death in this comic (as Roy failed to notice or celebrate his birthday when he was dead).

IRAs are retirement funds. Now, one thing we know about the oracle is that he goes on TV Tropes, and is in fact the Giant's way of acknowledging us; you can tell by the fact that he lords over other characters his knowledge of time, a crystal clear Shout-Out to the many "X is a time lord" theories. Therefore, he has a keen knowledge of the retirony trope, and hence, whenever he refers to retirement plans, he must in fact be thinking of death^note  This is even better now that it's been thoroughly Jossed.

Now the breath clue is harder to decipher. Normally when we talk about drawing breath, of course, we're referring to the act of doodling a lung or winning a charity raffle on the elemental plane of Air. But my guess is that the oracle is using his powers of prophecy to look forward into the future to a point in time where it's common knowledge that breathing oxygenates the blood supply, therefore directly maintaining life, and hence "breath" is taken synecdochically for life. Therefore, the oracle is coining a unique and visceral evocation of death, a phrase that brings to mind the fact that Belkar's muscles and organs will cease to function, shut down, and eventually begin the process of necrosis, as the only blood that reaches them, is depleted of oxygen rather than enriched by it.

• No. Way.
• Eh, I don't buy it.

Celia is, and always has been, Neutral Evil

No, this isn't a lawyer joke. The "deal" she worked out for Haley, and the way she tricked her into accepting it, don't seem very Lawful Good.

Roy and Redcloak will face off in a final epic battle.

Which will end with them peaceably talking their issues out. Based mostly on the fact that in On the Origin of PCs, Roy chose to talk to the ogre party, and realised they were camped out for concert tickets, rather than a war camp. If Redcloak let anything about his dead family slip, I can see Roy at least TRYING to talk to him, rather than automatically killing him.

Ian Starshine is not Haley's father.

Loki is. At least I think that's Loki. Also related to the "Haley is a Celestial, etc." guess above. If you change the eye color to something more human, and turn the Giant Holy Burning Aura of Ponytailness into normal human hair, they're pretty close. Assuming Rescue Mr. Starshine doesn't end up an Aborted Arc (with the recent revelations in the previous guess, it seems decreasingly likely that the strip will end before the more important secondary arcs are wrapped up), it seems that would be the perfect time for him (probably with his dying breath) to reveal that Hayley is a Doorstop Baby, or even that he and possibly his wife were tasked with/impregnated by the god himself. If Tyrinar turns out to be using Exact Words in his ransom note (as in my above "Rescuing Haley's Father" guess), and knows who her father is, expect things to get a bit more complicated. If Ian Starshine turns out to be an avatar or incarnation of the god that can't use his godly might whilst trapped in the mortal body, several possibilities open up (from him smashing Tyrinar and his throne room before ascending to him remaining on earth, but with a God Mode that casts from hit points). Refer also to her family name: Starshine does not seem like the typical human name in such a setting, though the Greenhilt clan isn't much to go on, and I highly doubt think she's a half-elf or (less doubt) direct male-line descendant of a halfling.

• If you think about it Haley has been extremely lucky. There's the million to one shot she made in the first Linear Guild arc. She was saved in the nick of time in the Second Linear Guild Arc. She lucked out that Belkar was too distracted to consider a Face–Heel Turn in the Escape Arc. Almost all the bad things in the series have happened when Haley wasn't around. Even the destruction of her money led to a boyfriend and valuable Character Development. Perhaps this suggests the gods favor her. It also fits that she would be ashamed if her father was Loki. He often gets painted as pure evil in Hijacked by Jesus settings.
  • I had a similar theory I wanted to post on the Gitp boards, so I would like to offer some additional arguments for this. Haley has a fear of Elan leaving her like all the good people she loved and did leave because she was not good enough. Being descended from Loki a evil god could be a good cause for this feelings. Two things I want to further clarify/suggest in my theory: Loki was on Haley's father's side of the family tree in my mind, possibly as close to her as being her grandfather. Why her father's? This can work with her father actually being Loki's avatar: he's left out of the good people who ran away (thus suggesting "evil"), plus he looks like Loki with another hairstyle. Why grandfather? It would make the right mix — 75% human 25% celestial/god — so she could be Aasimar, with a + 1 Level adjustment so the others wouldn't catch on to her different race, or maybe even no Level adjustment if the author houserules use the many official ways to avoid La. (Sorry for the wall of text!) In the end Loki is evil, hence her whole reason for hiding it. The Northern Gods come as a package, so many worship/stand Loki, but he could still be bad. The author portrays Loki as a reasonable guy, but his two clerics shown strongly suggest (plus the books, I think, spell it out) he's Chaotic Evil, so he gets the short end of the stick again.
  • Two periods, ten lines of text before a kindly editor cleaned it up. I already accounted for the possibility that Ian is an avatar, but the possibility of Loki being Haley's grandfather leaves him a demigod (unless he's her maternal grandfather, which is ignores several clues and is thus less likely). And for the record, in non-Hijacked by Jesus settings, I usually see Loki portrayed as Chaotic Jerkass (When he's not Sympathetic Villaining).
• This (recent strip, so mild spoilers) sounds like something Loki Lie-smith would teach his son, minus the "except family" (considering how often most of his family screwed him over, even when he deserved it, though it wouldn't be entirely out of character to say "trust no one but me"). The family history doesn't really say much yet, although framing each other for murder does run in the family, especially whenit comes to Loki's schemes...

Inkyrius is male.

Because I don't care what anybody says, that is a man chest, damnit. It doesn't necessarily confirm what Vaarsuvius is, but Kyrie's a dude.

• Also, he has square hips, which is a male trait, and eyes pretty high up on the face (another male trait).
• That doesn't confirm anything, especially given that Burlew's become much better about gender inclusivity. Inkyrius could be a masculine-looking woman(trans or cis) or some nonbinary identity. Unless we actually get gender confirmation, we can't know.

Celia and Navi are the same person.

Think about it: Good-natured but useless and annoying fairies with light blue color schemes. Both are intelligent, but their clueless nature annoys and can get others into trouble. And they both left! Hooray!

• No actually Celia is Ciela. Unless... Ciela and Navi are the same fairy.
• Actually, Celia is the companion of Leila and Fleta.
  • You mean that Leila and Fleta are the other two elementals, who were killed by the Linear Guild?

Crystal will be raised and recruited by the Linear Guild

Nale will want her on his team due to her being Haley's Evil Counterpart. This will cause conflict with Sabine (now redundant as Haley's Evil Counterpart), perhaps leading to Nale's and Sabine's break-up as hypothetised in a previous WMG.

• Crystal isn't an Evil Counterpart, though. She's The Rival. Aside from being in the same Thieves' Guild as Haley, the two don't have much in common.
  • Of course, the same argument could be made for the actual Linear Guild members. In fact, it has. Naturally, this doesn't account for other problems with the theory...

In the battle for the final Gate, the Order of the Stick and the Linear Guild will set aside their differences and join forces to destroy Xykon

The IFCC made nale and the rest of the liner guild

maybe Elan really HAD a twin, but he died a long time ago. the IFCC needed someone to be their pwans on the mortal plane, so they crated five humanoids so they could watch for anything that can help them and they put sabine on the group so they could inspect them

Serini Toormuck or Girard Draketooth is going to get the Order to Girard's Gate.

In #695, the illusion of Girard says that the spell is set to inform himself, Serini, and (presumably) the rest of the Order that it's been triggered. Dorukan and Lirian are sealed, and Kraagor and Soon are dead, so the only people affected by the spell would be Serini and Girard himself; being that Serini is probably too good-natured to have been happy with the idea of Girard also setting it to blow Soon up, Girard probably didn't tell her about that part of the spell in the first place. Since Serini's a Rogue, she'd know to use this as an opportunity to see Soon Kim while she knows for a fact that he's away from his Gate and thus avoid breaking her promise not to interfere. Alternatively, Girard will teleport there himself, either to make sure Soon is actually dead, or to finish him off.

Either way, once they realize that the Order of the Stick has very good reasons for being there, whoever shows up will give them the proper coordinates.

Kraagor isn't dead.

Nor is anyone else swallowed up by or sealed off into a Rift. Kraagor is living on the Planet Inside The Planet, and just has no way to get home.

Girard's Gate is exactly where Soon believed it would be.

Girard was an illusionist who had a personal grudge against Soon Kim; anyone who knew about the Gates would have to know about it. It's just a very cunning deception, designed to deter anyone from searching for the Gate any further; the spell to blow up Soon Kim is for authenticity and probably a bit of vindictiveness on Girard's part. After all, Roy survived it just fine, and Soon was likely higher-level then than Roy is now, and would have more HP to burn on what amounts to a very nasty prank— especially since Soon would be traveling with a bunch of paladins who could probably heal the inflicted damage with not much effort.

• So what about those quite-possibly low-level paladins or others you are talking about? Would they all be fine?
  • Who would bring low-level anybody into a part of the world with Purple Worms in it? It's been some time since I took a flip through the Monster Manual, but as I recall, Desert and Undersea were some of the worst terrain types in terms of typical monster habitats.
    • Because they don't HAVE all that many high-level people like the order of the stick in thier ranks, and you notice there's 'normal' people who go through the desert all the time, the spell was clrearly meant to be as lethal as possible.
    • Girard put it specifically in the middle of nowhere, possibly for several reasons, but the stated one is because it's the middle of featureless desert, with nothing in it of value to anyone. Since the Order had to split off from the route the common folk were taking, normal people probably don't go through that part of the desert. And the Sapphire Guard did have some fairly impressive paladins in their roster; evidently this is especially the case for the ones they send out on long missions away from home (ie, Miko.)

Girard really did try to kill Soon

However, Evocation is a common barred school for Illusionists (what with spells like Shadow Evocation and its more powerful versions) so he couldn't get enough damage in a concentrated area as possible that would last indefinitely. It was more designed to kill/weaken Soon's flunkies (the ones with K. Geography) and now the illusionary Spice traps are going to activate (illusionary Spice scents that will attract every Purple Worm within ).

Soon was once like Miko

• It seems very odd that Girard would set a trap in the desert for Soon, literally betting on Soon breaking his oath of non-interference. Anyone who knows Paladins knows that they adhere to their promises very strictly, and Girard knew Soon personally so one would think he'd know better. However, there is one known Paladin who, in that situation, would have done exactly what Girard accused Soon of doing. Miko Miyazaki frequently reinterpreted events to suit her worldview and justify just about any action she took (up to and including killing her liege lord). In Soon's place, she would have found some way to justify breaking the oath and done precisely what Girard thought Soon would. In that context, it might just be that, during their time in the Order of the Scribble, Soon behaved much like Miko, which meant Girard probably felt justified in setting the trap he did. This also turns Soon's speech to Miko at her death into a Harsher in Hindsight since it means that Soon, when telling Miko about redemption and needing to admit you were wrong, was speaking from personal experience.

Lirian was part non-elf.

Something like a grandparent or great-grandparent was a human or sylph or other noticeably sexual dimorphic race. Might explain why she's the only non-androgynous elf we see.

• Also the only elf with a name not ending with "-ius". (Even Zz'dtri followed the pattern when he disguised himself as Polozius.) Maybe she's a half-elf, like Pompey.

Celia will die

The fact that sylphs can't be raised from the dead sounds suspiciously like a Chekhov's Gun, or Chekhov's Boomerang if you consider her explanation for why she's reluctant to kill the first use. It would also be a good way for Burlew to pull an Alas, Poor Scrappy.

• Realted theory: when sylphs die, they go to the planet inside the planet. It is also where you go in the Lawful Good afterlife if you climb to the top of the mountain. It is a world similar to this one, but without death or injury.
• Didn't Celia confirm what happens to sylphs after they die doesn't involve an afterlife like other humanoids get?
  • Yup, in 669.
  Celia: We don't have [an Afterlife]. We just sort of merge back into the plane we're from.

In some alternate reality, a Super Hero version of The Order Of The Stick exists

• What? It'd be cool. The teams membership includes
  • Roy Green, AKA Star-Fist. His father was Dr Star (aka Eugene Green) a Science Hero who defeated the Alien Demigod (think Thanos or Darksied) Xykon years ago, but didn't remove the threat long term, thus allowing Xykon to threaten earth once more. Roy thus formed the Stick Squad as a team dedicated to defending earth from Xykon. Roy's a Flying Brick due to accidental exposure to alien Starmetal while still in the womb- a sore point for his father, who wanted him to follow in his footsteps as a Badass Normal Science Hero.
  • David Durkon, AKA Hammer-Bolt. Stocky vietnam vet whose war experiences left him with a phobia of trees. Self-medicates his war trauma with a combination of neo-pagan Thor worship and sledgehammer assisted street-vigilanteism. Manifests various powers (summoning lightening, brief bursts of Super-Strength) that may be the product of Thor's influence, or simply previously unknown superpowers manifesting themselves.
  • Elan Edwards, AKA Charmer. Along with his estranged Evil Twin Nale, AKA Dominator, the product of a liason between two telepaths- one a hero, the other a villain. Possesses limited mindcontrol powers, which he has never really developed, until a familiar incident at the hands of Nale led to him doing time (well, 24 hours) in prison, forcing him to develop his powers further, and augment them with some new Badass Normal style skills (ie: he read one too many Batman comics, and thought it'd be fun to jump through Skylights dramatically).
  • Haley Hawkins, AKA Starshine. Former jewel thief turned Badass Normal superhero. Armed with Waif-Fu and a selection of trick throwing darts, of which her favourite is the fast freezing Nitro-Glycerin dart.
  • Vaarsuvius, an elven sorceror from another dimension who has travelled to the Squad's home dimension in search of new magic, and whose gender ambiguity is a running joke amongst the media.
  • Ben Belkar, AKA War-God. Bestial Nineties Antihero, whom Star-Fist keeps on the team because it's better to have him pointed at the bad guys than at the civillian population. In addition to animalistic powers, such as Super-Strength and Super-Senses, is certifiable Knife Nut.
    • Everyone's basic characterisation and behaviour is the same, just slightly modified for the new, modern day setting. Similarly, the story progresses differently where appropriate, either due to the modern setting (for example, the Saphire Guard are a secret organisation a la SHIELD, rather than a group of paladins, with Miko as their top operative- she's just consumed with Patriotic Fervour rather than being Holier Than Thou) or changes in character (obviously, Roy can't die from falling now). The villains are also modified to be more approrpriate to a Super Hero setting (as mentioned, Xykon is now a Darksied alike, while Redcloak is now a superhuman supremast a la Magneto).
  • Show of hands, who wants to help make this happen?
    • ... Dammit, fine. Yes. Although I'm not too sure about Charmer - It's to the point and matches Dominater, but seems a little plain for a supername. Also, rather than vaguely psychic mind-control, I think pheremone-type powers would work better. Like a non-Evil Purple Man. I kind of love the idea of Haley as a Distaff Counterparty Hawkeye-meets-Catwoman, though.
    • Isn't it more of a gender inverted Green Arrow/Black Canary?
  • Ladies and Gentlemen, I believe that we have discovered the contents of the World Within The World.
• Stick Squad!Tarquin = Mafia don? Admit it, that would rule. And maybe Nale/Dominator wants to take over the Mafia, but Tarquin is scared that he'll mess it up? Sabine (or "Succubus") is probably from V's dimension, and Thog... well... Some sort of experiment with mutations, which produced a very strong and easily angered mutant who was really dumb? Aaaand kobolds could be some sort of lizard people living below the surface, hidden from human eyes.
• I can see Sabine as a Hooker with a Heart of Gold (or just a hooker) with connections in the crime world and some mysterious debts to pay. Thog would be a very effective bodyguard of Tarquin's, somewhere between a Bunny-Ears Lawyer and the Dumb Muscle, who for some reason sided with Nale after their falling out. Elan... I know he's already been covered, but I really, really want Elan Edwards to be a pop star. I mean, he's a bard, and he's certainly pretty and ditzy enough. He would be raised apart from Nale in a foster family, and they would become aware of each other's existence after Nale is mistaken for Elan during a robbery/murder/whatever.
  • As an alternative for Team Evil, how does this sound:
    • Reginald Cloak, Dr. Doom style, was a member of the Gobbotopian royal family and was horribly scarred working on a think tank for the spy agency SMITE. Unable to return to his home as his family was deposed, he blamed SMITE and the UN for not offering aid, and now uses his scientific skill to aid Corrupt Corporate Executive and secret backer for the Crowned Skull Gang, Xavier I. Khan. (It's just "Galactic Overlord seems a bit too high-tier for a Xykon analogue. Surely that's more IFC's bailiwick?)
• This could only ever work as a Tabletop RPG which pokes fun at various comic book clichés.
• Don't stop there! Celia as She-Hulk! Snarl as Galactus and Serini as Silver Surfer! Vaarsuvius jeopardizes his marriage making a deal with a demonic entity!... okay, not that last one.

If Miko had gotten "Treasure Type O" regularly...

• She would get over all over her issues, be exceedingly nice and merry, and skip happily from place to place with birds and butterflies following in her wake.
• She would switch from Lawful Stupid to Stupid Good.
• It wouldn't change her personality much, but it would awaken her sexuality. Which she would be very confused about since she's kept it repressed so long. Say, she'd try to give Haley an angry lecture about greed, only to trail off when she learns she wants to bath in a pile of gold, and concludes, "I'll be in my bunk." I'd write up dialouge if I wasn't so tired.

Burlew isn't using the standard alignment restrictions.

I thought of this when considering an alignment for Thog, who's both a Barbarian and almost certainly evil. He can't be lawful by standard rules, but he's acted Lawful Evil far more often than Chaotic Evil or Neutral Evil. His only chaotic acts that I can recall are killing a sylph, which he did under orders and in a dungeon where there was no law-enforcement authority, and dressing as a leprechaun, which he apparently did out of stupidity rather than whimsy. Furthering this, Miko Miyazaki acted so crazy because she was never precisely good—she was lawful, so she could be trusted to follow orders, and she was close enough to good that the Sapphire Guard could make use of her in a similar way to how Roy makes use of Belkar, but she didn't fit the alignment because she didn't need to in order to be a Paladin in this universe. This would also tie in to how the evil races seem to be Noble Demons as often as true villains.

• When has Thog acted lawful? And also, don't forget "yay, resisting arrest is fun!" as well as hacking to death several hundred people within city limits.
  • I figured "lawful" was the best term for someone who looks for a leader (usually Nale, in his case) and follows that leader's orders without thinking for himself. I guess you could call that Neutral Evil with pathetically low Charisma—I'm a bit confused about the alignments at this point.
• Burlew sets out his view of alignment vs emotions quite well in this article.
  Rich Burlew: First, remember that alignment is a guide, not a strait-jacket. Not even for NPCs. Evil characters can love, good characters can hate.

Niu, a new character, will be important to the storyline.

Think about it. Why bother NAMING a character when he/she won't serve a supporting role to the heroes at the very least? In fact, I'll bet my money she was a relative to The Scrappy Miko. (I have ten.)

• Niu has been around since the beginning of the Resistance Arc, helping Haley freeing slaves and even before. And also, tell that to Solty Lurkyurg. And/or Buggy Lou. Or Trigak. Oh, wait, you can't, because they're all dead. I would expext Niu & Thanh to stay at this same supporting character level, maybe eventually show up in a big battle to take back Azure City.

The Dancing Knights will return.

They will either:

• Become a recurring Funny Background Event.
• Create a distraction at an important time.
• Be intentionally summoned as a distraction.
• "And kick, and kick, and ham and jam and spam a lot!"
• Be the new, much more painful-to-land-on flumphs.

Redcloak and Hinjo are gonna strike a truce at some point

Both want their peoples to have homes, both are pragmatic enough rulers to not let the past cloud their judgements, and both take rather laissez-faire approach to their alignment restrictions (which is really the only thing preventing them from realizing that war between the Sapphirites and the goblins is the worst outcome for both).

At least one of the NPC leveled prisoners is well optimized

Such as an iaijutsu focus expert,

The Divine half of the gate-opening ritual requires the self-sacrifice of the caster, and the ritual cannot be stopped once the Arcane half is complete.

Xykon may genuinely care about Redcloak, or Redcloak may know enough about the ritual to not do it, but Xykon has no qualms about getting rid of Tsukiko the next time her death becomes useful.

• I'm sorry, you lost me at "Xykon may genuinely care about Redcloak".
  • You lost me at "Xykon may genuinely care".
    • I said "may".

Girard is a dragon that assumes human form.

The 3.5 fluff makes it pretty clear dragons often do this for shits and giggles, plus Draketooth?

Shojo is attempting to change Belkar's fate.

According to Shojo, if Belkar keeps playing the sociopathic Jerkass, chances are someone, possibly an ally, would kill him. That's why Shojo came to Belkar in the dream: He knows Belkar is going to die, but needs him to live for some unspecified reason. Belkar's "fake" character development could end up with him making a choice he wouldn't before, something that will save his life.

The Other Planet is Eberron.

Because really, Without Eberron, there wouldn't even have been an Order of the Stick Comic.

• Someone has to get beat by Loli Pope.

In the Order of the Stick universe, the term "PC" refers to a hereditary immunity to Diplomacy.

• There are no players. What else could it mean?
  • My interpretation was that PCs were individuals with killing skills far beyond normal people—in our terms, people capable of taking combat-oriented classes like "Fighter" or "Sorceror" rather than NPC ones like "Aristocrat." Basically, they're Gracelings. (Also of note is that whatever it is, it's apparently hereditary.)
  • Edit from second poster: just realized that some members of the Sapphire Guard are NPCs, and apparently so was Krystal (that line about how one's rival is always equal to or higher than your level wouldn't need the "higher than" if the rivalry worked the same way both ways, and Haley's a PC, right?) Still, maybe PCs level faster, or maybe they're people who're forced into adventure by fate (ta'veren rather than gracelings.)

Malachar is either human or allied with the humans, and plans on taking over sooner if not later.

Why else would a kingdom full of lizardfolk accept a human Guard? He used either diplomacy, Diplomacy, or his power as His Vizierliness to convince anyone who could argue.

Ian Starshine is Malachar.

"This 'Elan' fellow seems nice enough, and he will be Family, but Nale has got to be taken care of before the wedding." It's better to use a meat shield that will require an epic spellcaster or a lot of fighting than sit on the throne yourself (especially since Starshine sounds like the sort of guy who would hate being in the spotlight, aside from just the Rogue-type logic seen in flashbacks). Ian wouldn't bother trying to keep power when that strong a spellcaster or someone with the Order of the Stick equivalent of a MOAB is after the throne, and anyone else can be dealt with while they're trying to pry the meat shield off the throne.

Pompey is the son of Dorukan and Lirian

It is possible that Pompey is the son of the two Order of the Scribble members. Even though they had sworn not to interfere with each others gates, that wouldn't keep them from seeing each other for other reasons. Also, the age of Pompey checks out. He told Nale that he was 43 and Lirian was killed under 30 years ago. Also in the comic detailing the effects of a Cloister spell seen here, the last panel shows how Dorukan and Lirian could have met several times. It could be that Lirian never actually told him who his father was or if she even gave any thought to him at all. He could have been given to an other elf family or even a human family, perhaps for his own protection (his parents being epic level characters makes him a target) but that didn't turn out that well.

All the characters are really characters from other webcomics.

V is Black Mage, sans destructive tendencies, Xykon and Redcloak are Richard and Cale, The Oracle and Therkla are Dominic and Luna, and Sabine is one of the Succubi from Sinfest

• Belkar is Black Mage after some re-constructive facial surgery and losing his magic.

The upcoming arc will be a Star Wars parody.

General Tarquin (not the resemblance to Tarkin) dresses like Boba Fett and reveals himself to be Elan's father in a parody of Vader's famous scene. And it also hit me that the lizard cleric looks a lot like Palpatine and the Blood Empress has Jabba Table Manners. You could even go back a couple of chapters to the Dune chapters- Lucas kind of ripped off Arakis when creating Tatooine. Also, the termal detonator, the "pray I don't alter it any further", etc. Speculations on what will come in the future is include that Elan will get a hand cut off by his father after he turned on the heroes but in the end dies to redeem itself to an army of small creatures defeating the empire.

The Empress of Blood is the current ruler of the kingdom which imprisoned Haley's father.

Hence, Haley's imprisonment will lead to her reuniting with him.

• "Tyrinar the Red was my father. I don't see why I should have to keep track of his prisoners." "...or any of my bastard stepbrothers."
  • Well, the Empress isn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, but she did rise to power two years ago — the same time when Tyrinar decided to ransom Ian Starshine for a crapload of GP. Desperately trying to get money for troops during the war with the Eo B? Or trying to line his pockets before fleeing the kingdom? Either one is believable.
  • Wait, when was that quote said?
    • It wasn't. The troper was speaking hypothetically.
• Confirmed that Haley has met her father Ian, and of course Jossed that Tyrinar was her father. Also the Empress is just a figurehead for Elan's father, Tarquin, just like Tyrinar was before her.

Elan and Nale were only twins after they were born.

They used to be a Chaotic Evil half-pint, possibly named Neal. Elan got the chaotic, Nale got the evil.

Elan and Nale have other siblings.

I'm going to say older sister, older half-sister, or younger half-sister and/or multiple young half-siblings of varying sex. (Additionally, with the guess that this sequence is going to be at least partly Star Wars homage/pastiche, it leaves room for There Is Another, though I really hope they don't pull off a Luke And Leia bit, regardless of whether Vaarsuvius is Han or Luke. Unless s/he leans against the fourth wall long enough to express relief that that sort of thing wasn't going to happen).

Lien called her shark Holy Paladin Mount "Razor" not because of its teeth...

But because its skin was so good at removing stubble.

Thog is Elan & Nale's half-brother.

Tarquin referred to Elan & Nale's mother as his first wife. That wouldn't have been in there if it wasn't important somehow, and it's already been established that inter-species hookups are more common, and attitudes to them more tolerant, on the Western Continent than they are elsewhere. This would also make yet another parallel between Elan/Roy & Nale/Thog, given that Roy & Elan have a surrogate big brother/little brother relationship.

Pompey and Leeky Windstaff will return.

Do we have this already?

Every major good or neutral-aligned character introduced as of strip 729 will survive to the end of the strip, as will more than half the major evil-aligned characters.

The author seems to dislike killing off anyone the fanbase likes or is neutral to (unless they're a minor character, in which case they can die freely.) The exceptions so far have been Lord Shojo, who doesn't count because old people tend to die in these sorts of stories, and Therkla, who doesn't count because Hopeless Suitors almost always die in these sorts of stories. The only other major and popular good or neutral character who now has a precedent for doom is Varsuvius, and he's likely to just suffer for what he's done, rather than outright die. The only major good or neutral character who's currently unpopular is Celia, and she's likely to survive because she's a useful tool to comment on the morality of Dungeons & Dragons. There are a couple evil-aligned characters who have a good precedent for doom, like Xykon and Tsukiko, but even Redcloak has a good chance of getting spared for being interesting and vaguely sympathetic. (And Belkar is definitely going to survive—he fulfills the Richard rules of karma avoidance by being badass, funny, and an ally of the good guys.)

The oracle leads one of the factions that haven't been revealed yet.

His followers are the inhabitants of Lickmyorangeballshalfingville, and he's been manipulating several other sides for his own mysterious goals.

O'Chul will gut Belkar like a fish.

O'Chul said that he'd gut Belkar if he learned of B treating anyone else the way B treated him.

Tarquin will be killed by Sabine

He'll die by the very genre conventions he trumpets. The lone defector (sort of, not so much 'defecting' as 'persuing her own thing for a bit') from an evil faction and agent of chaos avenging a fallen loved one on the tyrant who refused to see said loved one's value. It has everything! The hero being the only one who saw value in their fallen icon, the villain's forgotten actions coming back to haunt them, victory through the power of love, the intense personal emotions of family, one individual versus the might of an empire, all the elements.

BUT! Because Sabine is a DEMON, nobody will see her as a hero, and nobody will see Tarquin as the villain. He'll just be some shmuck who had dealings with devils backfire on him; and even though from the perspective with all the information a great story will have been told, IN-UNIVERSE nobody will remember or care.

Burlew will not show us this because he is a diva who has come to hate Tarquin to the point of implausibly denying all his good characteristics, intentionally drawing out and making more boring the arc to try and manipulate the readers into wanting to be rid of him, and because he thinks that taking a victory based on defying resolution to a situation to a meta level isn't a bloody obnoxious thing to do; but it will still have happened.

• Nice conspiracy theory.

The Oracle misspoke. Belkar will be killed by Kira.

It's the only answer.

• How is that misspeaking? All we have is that Belkar will die in some unspecified manner that precludes him breathing (thereby preventing him from being brain dead and hooked up to some electronic breathing apparatus)

Tarquin is an arcane spellcaster

This is not based on anything Tarquin has done, but rather both of his sons have taken up arcane spellcasting classes. (Elan is a bard and Nale is a sorcerer) It's possible Tarquin did this too, taking levels in Duskblade, Warmage or some sort of prestige class. Fitting the recent Star Wars theme, a level 16 or so Duskblade can cast Chain Lightning a la Emperor Palpatine.

• I don't really know the D and D ranks well, but someone suggested he's a Blackguard once, and looking at the pictures for that class, Tarquin fits it to a t. On the other hand, Malack looks a lot Palpatine (if he was a lizard person), so I hope they'll have him shoot lighting from his fingers at some point.
  • While this is also valid, Blackguards are divine and not arcane, which is why I didn't mention them in my WMG.
• I think it's more likely that he's an eldritch knight, given Rich's desire to stick to core and Tarquin's appearance. However, given his associations, dragon disciple would fit thematically well, especially since spontaneous spellcasting requires draconic heritage.

Therkla will be revived.

Be it for Speak With Dead (possibly in an epilogue, with chronicler montage), as part of some mass-Raise Dead/create zombie plan, or just to push Elan's buttons. Bonus character-emotion-wrenching points if she had been told to move something important someplace hidden while under the command of her former lord, and V disintegrating his corpse and leaving the dust to the wind means the heroes have to revive her to learn where it is.

Belkar is Lawful Good, Xykon is the real Anti Villain, and Redcloak's a Complete Monster

They don't call it Wild Mass Guessing for nothing.

• Belkar promised... He had to, his master wouldn't tell him what the promise was until the oath had been cast, and Belkar Bitterleaf never went back on a promise... At least not until the day that Lord Brightpistil told him to act Chatic Evil to destroy the Evil Living MacGuffin, and save the world. He blocked Miko's Detect Evil to keep from revealing his true alignment even by the virtue of his own virtue, let alone his words or actions. Xyko's from the D&D equivalent of Halloweentown, where doing murders to people isn't a bad thing, and Redcloak faked every moment of compassion he showed onscreen, only wanting to get his brother out of the way and more easilycontrol the Goblin kingdoms.
  • OF COURSE!
  • Hey, why wasn't Belkar affected?

Girard Draketooth will be a Deconstruction of Chaotic Good and Chaotic Neutral characters.

While the exact details behind why he was sure Soon would break his oath are still not known (pretty much any theory is valid right now until we learn more), it's clear that he completely misunderstood what kind of man Soon was, and took the distrust of authority common to such characters way too far. He will be to Chaotic character types (including Chaotic Stupid) what Miko was to Lawful character types: Mainly a good guy who opposes the heroes anyway.

• This is arguably the case, since although we've never seen him and Girard is eventually revealed to be long dead, pretty much everything he's done has worked to oppose or make things more difficult for the heroes in some way, and Roy in particular has vented numerous times about how Girard's spiteful paranoia has only ended up causing more problems than it's solved.

The crescent moon above the Empire of Blood relates to the location of Girard's Gate as either showing its entrance or dispelling Girard's illusionary protection on the gate.

I also bet Xykon will appear soon that moonlit night after a dragged out battle between Roy's team and allies or gladiators of the Empire of Blood because conditions are right for the Gate to appear relative to the crescent moon.

The Creature In The Darkness IS an aspect of the snarl, but it is inside the shell of an animal.

The same as the WMG above, but it dispells the reasoning that calls for it to be incorrect. I do not know if the snarl has this ability, but it makes a bit of sense.

Vaarsuvius's raven is an aspect of The Gates/Pure Order

The snarl could not see its prison while it was being built, so it is reasonable to assume that it works the other way around as well. Blackwing's vision is of the world the snarl devoured, but he cannot see the snarl itself. The world would be in relative chaos, but it is not a complete aspect of the snarl and his brain filters out the chaos. Hey, until you disprove it, I stand by my claim.

The stone holding Dorukan and Lirian

......is a thus-far-unfired Chekhov's Gun. It's a stone holding the souls of two epic level mages. Now, where have we seen such souls used before?

At some point, V will decide to look into soul splicing, and will discover a way to do it with willing souls. During the final confrontation with Xykon, the stone will be broken, V will sense the souls, and team up with them to deliver an epic, well-deserved, and karmic beatdown to the lich.

Crystal is Right-Eye's daughter in disguise, which means that Haley's dagger is Right-Eye's dagger in disguise.

• Which, if Xykon can be separated from a certain magic item, would prove very useful indeed.

All remaining Black Dragons will join Xykon

This is the best way to V's Deal with the Devil to bite him/her.

Tarquin had his nine or so wives killed for the worst possible reasons.

This ventures into Poison Oak Epileptic Trees but, Tarquin said he's gone out of his way to prevent having any more children after the way Nale turned out. So every time he learns of his current wife being pregnant, he has her die of "mysterious circumstances" all in an attempt to prevent another Nale being born. Horrible yes, but this is the same guy who has two bounty hunters sentenced to imminent death because they "threatened" him for more money.

• That doesn't seem quite right for him. I think it's more likely he uses some sort of fantasy protection. Roy and Celia don't seem to have any worries with pregnancy, after all. Then he'd have a bit more time before getting tired of his unfortunate wife-of-the-hour, which I'm sure he'd prefer.

Miko will appear in the comic again.

I'm not saying she'll return to life, but she'll make some sort of appearance. Possibilities include:

• Another cameo of her corpse.
• A flashback.
• We'll see her in the afterlife.
• Montage of important characters before the strip ends.
• She might actually return to life. I doubt it, though.
  • The Linear Guild are gathering in a gladatorial arena. Given Vaarsuvius' suggestion here, it seems possible that Miko could return once more.

The Guy with the Halberd will never appear again.

Rich might do it out of spite.

The Monster in the Darkness can channel touch spells through Xykon.

Consider: spellcasters can channel touch spells through their familiars. Dimension Hop is a touch spell that can teleport. Granted, the spell is short ranged, but this can be circumvented with homebrewed metamagic. The Monster in the Darkness channeled dimension hop/similar spell through Xykon and saved V/O-chul.

The Grecian Gods live on inside the rift

Because theyr'e the only gods there, the world is heavily influenced by Grecian culture.

The world inside the rift is a normal modern world, with all the characters having normal counterparts

Roy would be a police officer, and his father a scientist, Durkon would be a priest, Haley would be a spy or a cat burglar, Elan would be a musician, his mother would still be a barmaid, but Tarquin and Malack would be ruthless businessman, and Nale would be criminal. Vaarsuvius would be a scientist, Belkar would be a serial killer on death row,and Xykon would be the leader of a terrorist group trying to, you guessed it, take over the worrld, M. Bison : Of course!.

Tarquin will kill Julio and cut off one of Elan's hands.

The Star Wars references in this arc kind of make one or both a necessity. With the former, I can imagine Tarquin killing Julio (perhaps for sleeping with one of his ladyfriends) and then as he dies, Julio would see Elan and tell him "I told you so". The maiming would make a lot of sense too (especially because it would work for both drama- besides the cruelty, it would temporarily impair Elan's bard abilities; as well as comedy- see Arrested Development for how a Hook Hand can be used for comedy gold). I picture Tarquin discovering how Haley freed all those slaves and thinking that Elan was in cahoots with her. Or in any case, soon enough, the two of them will have to come to blows. Tarquin will defeat Elan in combat and after declaring that he would never kill one of his children, chop.

• Forshadowed here and referenced here

Serini Toormuck is dead.

The incident with the Order of the Scribble occurred sixty-six years ago. Even when you consider that this comic doesn't completely follow D&D rules, she was probably in her twenties, which would put her somewhere in her eighties at this point — it doesn't seem like halflings live that long. Furthermore, Xykon is in possession of her diary — an object that someone with her personality would never want to let go of, so it stands to reason that Xykon might have taken it from her after her death (either he killed her personally during the eighteen year timeskip in Start of Darkness, or he took it from her corpse by chance, knowing him, it could be either one.) If this is true, the Order of the Stick is gong to be in for a nasty surprise if they end up trying to find her.

• Except halflings do live much longer than humans... they're based on hobbits, after all.
• Another possibility: When we do find her, she's jaded and embittered from being the last of her party left.
• Yet another theory: Serini had at least one child with Girard after the Order of the Scribble split up and fell victim to Familicide as well if she was still alive.

Miko will become The Atoner in the afterlife.

She will be allowed to go to heaven for her virtue, but only if she makes peace with people like Roy and lord Shojo.

Theories on new Linear Guild members

Evil Durkon: An ogre cleric of Tiamat who is a teetotaler.Evil Vaarsuvius: A warlock or a cobination conjurer, necromancer.

• Evil Vaarsuvius has been Jossed, it was Zz'dtri. Durkon has no counterpart yet (strip 811).
• Wasn't Hilgya Firehelm pretty much Durkon's evil counterpart?

Current Arc Star Wars references will escalate.

Tarquin already has something planned for Elan that has to do with the Empire of Blood (and bringing order to the continent perhaps?), as in "with our combined strength, we can end this destructive conflict, and bring order..." complete with ruling the empire (or continent) as father and son. Then through a series of events Tarquin will find that Redemption Equals Death as he dies in his son's arms.

The Northern, Southern, and Western gods deliberately engineered the creation of the Snarl to kill the Eastern Gods.

• After all of the pantheons had been arguing over how to make the world for whoever knows how long, the leaders of the North, West, and Southern gods realized that it was Zeus and his kin that were causing the most problems in terms of making the world. One of the gods saw how the occasional snag in reality would develop a semblance of intelligence for a few moments, and this led to the theory that enough snags would create an actual, intelligent monster - this god then explained to the other North, South, and Western gods that this could be used to get rid of the Eastern gods, take care of whatever problems they might have caused for making of the world, and then creation could be made with much more ease. All the other Southern, North, and Western gods agreed to this, and began to purposely create snags in reality to make an intelligent Snarl. They eventually did, and the Snarl what they wanted it too, but it was done a little too well

General Tarquin was originally Good but fell victim to a Helm of Opposite Alignment

This would explain why he keeps doing everything in such an evil way. It makes no sense. Even the food he serves is evil. Whatever he does, he has to go out of his way to do it as evilly as possible, even though he's not really malicious of attitude. So maybe he's doing it because he's magically compelled to be Evil.

Elan will overthrow Tarquin from the shadows

Tarquin makes a big deal about how dramatic, widely told stories of good overthrowing the evil empire lets the bad guys win. Elan will brood over how it goes against his bardic philosophy, but ultimately decide to go against narrative convention and arrange for a more realistic and less personal and theatrical destruction of Tarquin's empire, possibly by arranging for a Paladin crusade and making sure his name is left off.

Tarquin gets devoured by the Snarl

Maybe Elan pushes him in, maybe not. But it eradicates him as thoroughly as the Gods of the East. Famed In-Story? Forget it. He won't be a footnote.

I have no particular reason for believing this except that it would be perfect karmic justice. An alternative method of destroying the memory of him works just as well.

• Except getting killed by the Snarl doesn't destroy the memory of someone. Soon still remembered his wife, for instance.
  • Doesn't always. It's not necessary that it happen all the time — just to Tarquin.
  • Not "doesn't always," but doesn't at all. There's not one person in the comic killed by the Snarl whose memory was "destroyed." Not even the Eastern Gods.
    • Only because you forgot about them...
• Neither confirmed or jossed, but the Snarl apparently just got loose in Tarquin's backyard. Things aren't looking good for him right now.

Tarquin will be made immortal.

And then he will be sent to a plane of eternal torment.

Malack is actually female.

In this strip, Malack's discussion of pursuing a mate/having more children suggests two interpretations. On one hand, the obvious explanation is that Malack is male and lost his wife at some point before Nale murdered his children. On the other hand, the having a mate and having children might not be directly connected. It's possible that Malack is something like a lesbian lizard- reproducing through parthenogenesis, but still engaging in mating behavior similar to that of a typical lizard. The comic has followed lizard biology before, so this wouldn't be too surprising. It would also work for narrative purposes, as it makes Malack a perfect Evil Counterpart to the ambiguously gendered V.

• He has been described as "he", but that doesn't preclude him being Transgender. Which would kind of be awesome, actually. IMO there are both too few transmasculine characters in popular fiction, and not enough trans characters for whom their gender identity isn't the main focus of their characterisation.
  • While I do support increased presence of transgendered characters in fiction, I am unsure how that would happen in a D&D setting. Any ideas?

The Oracle is the equivalent of a GM

It would explain why he knows everything, tries to make life easier for the PCs, punishes a PC for going too far, and can essentially cheat death.

Xykon and Redcloak will succeed in finishing the ritual...

Only to fail in their ultimate goal becaus the snarl no longer exists.As evidenced here. Redcloak will also reveal the ritual's true purpose moments after it is complete, leading Xykon to kill him out of frustration and boredom.

Tarquin has read the Evil Overlord List.

This would explain this.

Vaarsuvius and the rest of the elves are a genderless species.

Just look at it's partner and children, the latter were adopted but still, we don't know if they are males or females. Thus, we can assume that Elves in the Order of the Stick universe are a species of Ambiguous Gender like the Asari in Mass Effect. So, it's appropriate to refer V as an "It" instead of "Him" or "Her."

• What about Pompey?
  • He might have 'inherited' a gender from his human parent.
• Lirian is clearly female though, and is a full-blooded elf.

Girard was unconscious during the final battle with the Snarl

He didn't see first hand what happened, only heard about it from Dorukan (who also had a grudge against Soon) and based on the descriptions provided by Dorukon came to the conclusion that Soon did something like shove Kraagor into the rift to save his own skin.

• But Dorukan wasn't the only witness to the final battle. Lirian was there too, and Girard knew that because both of them were required to seal the rift. It's more likely that Girard's (by all appearances) somewhat chaotic nature clashed with Soon's Lawful Good alignment.

We're going to run into a zealously over-paranoid Neutral Good character

We've got Miko for overly deluded Lawful Good, we've got Ian for overly paranoid Chaotic Good, so all we need is an overly paranoid Neutral Good to round out the circle.

• While I think she's canonically Lawful Good, it's easy to read Celia as Neutral Good, and she'd be a pretty much fit this- good to the point of Stupid Good, and if not paranoid, then somewhat overzealous.
• Does Girard Draketooth count? He seems a bit Chaotic, but he is incredibly paranoid, doesn't trust Soon as far as he can throw him, and he's been hiding in the desert since he started guarding his gate. Plus, we've never been given his explicit alignment.

The Monster in the Darkness is a Polymorphed Wizard.

He lost his memory due to... let's say a head injury, but managed to retain his spellcasting abilities. Hence the "Stomping"(Earthquake spell), the mystery teleportation, and the fact that whatever creature he is isn't commonly found in the jungle or able to speak common.

• Question is, what did he Polymorph into?

Tarquin and Julio once adventured in the same party.

There's nothing to contradict it: All we know is that they're both past adventurers of at least moderate success who appear to be roughly the same age and - one could assume - character level. It's entirely possible that, before Tarquin's empire-building and around the time of Julio's first Sexiest Man Alive award, the two roamed the world in adventurer style, slaying monsters and gaining EXP in manners appropriate to their alignments. Which, yes, are diametrically opposed, but there have been cross-alignment parties before; or maybe the years had one or both undergo an alignment shift? As to what broke up the group, and who the other members were/are... But hey, Anakin and Obi Wan were comrades before that whole 'Sith' thing. It would also explain Tarquin's experience with Pun-Duels, a feature of an apparently-rare character class; either he fought Julio (friendly sparring or otherwise) or was there when Julio wrested the secrets of the Dashing Swordsman from its previous holder.

The Order of the Stick takes place in the Forgotten Realms multiverse

But obviously not on Abeir-Toril. In Fourth Edition, the Blood War is ended. This is a result of the IFCC's machinations as outlined here.

Tarquin will be killed offhandedly by someone besides Elan.

If he dies in a dramtic fasion he will get what he wants: to be the Big Bad of his son's Story Arc. The only way for him to lose if he becomes a mere foot note. V could disintegrate him, or Xykon could show up after the heroes leave (since he will be searching for that gate soon) and kill him out of boredom.

• Or he'll be killed fighting Roy (since he joined up with Elan partially with the intention of fighting him) after finding out that this is ROY's story (not Elan's as he believes), which means not only does he not die in a big grand dramatic final battle, but he'll be remembered as a mook of Nale's at best.

The three demons will cash in on V's debt at the worst time possible.

Vaarsuvius did the soul splice, but her debt hasn't been paid yet to the demons she bargained with; they still have a contract and they haven't yet made good of it. I predict that V will have her soul be controlled at the worst possible time; the final confrontation with Xykon. V will preparing to deliver the final blow when her soul will be seized and the group will have to deal with her in addition Xykon and the gang.

Tarquin will suffer the most horrific defeat... dying as a hero.

It may be against Xykon or the Snarl, but Tarquin will face them to protect Elan or his own hide. He'll lose, but he'll have done enough damage/inspired the masses to defeat them. The last thing he'll hear is his son saying how proud he is of his father, and how everyone will know his story as a person willing to sacrifice wealth, power, and everything in the name of the greater good.

• As poetic as this would be, given all the Vader references Tarquin's gotten already, it's almost too good for him at this point. Maybe Elan and co. will know the truth, but to the general public Tarquin would have gone down as The Caligula who put himself on the wrong end of The Worf Effect out of obsession with his "perfect story." That way, even his last dramatic twist will end up forgotten by history.

The MitD will destroy Xykon.

At some point in the future, Redcloak will seek to finally rid himself of Xykon, and they'll clash. The Monster, thanks to Xykon's curse he put upon the monster in Start of Darkness, will be horribly conflicted, and decide to Take a Third Option and just blindly leap into battle. His immense weight will smash Xykon into dust, and might even give the lich's soul a few bruises.

The Order of the Stick will be heading to Durkon's homeland at some point...

...only to find it completely destroyed by Xykon.

Durkon: How will I finally be returnin' ta me beloved dwarven homelands?

Oracle: Posthumously.

The Oracle never states it would be after Durkon dies; he meant it would be after all the other dwarves die. This is also the meaning of the dwarven prophecy that states the Durkon will destroy his homeland should he return.

• The word "posthumously," unfortunately, does unambiguously mean that Durkon will be dead when he returns. If he had asked, "How will my homeland greet my return?" and the answer was "Posthumously," that would mean his homeland would be dead when he returned.

The Snarl is not really evil, and in fact has never killed anyone

The reason its victims are supposedly Deader than Dead is because it doesn't kill them, merely teleports them to the planet inside its rift. It's not an Omnicidal Maniac, merely someone who wants a lot of people in its world. Its planet is a Utopia, hence why nobody has left. Team Evil will find all this out the hard way

Tarquin will be defeated, and Elan will make sure nobody knows what he was up to behind the scenes

Tarquin's whole gambit for becoming famous even after death revolves around him getting the credit for ruling all these kingdoms, even in the midst of all the political upheaval. However, the average person on the street wouldn't know that Tarquin was the real ruler each time and would just assume that the empires were being ruled by their respective rulers. When Elan finally gets around to defeating Tarquin, he's going to make sure that he knows that this story is going to stay untold. That way, he will rob him of the satisfaction of becoming legendary upon defeat.

Tarquin's allies won't be able to spread the truth either because nobody will believe them, or the Order will get them too.

Oracle lied

Belkar won't die. Oracle just manipulates Roy to think othertwise for some reason.

Tarquin will be killed by Xykon

There is one hole in Tarquin's Genre Savvy worldview "If I will I get to be the king, if I die I will become the legend'' he explained to Elan - if he will be killed by even bigger villain, after being at the reciving end of Eviler than Thou speech and said villain will then unleash such terror that everything he did will pale in comparision, he won't become legend. He will be doomed to be remembered as just one of minor characters in much more epic story of greater Big Bad. He cannot even hope to get his sons to have classic "avenging dead parent" subplot, because Nale hates him and Elan knows very well now how evil bastard his dad is. Can you imagine worst ending for somebody who loves the epic story structure so much? And who is better to do that to him than Xykon?

• In fact, Tarquin might get set up for this to happen. We now know that he will be following the Order of the Stick along with the Linear Guild, and is looking for the opportunity to fight Roy. Tarquin is at least a level above him, probably more, very intelligent, and extremely genre savvy, and so is quite possibly more than a match for Roy. Roy will have to think of a way to trick Tarquin into screwing up. Tarquin isn't cocky enough to lose like Xykon, and certainly not stupid and careless enough to lose like Thog, so he would have to trick him into doing something that Tarquin isn't aware would be a bad idea, like being in Xykon's way. Considering this, Roy may just stall for time, and, when he loses, bait Tarquin into gloating, just as Xykon or Redcloak walk in. They counter his plan exposition with an Eviler than Thou speech or Motive Rant respectively, during which Roy hopefully gets away, before Xykon/Redcloak unceremoniously mops the floor with Tarquin, instantly reducing him to a B-list villain in someone else's narrative.
• Or, Tarquin decides to stick to his usual MO: sign up as someone's Dragon, pull the strings from the shadows. Xykon is an actual Big Bad in his own right and already has a Dragon with an Agenda, but Tarquin decides to give it a go. He's high level, he's experienced, and he and Xykon have similar-but-different views on narrative and power and morality. So, Tarquin presents himself to the true villain as a humble evil warlord looking for work- and calls him Zykon.

Trigak the Chimera will return as a recurring villain.

As Hayley pointed out, Trigak was in the middle of escaping and swearing to come back and get the Order when they least expect it. All Trigak needs is some Offscreen Villain Dark Matter and a plausible reason to bring Trigak back and *BAM*! Resurrection.

• I will note that everything I know about D&D comes from this comic, so I don't know if monsters can be raised or not.

Tarquin and Redcloak will share a moment of being not so different.

No reason, but it would be cool.

• Perhaps the Empire of Blood was one of the nations that officially recognized Gobbotopia, something that they can bond over. And when Redcloak and Xykon inevitably turn on each other, Redcloak can team up with Tarquin, possibly in a Big Bad Duumvirate.

The IFCC identities

Judging on their colors and the colors of the summoned wizards (and knowing there's one for each evil alignement), it's highly probable that:

• 1: Lee (Lawful Evil) is the Orange one.
• 2: Nero (Neutral Evil) is the Purple one.
• 3: Cedrik (Chaotic Evil) is the Yellow one.

I'm aware that there's at least one strip that hints that Lee is actually the Yellow one, but it could be a mistake, since the Yellow Sorcerer looked more Chaotic Evil than else ("Tear down creation just to see if you can" sounds a lot chaotic) while Ganonron (orange guy) was more likely to be Lawful Evil (Or at least, using epic teleports and armies to conquer nations seems quite lawful-ish to me). This is my theory, I'd be glad to hear other possibilities.

• Word of God is that Lee, Nero and Cedrik are the yellow, purple, and orange one respectively; and that Rich basically writes the archfiends as The Dividual instead of giving them independent personalities.

The Linear Guild will be destroyed

As soon as The Order will eventually stop to focus on nemesis-on nemesis fights and get more pragmatic (eg: V using magic to blast Thog, Durkon using his holy powers to vanquish Sabine and so on).

Monster in the Darkness, possible 8-bit image.

I wish I could remember where I read it, but I remember hearing that Rich himself stated that the go board in strip 651 was more than a symbolic image of MitD, but included a reference to his physical appearance. The slightly off-set go pieces, the tilt, I always had trouble looking at it until today. It hit me to convert the board into an 8-bit image. This is what you get :Linky!◊. The top row is as the go-board is with yellow eyes added for clarification's sake (explained below). The bottom row is inverting the colors just for a different perspective.

Keep in mind that this is a black and white image of a creature that could be easily purple and green so some imagination still is needed. Also, there are two ways of looking at this. First, the holes in the darkness are MitD's eyes left blank. This would turn the entire go board into the MitD's full body or upper body. The second possibility when you note the consistent use of perspective is the eye sockets are encased in white. This means that the Go-board, if my memory about what it is supposed to be is right, is only of the MitD's head.

I don't play, nor have I, D&D so I don't know what monsters or creatures are considered canon. Rich did state it was a guessable creature that existed in 2004 and earlier. I hope this can help someone more knowledgeable than I am in this quest to guess MitD.

• Good work there. I think the face is the rectangle with the eyes, down left part the right arm, down right part the belly, and between the belly and the face is the chest, composed of two parts. The rest is background. However I don't know what kind of creature it might be, I know D&D stuff enough to get the comic's jokes but not enough to make a good guess. Still I might add some info: the creature, whatever it is, must have arms in order to push Miko while playing "who can hit the slightless" and also to carry the umbrella, which adds the fact of it having prensile fingers (more proof: it can hold Go pieces and Monopoly money). Going from there it can be presumed to be humanoid, the umbrella can cover the MitD with no problem, and it seems bipedal.
  • As an 8-bit spriter, I can say that the full body sprites bear more then a passing resemblance to Classic Megaman's jump sprite. I wouldn't be surprised if that's a hint as to it's physical form.
• Brilliant! Going off of this revelation, my own guess would have to be a giant hand puppet.
• So the MITD is Banjo?

Redcloak will end up giving up on the Plan.

Back in Start of Darkness we learn Right-eye's daughter is still alive, and we can see too that Xykon charms the MitD so it will eat Redcloak the moment he betrays Xykon. Probably when the comic nears its end Redcloak will find his niece, safe and sound and maybe even living peacefully with a human family (Right-eye was worried about her living with humans), and will realize that his brother was right, even more if Xykon kills them all, or only her if she's alone.

There's also the possibility of Redcloak's niece making Redcloak have a Villainous BSoD when she blames him for the death of her father when he encounters her. Either way this will also be the time when we'll get to see what the Monster in the Darkness is, as it will try to eat Redcloak for disobeying Xykon. Bonus points if O'Chul's words make the MitD fight the charm in order to be what he wants to be and helps Redcloak survive and then both of them fight Xykon together, maybe even with help from the Order in a last battle against the undead sorcerer.

• Tsukiko's discovery regarding the critical spell it's conjuration, so it most likely unleashes the Snarl, if true, effectively kills the plan on the spot, as Xykon (and just about anyone else who could work) doesn't want to destroy the world. It also means that the Dark One lied about the Plan and was actually cutting directly to plan B (i.e. unmake reality and help rebuild it with his terms.) Considering his successes so far, including forming a stable, fully functional and internationally recognized goblin civilization, Redcloak might be rather displeased about this. Combined with something to knock him out of his comfort zone, like meeting Right-Eye's daughter, and Redcloak could very well walk out of the whole thing.
  • Except Tsukiko got the context of the spell wrong, and Redcloak not only knew about it all along (Hell, he's been actively lying to Xykon about it), but it doesn't affect his own efforts for goblin equality at all, so this isn't going to knock him out of his comfort zone. Given recent revelations, it's entirely possible that even if/when Right-Eye's daughter does show up, it won't be enough to convince Redcloak to abandon the Plan.

Because otherwise I can't see why Richard would put those Chekhov's Guns in the first place. Anyone wants to debate?

• Xykon's charm command could just be him being Genre Savvy. Right-Eye's daughter, on the other hand, is an obvious Chekhov's Gun.

Miko had schizophrenia and some other mental illnesses.

There were some episodes where she was meditating all by herself and asking the gods for guidance. Those scenes never actually show someone or something giving her said guidance. They do show her getting it after a pause. This seems to hint that she hears at least one voice in her head. While it does not excuse her actions, it does help to understand why she went and did them.

• Paladins are immune to any and all illnesses and diseases.
  • Even mental ones? Anyway, at that point, she wasn't a paladin anymore.
  • She's shown to think the gods favor her long before she fell, though.

Elan, Nale, Tarquin, and Elan's mother all have British accents.

Elan would have one because I've heard a LOT of people saying that they think British accents are adorable. You can picture it, right?

Nale and Tarquin... well, it'd RULE if they were Evil Brits. You can imagine them detailing their plans in suave, refined, RP accents.

The mother needs one so that Elan could get his from somewhere. He uses American/Northern slang, but he has a British accent because he's copying his beloved mumsie!

Zz'dtri is male.

He's supposedly ambiguous like other elves, but then you realize that the Drow female stereotype is that they look like big-breasted sexpots. By process of elimination, Zz'dtri is a male.

• We see a female drow depicted here as a rogue. Perhaps the rule of elven gender ambiguity doesn't apply to drow because their society is so gender-based.

Nale and Elan's names are anagrams of their mother's first name

We haven't met her yet, but she could be named Lena, Nela, Elna, or Lean (pronounced Leanne, although that one's unlikely with a character named Lien in the strip already). We might even meet some male relatives named Alen or Neal!

• Lampshaded!

Tarquin and Julio are twins (or at least brothers)

Like Elan and Nale. Well, neither of their parents were mentioned, they seem around the same age and they are both supposed to be good-looking? And Tarquin is familiar with pun-dueling, although it seems to be rather rare.

The story of The Snarl as we know it is wrong

OK, I know there are a lot of more specific versions of this theory up above. All the more specific theories are equally likely, but I think we should get the evidence for this basic premise on this page somewhere.

The main reason I think that the story is wrong is the fact that there is a "planet inside the planet" and the fact that this revelation, along with the line "perhaps we do not know everything we ought to regarding the task we are undertaking," ends a book. Note that all other books have significant forshadowing as their endings, too.

There are several ways that the story of the snarl could be wrong. We only know about the Snarl from two seperate stories (told by Redcloak as revealed to him by The Dark One and told by Lord Shojo as revealed to him by Soon). Both The Dark One and (maybe) Soon got the story of the Snarl's creation from the Gods. This means that one of the following could be true:

A) The gods lied. It was already explicitly stated that they tried to hide the Snarl's existence from the world, so what if 'the Snarl' is just another way to hide the real truth? See 1st panel of [1]

B) The Dark One/Soon lied. They could have learned the real truth and been so horrified that they told an incomplete or inaccurate version to their followers. In The Dark One's case, this could be part of an evil plan that he thought his high priest wouldn't like, and in Soon's case it could be part of some promise he made with the other members of his party to not tell the truth (and who knows, maybe the Dark One told the Order of the Scribble this version of the story, and they believed it). We already know that Soon and the others promised to not tell people about the gate, which seems to contradict that Lord Shojo knows the story.

C) Soon and the Order of the Scribble just guessed at the origin of the Snarl. The gods decided not to tell anyone (The Dark One, being a god, may have been an exception), so The Order of the Scribble must have figured out the story on their own, and they could have jumped to some incorrect conclusions. Note that in Start of Darkness, the origin of the Snarl is never discussed, just some vague lines about "you don't want to mess with it" and "we all now know what happens should we ever come to direct conflict." This could mean that, though The Dark One was told the origin of the Snarl, he never told his followers for the same reason the gods didn't.

The comic will end with a Heroic Sacrifice Total Party Kill

In order to finally save the world from whoever or whatever the real main threat is going to be, the entire Order of the Stick will willfully sacrifice themselves. It will happen on New Year's Eve, thus fulfilling the prophecy that Belkar will die before the end of the year. It will happen in such a spectacular way that their bodies are all obliterated except Durkon's, which Hinjo will find and respectfully return to his family, thus fulfilling Durkon's prophecy. Julio Scoundrél will also be dead by this point (after returning and dying in Elan's arms) and Elan will therefore get to spend eternity in the Chaotic Good afterlife, living it up with his girlfriend and mentor, thus fulfilling Elan's 'Happy Ending'. Plus whoever's in charge of the afterlife will, being Chaotic Good, find a way to bend the rules and let Elan and Roy visit each other occasionally, as a nod to Oh Buddy Roy.

The Monster in the Darkness will have a Heel–Face Turn and destroy Xykon's Phylacetery

In strip #147, Redcloak doesn't let the Monster hold Xykon's phylacetery because he says the Monster'll break it. The Monster's friendship with O-Chul starts the turn, and in the end the Monster will reveal themself — to help destroy Xykon.

Elan and Nale have a true neutral brother

It's been mentioned in two strips, and The Order of the Stick has a habit of bringing back one time jokes 500 chapters later.

• Probably a lampshade and nothing else. On their mother's side it's impossible, or Elan would know. On their father's side it's pretty difficult, Tarquin says he took care not to have more children seeing how Nale developed. Also it would be pushing the joke too far.

The planet within the planet is an accidental, and inevitable, creation of the Snarl

The Snarl is literally an incredibly potent bundle of divine energy (energy SPECIFICALLY USED TO BUILD A WORLD, no less) driven by pure chaos. From this, we can assume that the energy that composes it, having been rubbing against itself in an infinite number of ways for an undisclosed amount of time, eventually led to the creation of another set of Gods, who eventually made their own world. As for why the Snarl didn't destroy them: being that they (and everything else in the rift, due to it being a completely empty void except for the Snarl) are literally made of the Snarl, and so it can't distinguish them, or their planet from itself.

• Alternatively, the planet was created directly by the Snarl's chaotic and divine energies, with no God's in the middle of the process. This could potentially be foreshadowed by Roy musing on a world where people don't worship Gods in strip 669.
  • Hell, keeping in line with the whole 'the Snarl is a metaphor for dissent ruining a gaming group' thing, the planet in the planet could represent that sometimes bad situations lead to good ideas (which is to say, the dissent between the members of this 'gaming group' eventually lead to a second group creating a second world in a second session).
• Alternatively, the Snarl is just part of a giant recursive cycle, in which its chaotic creative power creates a set of deities, who create a world, only for that world to be destroyed due to arguments amongst the gods, resulting in a new Snarl. The gods will then seal the new Snarl within another new world, causing the cycle to continue. I dub it Snarlception.

Girard Draketooth is a pseudonym

Why would a paranoid illusionist be using his real name after all?

It was the IFCC, not the Monster in the Darkness, that saved V and O-Chul from Xykon

If Xykon had killed V, then the IFCC wouldn't have been able to get much use out of V's soul. V would just be stuck in the Lower Planes for a short time, and they clearly have many spellcasters that are higher-leveled than V at their disposal. They need him alive so they can take control of him to ruin everything at a critical moment, so they were the ones who arranged for the Deus ex Machina that saved V at the last moment. "Framing" the Monster in the Darkness would also have the fringe benefit of keeping Xykon from suspecting their involvement. (As an epic level spellcaster, Xykon would be powerful enough to be a serious threat to the IFCC if he put his mind to it.)

• Except Word of God says in "Don't split the party" that it was the MitD who made V and O'Chul escape thanks to "powers he didn't know he had". So Jossed.

Three Fiends will try to off Tarquin

Tarquin has recently joined forces with Nale and Linear Guild as as we all know Fiends use the Guild as their unwilling pawns. Having somebody as Genre Savvy as Tarquin messing in their plans would be a diseaster, so Fiends will try to get rid of him.

Elan and Nale don't have another twin brother they don't know about.

They have twin sister they don't know about.

Tarquin will betray Nale

Somebody so Genre Savvy and in love with story structure should know that when there is Villain Team-Up there is going to be betrayal and that his partner is prone to Chronic Backstabbing Disorder. It's only logical he will betray him first.

• Probably after they find the Gate. "Malack, our business has concluded."
• This betrayal is so inevitable it barely counts as a Wild Mass Guess.
  • I think this could be technically considered Jossed. Nale absolved any allegiance to Tarquin before Tarquin killed him in revenge for Malack and the host of other crap Nale did. From that very limited definition, Tarquin did not actually betray Nale.

The Final Battle will end up being a massive Mêlée à Trois

For some reason, Girard's Gate will be destroyed, leaving only the last one. The Order and their allies will race to find and defend it, while Team Evil, the Empire of Blood, and the Linear Guild all pursuing. When they all arrive, they all start fighting each other for control of the Gate in a free-for-all, possibly with an Enemy Civil War breaking out for Team Evil (depending on whether or not Redcloak's had enough of Xykon's bullshit). And then, just when things seem to be reaching a climax, the IFCC will show up with their own forces, revealing that they intended for this battle to happen, in order to weaken all possible opposition/competition, before attacking everyone (and possibly taking control of V as per their deal, using him/her against the Order).

The MitD is an angel

Not the [good] outsider, but the real deal

• Hunter's reaction is a bit of a weak link, given most of them do speak, though doing it in "common" would be a surprise.
• Would explain the audience at the circus's reaction (A big step under a Seraph's "cause people to burst into flames and die", but still warranted with some descriptions in the book)
• God sends them to destroy cities, so they should be quite strong
• Depending on the writer, they do reproduce, so the dad comment works
• Would explain the MitD's naive but overall good nature.
• Redcloak knows what it is. Given he has alreddy made use of the real deal of something in place of fantasy versions (elementals) once. Also would be covered under a know skill that is a class skill for clerics.
• Easily fits into public domain.

Xykon will be set up as the Disc-One Final Boss to the IFCC, but will hijack the plot at the climax.

At some point, Xykon and his phylactery will seemingly be destroyed, allowing the Fiends to take over as main Big Bads. Then, during the Final Battle, it will turn out that the phylactery was a decoy Xykon created after getting his real one back, which was then hidden away somewhere. He'll then regenerate in secret, then make a grand entrance during the climax, leading his forces against the weakened forces of both the Order/their allies and the IFCC, in the process proving himself worse than the Directors could hope to be.

• Not sure if this is entirely relevant, but as of right now, there is in fact a false phlyactery.

Right-Eye's spirit will appear at some point

Perhaps near the climax of the story, he'll start haunting Redcloak, playing the part of his conscience, trying to talk him into a Heel–Face Turn. Then Tsukiko will find out and inform Xykon, who'll capture and torment Right-Eye's spirit, which will cause Redcloak to snap — even if it's not a full HFT, it'll at least be an Enemy Civil War.

• Alternately, Right-Eye, believing his brother beyond redemption, will instead become a Spirit Advisor to the Order, in the hope that they can stop the Plan.

Thog will team up with Team Evil.

Tarquin's forced the Guild to abandon him, right? So, he'll probably escape from the Empire of Blood, wander around a bit, and then run into Team Evil. After he kills a few wights and/or hobgoblins, Xykon is impressed enough to keep him around as extra muscle. At the very least, this'll offer the opportunity for him to strike up a friendship with the MitD — they're both Psychopathic Men Children and dumb as bricks, so I imagine they'll get along.

Redcloak will try to abandon the Plan, but will have a Heel–Face Door-Slam.

This is related to the "Redcloak will give up on the Plan" one further up the page. The sequence of events described there will probably play out, but then something will happen that prevents him from completing the Heel–Face Turn. Perhaps:

• Tsukiko kills him for turning on Xykon
• The MitD's mind control forces it to kill him
• The Dark One performs a Villain Override via the Crimson Mantle.

Kraagor/Serini's Gate is in or near the dwarven homelands.

This would make a pretty good reason for the Order to go there, thus allowing for the prophecy about Durkon causing it to be destroyed.

The evil souls will return as a Quirky Miniboss Squad.

The IFCC will eventually need V brought to them so they can cash in on their deal (without wasting any time on it), so they'll dispatch these three to retrieve V. Perhaps it'll even be Qarr's suggestion, as he'll point out that they can't really trust Sabine to properly manipulate the Guild in their favor anymore because of her feelings for Nale, thus making it necessary to get some new minions in the field. As for why this is a feasible idea:

1) These souls were specifically chosen for the Soul Splice because they were the strongest, most evil souls the Directors had at their disposal. And don't forget the ghost-martyrs of the Sapphire Guard — we know that spirits can physically interact with the living world, so why wouldn't you send the most powerful ones at your disposal when you need something important done?

2) From a thematic viewpoint, this would be a great redemptive step for V, complete with Hannibal Lectures from the souls (Haerta seems like she might be the most prone to it), and V shutting them up, with help from the Order.

The Dark One (and by extension, Redcloak) and the IFCC will team up.

The Dark One wants equality for the goblin races, something that was denied them by the gods, though probably just the good gods, as we know at least some of the evil gods (like Tiamat) are the Dark One's allies. Meanwhile, the Archfiends have implied in their conversations with Qarr and Vaarsuvius that their ultimate goal (or part of it) is to invade the Upper Planes and bring down the gods of Good. So, perhaps they can work out a compromise of sorts — once they gain control of the Snarl, they use it to defeat the Good gods, and then the remaining Evil (and possibly the Neutral ones) can grant the goblins equality (or possibly even superiority, at this point).

Elan and Nale have a True Neutral sister as mentioned above, but not a fraternal (or half-identical) triplet.

She's Elan's half-sister, through his and Nale's mother. There's a strong chance that she's either older than Elan by several years or only now about half a year old (and hey, babies are technically True Neutral/Neutral Hungry).

Elan's four family members each have different strengths and weaknesses regarding their INT/WIS scores.

Elan: Kind of low in both, because of his amazing Charisma.
Nale: Quite low in WIS, but with a decent CHA and high INT to enable his multiclass-mishmash to be anywhere near as effective as a straight-up Bard (though he has recently been using his magic more effectively, which also hints at him having a strong INT). His Intelligence lets him think of fiendishly complicated plans, but his low WIS keeps him from being able to let them unfold properly without doing something foolish.
Tarquin: Above-average WIS and decent CHA but below-average INT. He's better than Nale at reading people and situations, but instead of doing "so much more", he sticks to the small-time Banana Republic grifts he can handle (big enough to make him comfortable in this life and a legend afterward, but nothing unnecessarily expansive) and lets Malack (or whomever is in on a given scheme) do most of the stuff that non-WIS, INT-based planning.
Elan's Mum: High WIS and INT (her INT is a given, with what we've seen of her wait-staff planning). Her dump stat is CON, because she doesn't really need it with a reasonably high DEX and a passable-for-a-commoner Strength, what with being a waitress in what appears to be a first-world country instead of an adventurer.

Xykon will attempt to take Kraagor's Gate first.

Because punishing Roy for being too specific once just wouldn't be enough. He asked for the first of the two gates Xykon would be within of first, not which one he'd actually attack. Xykon will approach Girard's gate first, but with both the Order and Linear Guild (which has access to the forces of at least 1, possibly 3, local empires, should Tarquin decide keeping Xykon from it is important enough) attempting to take it, he turns around and heads for the last gate.

The MiTD is an Atropal.

Think about this one for a minute. It's constantly surrounded by undead, it has a childlike disposition, absurd powers for its size, and is supposed to be utterly terrifying. What could be more terrifying than an undead god fetus?

• Atropals are undead. They don't eat while MiTD loves to eat.
  • Well, don't need to eat, but as pointed out when Roy died, not needing food doesn't mean he doesn't get to enjoy it. The bigger problem would be the fact that Atropals are Walking Wastelands and multiple living characters have gotten near MiTD without suffering any ill effects. Redcloak and his minions might be protected by some kind of shield against negative energy, as might O-Chul, but Haley and Belkar certainly aren't, and MiTD was found in a lush jungle. On top of this, Atropals are also intrinsically evil (undead status aside, they're Always Lawful Evil outsiders, like devils), which makes it rather difficult for the Token Good Teammate that is the Monster in the Dark to be one. (Even if one wanted to argue that he was dropped on his head or something, an undead creature wouldn't be affected by that, and even if he was, he'd still default to "Lawful Evil without memories".)

Nale has one more Linear Guild member in hiding.

We still didn't meet a Durkon equiviliant during the fight. Malack may be taking up that role at the moment, but that doesn't mean that Nale didn't simply have his divine caster sitting off in the sidelines and waiting for the right moment to strike.

This last Linear Guilder is probably a former member who hasn't been seen for awhile, like Leeky or Hilgya. And they are either the ally who's supposed to cast the ritual, or they are hiding out and waiting to free Thog and take him to reunite with the rest of the guild at the Gate

Not every one in universe who has the same color of hair is directly related.

Ok, I know that this is a long stretch but work with me. There maybe a genetic trait that is in universe that can be found in anyone that determines hair color. And though some hair colors appear less often than others, the hair color itself might not be exclusive to just certain families. The proof is even though Penelope is a red head, the fact that she dated Orrin without it raising a few eyebrows suggests that they might not be related at all.

• Unrelated people having similar hair colors? That's insane! ^note But seriously, thank you for being sane enough to post that.

Redcloak believes Xykon in panel 3 of this exchange

Not because Xykon is telling the truth or anything. Far from it. He's lying through his teeth. It's just that Xykon is an epic level character, estimated to be about 32nd level if his fire immunity comes from a self-crafted ring and not simply an abuse of the custom item creation table. If he is 32nd level, then with bluff as the only Charisma-based class skill of sorcerers, and assuming it is maxed out or nearly so, that means that he's got something like 35 ranks + massive Charisma vs. Redcloak's decent Wisdom + at most 10 ranks in Sense Motive (what with it being a cross-class skill), and him spending a lot of his skill points in various knowledge skills, Xykon merely did this comic with less humourous overtones. In other words, he can beat the +20 to deceive someone with an insane, outright unbelievable lie. Xykon has already bluffed other people, like the Order itself, even though he said out loud "wink, wink"

The fiends will use their deal with V to manifest in the material plane.

The terms of Vaarsuvius' deal specify that for every minute of Soul Splice, his/her soul will spend one minute with each soul's owner. "With." Not "in the service of," and not "in Hell with." The terms of the deal would be satisfied by bringing V to the nether realms, but they could just as easily permit the fiends - who aren't allowed to manifest in the mortal world outside of a bargain - to appear at V's side. Whether the elf goes to the demons or the demons come to the elf, the deal is satisfied. And the IFCC could wreak a lot of havoc in 45 minutes.

The corpse was telling the truth.

In panel 845, Durkon used the spell speak with dead, who then said that Girard's rift is in between his butt cheeks, a typical moment of ass humor perfect for a chaotic NPC to stick it to the lawful PCs. But what if he was serious. In a few panels before when the PCs walked into the pyramid, they walked by the statue of Girard Draketooth. Now if that is where the rift is, then the Draketooth corpse was not lying and in fact the rift is in between Girard's butt cheeks. Besides, is there a better way than to tell the world to "kiss my ass" after death?

• I bet 10gp that you are right. It makes WAY too much sense.
  • Until I read this WMG, I did not think about this possibility. But now, I am completely convinced.
  • Exactly what I was thinking upon reading the line. After all, the gate can be any size, as we learned in Azure City, and having a statue of its guardian built around it doesn't seem that far-fetched.
• Jossed: The Order just proved my theory wrong in the next strip. You have to admit though, it wasn't that bad of the theory.
  • Well, they haven't checked the corpse's ass-bone yet.
  • Roy thought of that in the next strip. Poor Haley was the one to do it...
• Or maybe "Girard's Butt Cheeks" is the name of a rock formation

Redcloak has regenerated his eye.

Redcloak regenerated his eye shortly after getting the patch, but keeps it on to make Xykon believe that he is obeying his orders. Whenever he is alone, he takes the patch off so that he doesn't have eye problems.

Admit it, it would be totally cool: in the moment when Redcloak betrays Xykon (when the Plan gets carried on), he will take off the patch and say "Damn, I was fed up of this stupid patch", and by then Xykon will realise the size of his folly in trusting Redcloak's plan. Then, either Redcloak manages to pull off something that destroys Xykon (and the Monster in the Darkness attacks Redcloak due to his betrayal of Xykon), or Xykon could attempt to kill Redcloak but then the Dark God saves Redcloak by taking him away or by using something similar to Thor's Thunders to destroy Xykon. Alternatively, Xykon could get killed by the Snarl.

Soon and Girard blame each other for Kraagor's death.

We pretty much know Girard's side of the story, he blames Soon for ordering the sealing of the Rift which cost Kraagor his life, but what if it went both ways? Girard is pretty anti-authoritarian so he might have disobeyed an order that knocked him out of the fight (we don't see him in the final fight), but Girard finds it easier to blame Soon then acknowledge that if he followed Soon's order, Kraagor might have lived. Soon just doesn't dwell on it anymore (being dead does that to you).

• Perhaps he also blames Dorukon because the Rift sealing spell could have been fine-tuned, but Dorukon went on to his next spell rather than making it safer.

Soon wasn't at odds with all the Scribblers by the end it

The party wasn't Soon vs Everyone. Everyone had their own personal likes and dislikes, but they knew they couldn't function as bridges for the ones that hated each other (kind of like Magic the Gathering where each color has two more or less aligned colors that also happen to be opposed). Serini was the only one everyone liked by the end (so I won't include her in this analysis). My guess is the party breakdown went like this (includes my theorized personal views on each based off what I know at this time):

• Soon:
  • Allies: Serini (liked by all), Lirian (divine spell caster, traveled with longest, Azurites and Elves longstanding allies).
  • Enemies: Girard (anti-authoritarian prick, antagonistic toward divine spellcasters), Dorukon (cares more about magic than the safety of the world).
• Lirian:
  • Allies: Serini (liked by all), Soon (divine spell caster, traveled with longest, Azurites and Elves longstanding allies), Dorukon (lover).
  • Enemies: Girard (antagonistic toward divine spellcasters, uses people shamelessly).
• Dorukon:
  • Allies: Serini (liked by all), Girard (arcane spellcaster, mutual dislike of Soon), Lirian (lover).
  • Enemies: Soon (feels he negligently sacrificed Kraagor). Occasionally Girard but only when he's trash-talking Lirian within earshot.
• Girard:
  • Allies: Serini (liked by all), Dorukon (arcane spellcaster, mutual dislike of Soon).
  • Enemies: Soon (fascist prick, feels he negligently sacrificed Kraagor), Lirian (antagonistic toward divine spellcasters, wishy-washy hippie druid chick).

Therkla will return... as a succubus!

Okay, this is stretching a little, but; If you look at the circumstances of her death; She was a lawful neutral or lawful evil character (I can't remember if her alignment was ever given, but she obeys a master and he's evil, so non-lawful and good alignments are out of the question), however she betrayed her master (a chaotic act). As a result she might end up in the pit and become a demon. Since her sin (and reason for betraying her master) was lust, a succubus would make sense. Alternatively, if she ends up in a LE afterlife she could still come back as an equivlent devil (I can't remember if there's an equivelent, maybe a Lilin^note From Pathfinder or an Erinyes, although their fluff might not quite fit). Either way, she could end up as a counterpart (or replacement) for Sabine.

Xykon knows what Redcloak is really up to; he just doesn't care.

Xykon knows full well what Redcloak is planning to do with the Gate, but Xykon is fully confident that the Dark One's plan won't work because it basically relies on blackmail and a constant threat. Since the Snarl is basically dormant (and Xykon is fully capable of flying and seeing what was inside the rift; Redcloak isn't) there's no real danger of opening a Gate onto the realm of the gods. He's going to wait for Redcloak's plan to fail, call him an idiot, bully him into being properly loyal, and use the Gate to control the real world by tossing ordinary humans into God-knows-where. It doesn't actually change his plans if the world on the other side of the Gate isn't actually dangerous as long as he knows it can remove them from their lives and possibly their chosen deities.

Tarqin will suffer a horrible fate...

...Elan will find a way to defeat him where he isn't remembered for all time. That's all it take for a crushing defeat for Tarqin, and Elan is humble enough to not need all his deeds known about.

• Worse. He'll die disguised as Thog, in such a way that nobody in the Order of the Stick will find out who he really is, so nobody will ever know how he met his end.

Tarquin's plan will be foiled by Villain Decay

The entire point of Tarquin's plan is that, if he is ever defeated, the story of his defeat will go down in history, with him as the badass General. Which is already working, as we are reading the story, and we see him as a Genre Savvy badass General. So the only way for his plan to be foiled is for him to lose that respect we currently have for him. He will be Out-Gambitted, Overshadowed by Awesome, and swallow an Idiot Ball, leaving him a complete failure of a villain by the time anyone bothers to kill him.

Kilkil will be killed

Making his name Meaningful. It will probably Belkar, who turns his head into... a bag?

• On the other hand, he might not die, making his name Ironic.
• Perhaps he'll be killed, raised, then killed again.

Redcloak's Ritual will be somehow completed by Elan

Naturally, giving control of the Gate(s) to Banjo the Clown.

The identity of the MitD will never be revealed.

As with a lot of mysteries which have been gradually built up to a big revelation, there's a chance that if we were to learn exactly what the MitD really was it would be something of an anti-climax no matter what it was. Ergo, we'll never learn precisely what it is. At most, if/when it's cover of darkness is broken, all that will be seen will be a blinding and all-obscuring bright light, and the reactions of various awestruck characters saying things along the lines of "What is that?!" and "Is that a...?" before being cut off.

Xykon knows what lies beyond the Gates.

• When he was being destroyed by the Gate rune, maybe he got a glimpse of the planet beyond. "Hey, this isn't so bad" may have simply been him realizing that the Gate didn't contain a god-killing abomination — it contained an entire world for him to conquer.

Xykon knows Redcloak is lying about the Gate Ritual but doesn't know how.

Redcloak's major ace in the hole is that he knows something about the gate ritual he's not telling Xykon and he plans to use it against Xykon once the ritual is complete. Xykon, however, had a chance to figure out how much Redcloak was actually telling him, though - Tsukiko. He made sure his half of the gate ritual got to Tsukiko then sent the MiTD to tell her it's only half a ritual knowing she'd seek out Redcloak's half. He then sat back and watched how Redcloak would respond to that; when Redcloak killed Tsukiko that told Xykon Redcloak was hiding something. This would explain why Xykon wasn't at all upset at Tsukiko's death - By getting killed she told him more than she ever could have realistically figured out on her own.

Redcloak will betray Xykon once he's outlived his usefulness, but not before giving him an Ironic Echo of Xykon's Eviler than Thou speech from Start of Darkness.

Throw in a "dramatically smashing Xykon's phylactery" scene, and the circle will be complete.

• Though given what Xykon did to the MITD, namely cast a Suggestion that will cause him to eat Redcloak if Redcloak betrays Xykon, Xykon might give a Meaningful Echo of his own "Oh Redcloak, don't confuse not caring with not knowing" line.
  • Suggestion's effects aren't permanent, and that was years ago. Unless Xykon's been recasting it on a regular basis that's highly unlikely.
    • Xykon had enough forward thinking to get the positive energy ring. He'd probably find a sufficiently permanent way of enrapturing the MITD.

The Dark One's Plan will not be necessary

Goblins will achieve equality some other way. They already have their own city, Gobbotopia, why must that be the end of it?

Kilkil will fall under Bait the Dog

The other two members from the Empire of Blood did so, why not him? He's an unassuming nerd-like Punch-Clock Villain: Perhaps he's a massive sadist. Perhaps the comic will make a joke about it, like with Toby, a casual mention of some heinous Offstage Villainy and then he's dispatched.

• Perhaps the Empress of Blood as well. Her Gluttony could be shown to extend to people. She might not be a secret genius, but could be more threatening than she is.
  • That's already been implied. She wanted to know if she could eat Elan, Haley, and V, and only didn't because they ran and she was too far and lazy to give chase. She considers people lunchtime food as opposed to breakfast.

Redcloak will get a series of natural 20s when he finally betrays Xykon.

When the goat turns red strikes true.When the coat turns red strikes true.When the Red coat turns the Red Mantle strikes true.When Redcloak turns coat the Red Mantle strikes true.

• So did you just skip over #60, or...?
  • No I had forgotten enough details of #76 to pretend it could be another false alarm.

Some people essentially have their soul/concience in an animal.

The ones I'm thinking about are Belkor and Scruffy, Xykon and his dog, and V and Blackwing. This means it's impossable for them to become good without the animal, and if the animal dies before it has meaningful impact on their morality they will never become good unless the animal is revived (zombification does not count). This is why Belkor was not even slightly good until he met Scruffy. The reason V was never as bad as Belkor or Xykon on screan is that Blackwing was right there with him, but he was not actually close to good until he started really acknowledging Blackwing. Xykons dog died when he was a kid without making and meaningful impact on him which made him evil from that second and continuing to get worse.

Hinjo will become a Fallen Paladin

Before Shojo's death, Hinjo was a paladin, and able to follow laws to the letter because that was all he had to worry about. However, he is also a patriot and will fight for his homecity. He's also rather bloodthirsty when it comes to the goblins when they invade. With Xykon no longer caring about Azure City, Hinjo will be free to purge the city of the goblins in a war. Jirix, and possibly Redcloak, will fight, lose, and surrender, only for Hinjo to execute them, which is unlawful and will result in a fall. But he'll understand, change his alignment to Neutral Good, and be a ruler like Shojo.

• Executing surrendered enemies is a perfectly lawful act, provided it is preceded with a fair trial, and entirely in-character for a good paladin. Lawful Good doesn't mean Lawful Nice.

The Lotus-Eater Machine runes are the happy ending promised by the Oracle, but only in an Exact Words / Prophecy Twist sense

Elan's exact question to the Oracle was if the story was going to have a happy ending. Given the nature of the illusion, whether Elan will have a real happy ending or not has become an open question.

• Explicit word of Burlew (author commentary) is that when the Order of the Stick saga is complete, Elan will have a happy ending.

Girard's illusion uses a Dream Within a Dream setup.

The first layer is a Lotus-Eater Machine. The second layer is used after the first has been realized, forcing people to live out their "realistic expectations" layer.

Goblin Dan will be far more instrumental in Goblinoid equality than Redcloak does

A big reason for the inequality is due to resource distribution. However, if there was a way to easily get food to people, a big reason for raiding will stop. So, instead of creating animosity like Redcloak does, Goblin Dan will build his people up instead of taking from others.

Nale and Zz'dtri will walk right into the illusion

Preferably with Elan warning them about it precisely because he knows Nale totally won't listen to him. Malack, being Genre Savvy, will lag enough to keep himself and Durkon out of it, and as a favor to Durkon make up something along the lines of "Gosh, darn, I'm not sure if any of my prepared spells could snap them out of that. I will have to take a lot of time and go through all of them. I sure hope the Order doesn't run and save themselves like a certain cleric of theirs would want or anything!". The Order will take the hint and book it further in.

• Also, Belkar will take a picture and/or blackmail notes of all of the above in case they need something on Nale or Malack.
  • Partially confirmed, Nale is affected by the Lotus-Eater Machine, but Zz'dtri isn't.

Serini will have taken at least one level of Paladin if/when she shows up for Kraagor's gate.

Rich said the schism between the Order of the Scribble is important to the plot and will be explained, and with every other member of that group confirmed dead it's up to her to explain that to us, so... anyway, there was a throwaway line where she expressed a desire to multiclass to Paladin, and we know how Rich loves bringing things back later on.

Tarquin's Buisness with Kilkil at the top of the pyramid is setting up the 2nd biggest reveal of all.

And the reveal will be that Tarquin and Xykon are one and the same with the living identity: Tarquin being a polymorph using Xykon's real unknown name. We know that before meeting Redcloak Xykon ran out of Toadies due to "creative differences" which is similar to Nale's rebellion against Tarquin (Malack does not seem to be a Toady unlike the Goblins). Kilkil is either Redcloak in a polymorph or a henchman for Xykon's plan serving as an evil counterpart for Belkar.

Banjo the puppet will get a Big Damn Heroes moment.

As Haley revealed, rivals get the others levels so each them are on even footing for a big "showdown". Now, Elan made a rival for Banjo, and gave it to an island filled with Orcs, which now has a lot of believers, meaning it should be an actual deity at this point. If the rivals thing applies to gods as well, Banjo should be just as powerful, meaning the spark will be able to smite even a Lich.

The final gate is in Durkon's homeland.

The prophecy says that if he returns, it will bring disaster and doom on his homeland. Durkon is now a vampire in thrall to the bad guys. No way his homecoming is going to end well anyway at this point, so it makes perfect sense that the final gate — and thus the final climactic confrontation — will take place there.

It's all a ruse by the Eastern gods.

Tired of the strife and conflict with the other gods with their own visions of the world, the Eastern gods simply left and created the other world within the gates. They created the idea of the Snarl to deter the other gods from investigating. This other world is Earth, and the ancient greek creation myths are a heavily veiled reference to the other gods - the titans of mythology.

The three hooded demon guys are greek gods, trying to secure Earth from interference by people and gods from the The Order of the Stick universe. D&D are the true laws of the universe, and exists on Earth because the Gates are failing to keep the OotS universe out.

• That's...certainly a theory. Except that the IFCC are clearly established to be fiends, and Greek mythology is not the only significant mythological pantheon on Earth. In fact, outside of the West they're mostly irrelevant. And also Jossed. Burlew has said the world inside the snarl isn't the real world.

When Xykon meets with the Order again, he will remember who Vaarsuvius is.

Roy is not amused.

• Alternatively: Xykon will remember Vaarsuvius, but pretend that he doesn't. Acknowledging V would mean acknowledging that the elf has hurt him in ways the others haven't.
  • Or, Xykon remembers V, and makes some choice comments about their last duel that forces V to reveal what's been going on with him.

Hinjo will get an Eyepatch of Power

It may be temporary from getting a damaged eye in the absence of a cleric or permanent. When it happens, he will turn out to have actually kept the eyepatch he confiscated from Elan and it will come in quite handy. Elan's parting words to Hinjo in this comic could be foreshadowing to this.

A young Miko Miyazaki made a deal with Kyubey

Distraught over the loss of her parents, she made a contract that would let her have an important destiny to make up for things. This let her claw her way up to the highest echelons of Azure City. Unfortunately, "important" doesn't mean "good". Her actions helped lead to the murder of an important public figure, the downfall of Azure City, the subjugation of her people, the destruction of her order, and the destabilization of the whole of reality. Fortunately, Miko died before grief could turn her into a witch.

We will get to see Malack's "children" via flashback.

One of them, if not all three, will look familiar. (Have no idea who they would be, but it seems like a great place to hide one of story's secrets)

• Who are/were they?

Nale wanted to murder Malack because he put sprinkles on his ice cream.

Malack: Hey birthday kid, you want some ice cream?
9YearOld!Nale: Yes, but no sprinkles! For every sprinkle I find, I shall kill you!

The last murder by Tarquin might not be what it seems.

What if Tarquin actually wants to save Nale from the revenge of Malack's friends? Now that they think that Malack is avenged, Tarquin can retrieve the corpse, later resurrect the dead guy and send him on his way.Oh, if you want to be really paranoid: what if the murder was planned in advance by Tarquin and somebody else? For example, IIFC may have their claws in it - perhaps even with Sabine's consent. Even Nale could be in on the plan, although that one is a bit harder to swallow.

• Or Tarquin saw it as a final mercy—a quick stab at his hands vs a very pissed of Psion probably willing to torture.
  • This seems likely. After that conversation, Tarquin knew he had nothing to use to talk Laurin out of killing Nale herself. By delivering the killing blow himself he not only has the mercy in sparing him from definite torture from a high-level psion but also cements his 'Villain' status with the The Order of the Stick, who were in viewing distance but likely not hearing distance. It's also clear afterwards that doing it gave him no personal satisfaction; he seems upset at having to kill him.
• Primary theory is Jossed. Nale's corpse was disintegrated.
• Maybe not. Can't a Resurrection be done with only a drop of blood? Some of Nale's blood could have been taken beforehand, therefore he could be resurrected off screen and have a big, dramatic reveal.
  • No, Resurrection needs the body part to be from the time of death. Though I suppose a Wish spell might work. Sabine works with devils, so she might be able to get a Wish off a Pit Fiend if she is sufficiently persuasive, or by de-petrifying the giant devil that owed Qarr a favor.

Tarquin just screwed up big time.

And he doesn't even know it. Only Sabine seemed to know that the IFFC wanted the Linear Guild around and want something with the gates. Given how they likely need Nale for that, they're either demonize or resurrect him and let him gun for Tarquin. Or possibly Sabine. Since they'd have the "you betrayed and killed me" or "you killed my beloved" trope behind them, they'll stand a chance rather than it being a tossup as Tarquin regurally describes Evil vs. Evil to be.

• If so and they win, Tarquin will actually be upset since it denies him the story he actually wants. The head general casually mowed down by two villains isn't exactly an epic.
• Or he'll be undone by an accidental public confession, when he defeats Nale/Sabine he'll state that he hasn't controlled an empire from the shadows for nothing. cue several listeners-in departing with htat knowledge and bringing him down in another un-dramatic way.
• Or for something completely different, Elan has Sylvia sue him for murder. Sylvia's proven before to be very good at wordplay, and something tells me she'd be more than happy to ream a guy for killing his own son because the kid said he didn't want any help.

In essence, somehow, some way, the death of Nale, the son Tarquin always dismissed, will be what bites him in the end.

Tarquin's last murder was to motivate Elan to want to kill him.

He expects Elan to be the end of him, but Elan was going to do it with a least some degree of reluctance. Now, killing someone Elan knows, then acting as if it were no kind of tragedy, may be exactly the kind of thing needed to change Elan's mind. And, cherry on the cake, Tarquin is using one of the very reasons of Elan's reluctance to go with the narrative against him, namely the fact he cares about his family members even if they're bad people.

The Empress of Blood is practicing a lot of Obfuscating Stupidity.

So far, we haven't seen a dumb dragon in the comic except the Empress, even though red dragons are supposed to be one of the smartest and most cunning types of dragon. Maybe she actually is smart and cunning, but she was deliberately hiding it from Tarquin and Malack so they'd set her up as the easily-manipulated figurehead. She would then be in charge of an efficient empire with a well-trained army and a well-organized bureaucracy without having to do any actual work because Tarquin, Malack, and Kilkil are doing it all for her. Further, by continuing to play the part of the easily-confused dullard, she ensures that Tarquin retains enough power, influence, and resources to want to keep her there rather than overthrowing her like he did to the others before her. With Malack destroyed all she has to do is wait for Tarquin to die of old age (or other causes that can't be linked to her) and she has full control of one of the strongest and best-organized nations in the webcomic without having to have so much as raised a claw.

• She may also fall under Bunny-Ears Lawyer, in which she really is just indulging herself while manipulating everyone.

Tarquin is slowly having a Villainous Breakdown over Nale's death.

Hence the whole "kill the Order of the Stick so you can take your rightful place as Hero" thing.

Xykon is going to kill Tarquin. Painfully.

Why? Because Tarquin not only waved Xykon off as a sub boss, the man mispronounced Xykon's name as Zyklon. People getting his name wrong is among the biggesr of Xykon's Berserk Button issues.

Thog and/or Sabine will ally with the Order of The Stick

Sabine needs a new set of puppets for whatever the IFCC is planning. The Order of the Stick is perfect as it includes the only other person besides her to mourn Nale's death and another member is already in debt to the IFCC. Elan is friends with Thog and quite possibly the only character that can control and/or understand him at this point.

• Also, Roy might use Sabine so they can hold on until dusk/survive the army, saying if she helps them, he'll come up with a coherent and workable plan for her revenge on Tarquin. After all, Nale wouldn't want her going off half-cocked, he'd want her to have a plan for the ages, wouldn't he?
  • The second paragraph has been Jossed but not the first.

The three fiends will not be as generous with the V next two times they cash in their time.

V owes three separate fiends time, and while they are working together they could easily agree that each decides how lawful to be with their time. That junk about breach of contract might not be as important to the chaotic evil fiend.

• Except Cedrik, the chaotic evil fiend, already called in his debt.

The Snarl world is Golarion.

All those loose creation-threads finally resolved themselves.

Tarquin will fall before the combined might of the empires of sweat and tears.

After the rest of the party decide he's become a liability to their scheme.

The Snarl is no longer a threat

The backstory here talks about the Snarl erasing everything in its wake. But several strips show what lies beyond the rifts another world resembling the Earth. It could be that the Snarl, imprisoned all alone, decided to create life rather than destroy life. Even if it were to escape, it wouldn't want to kill anyone.

• (I got this from a different WMG, but think it's definatly worth mentioning) And the planet is science fiction themed!

Alternatively, the inside of the rift is the original universe that the Snarl destroyed.

Its backstory suggests the Snarl erases whatever it kills from existence. Maybe it just drags them to its own world.

The Order of the Stick will Unperson Tarquin.

In order to beat Tarquin's Xanatos Gambit the Order will have to make sure that his story never gets told so that he'll be just another Evil Chancellor that's a minor stepping stone for the heroes.

We will meet Hannah (Mentioned here)

And she's spying on the Weeping King. She'll also say that her mom has no idea what she's doing and thinks she's just a well off plumber

• Or maybe that guess about Elan and Nale having a sister will turn out to be true. Laurin and Tarquin could have a past history for all we know and Laurin would have a good reason to hide it if Tarquin is using a radical method to be sure he doesn't have any extra children (which has been speculated also).
  • Maybe Laurin's favor will be for him to acknowledge her as his official heir...

Tarquin will wind up joining Team Evil as their Western Continent satellite office

Tarquin seems savvy enough to know when he's out matched, and can probably placate Xykon's world domination and Redcloak's aim of Gobbotopia by just saying "leave me my sandbox". He doesn't seem the speciest sort, and he could convince Xykon that he's going to need competent management, and Redcloak can't do it all. Of course, this will all be a ruse, and the three will form the 'unwinnable war' scenario, as no single one would be powerful enough to take on BOTH of the other two, but no two would ever really team up.

• Also, those three in the same room would be some of the most hysterical dialogue ever written.

Julio Scoundrel is working with Tarquin

It's an alliance of convenience more than anything, though. Julio offers to be the plot-relevant death that motivates Elan into coming back for Tarquin as the hero, and Tarquin will spare The Order because Elan will be suitably motivated to come after him when the world-ending threat is over. Julio will either remain dead in the interim or get rezzed and hide from Elan.

Somewhere, there is a preserved drop of blood of something else that can enable the resurrection of Nale

In the more complex version of the theory, the element is kept by his mother. However, due to being lost when he was a child, he'll resurrect as one, leading to a case of Raise Him Right This Time. As an extra bonus, maybe Elan and Haley will the ones doing the raising.

• Given how resurrection works in DND, this is exceedingly unlikely, especially since raising someone from the dead brings back their souls with the whole of their experiences. You'd either have an Enfant Terrible or simply a clone of the original young Nale. You might have something happen with a Wish or Miracle spell though.

Tarquin will meet Xykon at some point...

And shown just who is the Big Bad of THIS story. Tarquin will be infuriated, that this "miniboss" DARES to take the limelight, overshadow the struggle between a father and son, for some quest involving a blood oath and some gates, and unable to do anything but make Xykon laugh. Xykon will be dismissive, looking down on Tarquin for his long and over complicated plans. Tarquin will be beaten, BADLY. No glorious clash worthy of song, just Xykon smashing him for a bit, before getting bored and leaving. In the worst insult of all, within five minutes Xykon will forget Tarquin's name.

The Monster in the Darkness will destroy Kraagor's Gate

So far the other four gates have recieved a Death by Irony. Lirian's gate, which relied on nature to protect it, was destroyed by an unnatural lich and a forest fire. Dorukan's gate, which relied on arcane power and intelligence, was taken down by someone dedicated to countering spellcasters and was destroyed by Elan, a buffoon. Soon's gate, which relied on the honor of the paladin, was undone because Shojo's decision to ignore the paladin code set off a chain reaction that ended with a fallen paladin destroying it. Girard's gate, which relied exclusively on family to guard it, was left defenseless when V's familicide killed the Draketooths. Now what does Kraagor's gate rely on? The most powerful, ruthless monsters in the land guarding the gate. Who is the most dangerous yet utterly non-threatening monster we have seen? The Monster in the Darkness!

Tarquin intended to raise Nale as a hero.

Tarquin seems like he would prefer to lose to a hero so that he would go down in history as a legend and is ecstatic about being overthrown by his son in order to make the story more interesting. Unfortunately he failed due to being unable to comprehend good and unintentionally raised Nale to be evil. The plan of being overthrown by his son was shelved until he met Elan.

Tarquin has just set himself up for an Ironic Echo.

A fairly minor one: Tarquin, convinced to the end that It's All About Me, has told Elan to ponder that everything he's about to do is because "you forced me to do this". Given that the Order was perfectly content to fly away from Tarquin and leave him alone, this is a perfect setup for an Ironic Echo, and basically anyone on the airship is potentially in a position to give it — even Laurin if the circumstances set themselves up for it.

• Subverted: he did get an Ironic Echo, but it was for his "you'll live" towards Elan and the echo also came from Elan.

Xykon will make do with his threat about eyeballs and assholes.

However, it will be a semi-accident on Redcloak's part. He'll be polymorphed into a creature with multiple eyes, which even if the Morphic Resonance would cause him to lose half his eyes, he'll still have at least two eyes, meaning Xykon will rip one out and Ass Shove it.

Nale will get to torture Tarquin in Hell

They're both Lawful Evil, so they'll be in the same place. However Nale happens to be the lover of a well-connected demon who might just get Lee to swing something to give Nale something nice, especially since Nale had so far been working for the IIFC's goals, albeit unwittingly. Meanwhile Tarquin hasn't even given a care to his afterlife having been more concerned with his living "story" and so might have plenty of enemies down there...

• Or Malack and Tarquin will torture Nale.

Tarquin will ultimately be killed by irony

By which I mean Elan will not be the one to do it. Because, really, although all of his planning is going into a nosedive, I have to imagine that he still planned/hoped that one of them will end up killing the other; sort of like Voldemort and Harry's thing except it's less of a prophecy deal and more that they were anticipating it.

• In fact, to sweeten the pot, I imagine that it will be from a member of Julio's crew: the rest of the Order is getting themselves patched up, Tarquin climbs back on board and is about to kill someone (my guess is Elan), and the closest crewman just pulls out a knife and shanks him. And Elan can't bring himself to be bothered that his dad is dying. That is how i see it playing out.
• I still stand that it'll be Xykon that ends up killing Tarquin. It'd still be quite fitting with Tarquin, still convinced that he's the primary villain of this story, getting killed off without a second thought by the real main villain. Especially ifTarquin mispronounces Xykon's name again.

Draketooth doesn't have any problem with Soon the message was a bluff

More specifically, a bluff aimed at someone who was there as he recorded it. He actually knew Soon would never break his vow (he knew Soon had a "stick up his ass") and put on a show to fool someone else. Possibly as a way to win a bet (maybe he turned around and used the "Soon'll go back on his word" pot to get people to bet against the more likely one).

Whoever was still in charge of Draketooth's gate was Lawful

It would explain the table of chores, ends-justify-the-means kidnapping/abandonment and the fact that he continued Girade's legacy (how would Old Man Draketooth get someone who shared his mindset to listen to his instructions, after all?). It would also make for a great counterpart to Shojo.

• Wouldn't ends-justifying-the-means be a less-than-lawful mindset?

#936 is the last we'll really see of Tarquin.

It just seems fitting. He might get a brief mention or appearance in an epilogue or something, but this is it for Tarquin within the story.

• That would actually be rather out of character for the Order to leave him be. If they leave him be then he's denied his chance to be the villain of a story but he's still able to rule over three countries with an iron fist.
  • It may just be an aside mention; Haley receives a Sending from her father that Tarquin's been overthrown for realizes, and that's that.

The Oracle will join the Linear Guild.

Because he's a kobold, and it would be funny. That is, if the Linear Guild somehow goes on despite Nale's death.

Someone will refer to Tarquin as a "Side Quest".

And then the shit will hit the fan.

Next time the Order meet Xykon, Belkar will tell him something along the lines of "Stop obliterating our future, you egocentric lich!"

Because it would be a fun Call-Back.

The unnamed member of Tarquin's is the real leader and mastermind

The last member of Tarquin's group who has yet to be named in the story looks like a fighter or a similar class. It would make perfect sense for him to be Roy's counterpart, as while Tarquin is very capable in a fight and is very savvy about story genres and politics, he is terrible as a military leader (he wastes an entire battalion against a group of only 6 people, is too much of an egomaniac and story obsessed to be completely responsible the shadow ruler plan. So it is most likely that the Guy with the Tower-shield was the leader of Tarquin's original army that conquered eleven desert nations. He wanted long lasting stability and peace that comes from a strong empire and his first attempt (straight out conquest) failed and probably worked with Tarquin to come up with the shadow ruler plan, which we know that Tarquin has cut him out of the picture. Some time before Nale and Tarquin's falling out, he learnt about Malack's agenda, and realizes that Malack's plan must never come to past, so he manipulated Nale to assassinate Malack, knowing that Nale like Tarquin is too much of an egomaniac to mention him. He might be the only member of Tarquin's old party who was on good terms with Nale.

• I'm not sure sure I agree with everything on this wmg. However it should be noted that in #758 when Tarquin is explaining his plan in the flashback, he's the only one who is visibly frowning when Tarquin is explaining his plan. This says to me that while it was Tarquin's idea, the unnamed member is still the leader of the group.

The Empire of Tears and Empire of Sweat are nicer places than the Empire of Blood.

Laurin claims that she agreed with Tarquin's plans in order to create a place where her daughter can be away from all the political scheming while Miron is only in this to line his pockets. Both are uninterested in Tarquin's obsession with story and thus wouldn't want to Kick the Dog for the sole purpose of being Obviously Evil.

Eugene Greenhilt accidentally killed his son

Not much of a WMG. Roy has blamed his father for his baby brother's death for quite a while, mentioning an accident (#496), and #944 confirmed that Eugene killed somebody with a magical experiment gone awry.(Unless this whole thing has been confirmed in the paperback stories already.)

The Bandits from the Wooden Forest will return

And have reformed into a logging company, since Durkon accidentally defeated their leader, which in effect made Durkon the leader of the bandits and his last order to them were to cut down the trees of the forest. Some of the higher up bandits realizing that they could potentially make money out of chopping the trees down, likely even more money than when they were just bandits.

The Gates are linked visually, like portals

When Blackwing looked through the Azure City Gate, he saw a planet. This could easily be the planet of the setting, and one of the other Gates is somehow in space. Another Gate is said to be across an ocean, and this is the ocean that Laurin saw through the Gate in the desert.

The Snarl really is aquatic

Why not? The snarl-threads appeared to come out of the otherwise empty ocean gate in the desert, and the planet that Blackwing saw had considerable ocean space.

Strip #297 is going to be relevant soon

In this strip, Roy is informed that his reforged Starmetal-alloy sword +5 has a bonus against the undead. This may seem relevant to his quest against Xykon, but can you imagine what it might do to someone like Durkon?

• Confirmed [2]

Jacinda is the strategic genius of the group.

Rich says that the strategic acumen of the Vector Legion comes from elsewhere in the group, not from Tarquin.Tarquin is a high level fighter with a good intelligence, so he's not a moron in the battlefield, but placed against someone actually capable and he's going to be challenged. So when Tarquin was doing his campaign, Jacinda was helping by assassinating key members of the opposition, throwing the enemies in disarray, allowing Tarquin to steamroll the opposition. When the Eastern Continent banded together, Jacinda was simply too overwhelmed by the number of targets to be able to effectively decapitate the enemy armies, or she just didn't want to any more.

Durkon's father died a cowardly, ignominious death.

The reason why Durkon's mother wouldn't tell Durkon about his father was because the truth hurt her badly. That said, she didn't want to have to lie to her son. However, Uncle Thirden, being a bard, is more than capable of spinning a tall tale, especially since bards know the power of legacy. He acted the way he did to put Durkon off from digging too deeply.

• Durkon's father died calmly in a mining accident. Whether this counts as 'fighting nature' or 'accepting life in Hel' is still debatable.

The High Priest of Hel's mission is just to attend the Godsmoot.

The high priest mentions that Hel has no priests, as any undead who she gives clerical powers to are killed off as low level bosses for adventurers. So, Hel has never had any priests to make it to the Godsmoot and now finds it terribly important to get the one she has there. Why? Because, as the high priest puts it, she wants her due, her say in clerical matters she ought to have had already but was denied due to the other gods' chosen killing off hers.

• Confirmed, more or less. Her Evil Plan hinges on her vote deadlocking the Godsmoot until her pawns can swing the vote even further in her favor.

Spellsplinter users were purged.

Given how Resurrection is easy if you have a body and spellcasters desire to have ultimate power, how come no living fighters know the counterspell technique if you can raise or talk to death to teach it? Because wizards killed and destroyed the fighters' living bodies and made sure people won't know who possessed the feat. Being scholars, they could have known how to erase information from the fighter's college and historical records.

• Given that Fighters are often implied to be dumb brutes In-Universe (Roy was treated as a nerd in fighter college) and his grandfather had a specific motive for wanting to prove fighters could stand up to spellcasters (his mage son made fun of him), it's possible that its use was just never that widespread.
• Except people recognize the move and Roy has been attending a fighter college. So there is an education on how to fight instead of just going barbarian class.

Julio doesn't think he's escaped the Mentor Occupational Hazard

In his note he says that his chaos sabre won't be much use where he's going, and that he's "taking a long-overdue vacation to the Outer Planes", specifically Arborea, the Chaotic Good plane. He probably expects Tarquin to have him killed soon.

Vaarsuvius will die saving the world in a Heroic Sacrifice

V has already expressed interest in redemption,and it's possible that some opportunity resolving the last gate, the snarl and Xykon might present itself, and that V would somehow be able to use magic to do it, (perhaps some self destruct explosive rune spell powerful enough to do the job). V might realize in the moment that the best plan does't include V's survival, and has the best chance of saving the world, thus redeeming Vaarsuvius for V's mistake.

Belkar will not survive his fall from the mountain, but will be allowed into the Chaotic Good afterlife

Between the oracle's clear hints that Belkar will die, and the tendency of main characters who don't know feather fall to die from falling long distances, Belkar will most likely die from the fall. But his attempt at killing the vampire (who ultimately is trying to end the world) combined with his character development will be just enough to tip the scales into him being allowed into the Chaotic Good afterlife.

• Jossed

Banjo will sway the vote against Hel

Hel's whole plan hinges on the minor gods, and she's spent time aligning them to her vote. But Banjo is a minor god, with one follower, Elan.Elan tried to get Banjo into the Northern Pantheon, and almost succeeded. If he shows up and tries again, the gods could hold a quick vote and allow Banjo into the pantheon.

• Alternatively, Elan could enter as high priest of Banjo, and sway the minor god vote in favor of preserving the world.
• Jossed

Wrecan will kill Veldrina

In order to counter the Northern Pantheon's vote in favor of destruction, Wrecan will be forced to kill Veldrina so the Western Pantheon's vote will be nullified, leaving the vote in lock. Then followed by Roy killing Durkon to put the vote entirely in favor of leaving the world intact.

• Jossed

Belkar will sacrifice himself to get through the High Priest's Anti-Life Shell.

He said that nothing alive can get through that shell. With the focus on Belkar's character development, and the growing possibility of his impending death, a Heroic Sacrifice is a logical conclusion.

• Jossed

Belkar will get vamped.

But unlike Durkon and Vampire!Durkon, Belkar and his vampire spirit will be best friends. They'll alternate who controls depending on who can produce the most lols at the moment, constantly trying to one-up each other. Kinda like a split personality with one personality being more of a snarky comedic sociopath and the other being gleefully over the top laughably evil.

• Jossed... for now.

Hel's plan will be derailed by Xykon

Xykon doesn't want to see the world destroyed, since that would kill him. He'd rather take it over. Hel's high priest will succeed in Dominating the Dwarven Council, but Xykon, in the area looking for Kraagor's Gate, will find out what's going on (possibly from the Order themselves) and solve the problem by killing all the dominated elders so they can't advise the First King to end the world. Redcloak will be incensed at this since Hel's plan would have fulfilled the Dark One's goals as well and this will become a catalyst for the inevitable break between Redcloak and Xykon.

• Jossed: Hel has been thoroughly weakened by the Order of the Stick, Durkon's extended family, and Thor/Loki's tag-team soul-stealing.

After her death, Miko's soul read as Chaotic Evil

Although she believed herself to be Lawful Good, the fact that she killed Shojo, began acting under her own code instead of actual laws, and was generally a terrible person, means that she wasn't particularly lawful or good by the end of her life. Eugene Greenhilt is in line for the Lawful Good afterlife primarily because he committed lawful good acts rather than because he cared about staying true to his alignment, and these two things apparently have the same effect, making him appear properly Lawful Good in the eyes of the Celestial Bureaucracy. Since Miko tried so hard to be LG that she almost hit the other extreme (that extreme being CE), then for all intents and purposes she will be considered as Chaotic Evil (or True Neutral, at best), especially since she died unredeemed and post-death Alignment shifts don't appear to count for anything.

Dvalin will subvert Lawful Stupid

Possibly as a result of Rules Lawyer-ing and/or Exact Words. "I agreed I would consult the dwarven heads. I dinnae say I'd follow them blindly."

• Naturally, Roy will be pissed as a result of this. We "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot.

Right-Eye's daughter will reappear at some point

Why else would Start of Darkness explicitly discuss her survival?Maybe she's an adventurer in her own right (it's implied she was raised by humans, after all) or maybe she just really hates Xykon, but at some point she'll appear in the main strip. If she's on the side of the heroes, she might even cause Uncle Redcloak to have a Heel–Face Turn.Alternatively, she'll be a villain - if Team Evil doesn't get control of the Gate, her family will have died for nothing...

Tarquin's death will be as belittling as possible...

He won't get a Death by Irony, Karmic Death, or even necessarily a drama-filled death at all: he'll be killed off-panel, likely due to something innocuous and nobody will be the wiser until well after it's happened. This will be before the knowledge that he was really in charge of the Empire of Blood really becomes widespread among the populace, and the few people who do have that information have no real reason to share it after his death, especially if they also know that he wants the fame. Meanwhile, he'll be going straight to Lawful Evil Hell, which just so happens to be where his son (whom he coldly murdered and would not have any sympathy points with at all) and a certain now-very-pissed-off succubus reside, so once there, there's no way he's getting off easy. Given the nature of the comic, it wouldn't be surprising if Nale or Sabine even commented on the irony of it all.

• Of course, this being Tarquin, he'll also have a Thanatos Gambit in place if he dies to somebody other than who he intends to have kill him, but he'll have overestimated his pull and it'll fail miserably.
  • Alternatively Tarquin's Death WILL be seen. It will be due to Xykon, who will one shot Tarquin after a long speech because Tarquin mispronounced his name as Zykon.

All the current troubles the Order is having (as of strip #1073) in traveling across the mountain range are because of the Mechane's ability.

Julio Scoundrél explicitly stated that the Mechane has always allowed him to reach its objective just in the nick of time. Since the High Priest of Hel may not know where the dwarven kings are currently meeting, he may have spent that teleportation sphere to reach a different place, so he might be now in the middle of making his way towards the right place - so Roy, who does know where it is, has the advantage. Thus, the ship has to have some setbacks so the Order arrives just in the nick of time to stop the High Priest of Hel from putting his plan through - although still too late to prevent him from fulfilling the prophecy that led to Durkon being expelled from the Dwarven lands.

• Whether because of the ability or not they did arrive right at the nick of time.

Kraagor's Gate is not behind any of the gates.

In the strip where the origin of the gates and the Order of the Scribble is discussed, we see that the last fight to happen was against a rift in the open air, not in a cave. When the Order of the Stick was in Girard's pyramid, one of the places they checked was Girard's statue (although only because of a joke made by one of the deceased Draketooths). What if Kraagor's Gate is actually hidden within Kraagor's statue? After all, Serini was a rogue - it would fit that this was not just Kraagor's Gate, but Serini's too, so it would be a double bluff: make everyone think the Gate is in one of the caves, protected by the sheer power of all those monsters Serini had brought, while the Gate is actually protected by being hidden in a statue no one will pay much attention to.

• That makes a lot of sense. Serini's rationale was to use Kraagor's strength to guard the gate. But if they were involved, romantically or otherwise, in a relationship, then it would make sense to combine Kraagor's sheer strength with Serini's cunning. Even better would be if Serini was guarding what looks like the gate, while the statue is the real deal.
  • It also reinforces the Fatal Flaw of the rest of their Order — each Gate fell because it was defended by one of them, through one specific method. The one that's remaining and giving the villains the most trouble? The one defended by combining their talents. If the Order of the Scribble had stuck together and not divvied up the gates, they'd still be standing.
  • Additionally, we already know a Gate doesn't have to be huge - Soon's Gate was held shut by an otherwise inconspicuous sapphire.

Shoulderpads Guy is the srategic genius of the Vector Legion.

Because why the hell not? Also, the fate of the Western continent will be decided by a duel between Shoulderpads Guy vs That Guy With The Halberd .

The comic will end somewhere around strip 1330.

On a Twitter Q&A after strip #945, The Giant stated that we were about 71% done with the story. That alone would make it as easy to guess the end would be at about 1330, assuming that the story progresses at the same pace, but let's take an extra look at things. The Giant says he planned for 7 books. At the time of writing this WMG, strip 1131 has been released, and it seems book 6 is about to be finished up, likely lasting 10-15 more strips at most. This current storyline has lasted 185 strips thus far, and three out of the five previous books have ended in the range of 180-190 strips each^note the outliers being Dungeon Crawlin' Fools at 121 and Blood Runs in the Family at 274. Assuming this trends lasts and we give this book until it's 195th strip to wrap things up, that would leave the last book to be 189 strips if it ends on strip 1330 exactly, which would fit the trend of the average length of a book.

• Strip 1337 just for the pun?

Kudzu Thundershield will save the world.

We have no idea how dwarven clans work. Sigdi's donation to Thor's temple could have elevated the Thundershields to a clan with a vote in the council.

• Considering his name, he's probably destined to do something important in the next arc.
• Jossed.

The Snarl will be defeated for good when the Western, Northern, and Southern pantheons combine their powers with the Dark One and Banjo and/or Giggles.

It's clear that Banjo had at least a bit of power with only one follower. It's possible that the worship of an entire island of orcs would give Giggles the power of a real god. The way it stands now, even if the Dark One works with the main gods, the best they can do is trap the Snarl again in a more permanent way. But with five unique quiddities, it's possible that they may be able to defeat the Snarl for good.

Bloodfeast will save the world.

As soon as he's thrown through the first barrier, the Polymorph will be Dispelled. Then him and Belkar will have a free rein to march in and put a stop to the vote with extreme prejudice. After all, Belkar simply giving orders does not break any laws - since it's speaking - and Bloodfeast can't break any himself because laws don't apply to beasts!

• Jossed... for now.

Minrah's dark secret...

Is that she's a lesbian. The comic hasn't really touched on this subject, so we don't know how sexuality is viewed in the OOTS world, but Thor's reaction was "you do you", which implies something like this.

• Homosexuality doesn't seem to be a big deal in this world, though. Even in the more conservative Dwarven Lands, Durkon's mother said he'd find a "nice girl or fella" and he didn't react like that was something strange.
• It's plausible that she could instead be trans. It wouldn't be odd for dwarven society to be okay with gay people but a little behind on trans issues, and her talk with Belkar about people only knowing your changed self gains resonance if it also applies to her presenting as a female cleric instead of a male guard.

Azure City refugees will let the goblins keep Gobbotopia

The longer the goblins hold Gobbotopia, the less likely Azure City Citizens could take back the place. Several nations already recognise Gobbotopia as a sovereign state. And in order for Durkon to get Redcloak's and The Dark One's cooperation, he cannot very well ask that they leave Gobbotopia unless he rolls very well on his Diplomacy check. One of the stories in How the Paladin Got His Scar also implies Hinjo actually prefers leading his people in the island life rather than the city life.

Xykon's name is not pronounced "Zykon"

There is a Running Gag where Xykon can supposedly hear the wrong spelling of his name. It could be an example of absurd humor... or it could actually make sense. What if the characters that make up the name "XYKON" are actually Greek letters? Chi, upsilon, kappa, omicron, nu. "X" would be pronounced like the "ch" in "loch"; "Y" would be pronounced like the French "u". The joke, then, would be on the readers who pronounce his name as "Zykon", who would rightfully deserve Xykon's wrath.

Durkon's Cousin's Brother-in-law's Niece's Fiancé IS Thad

• Durkon and Thad never met, and Durkon never saw him dressed for work either.

Redcloak will rant to Durkon about how his family was slaughtered along with his entire village and then watched as his brother's family died as well causing the Order of the Stick to break off the alliance with Azure City

At some point in the comics Redcloak will rant to Durkon that when on the day he received the Crimson Mantle it was after his village was slaughtered with every single one of his village except his brother slaughtered by the Sapphire Guard and years later he failed to defend his brother's family from adventurers and had to kill his own brother for the Plan. He asks Durkon a question. If Redcloak and Xykon are defeated what will happen to the Goblins of Gobbotopia? Durkon is shocked and stammers before Redcloak asks the question again. Durkon looks down knowing the answer and Redcloak says" Your gods portray themselves to be gods who love all of their creations not caring about the monsters who are stuck with the worst places in the world and if that wasn't enough the gods made them sources for XP. Your gods betrayed us the moment we sprung into existence and all we wanted was equal rights but your leaders killed our best chance at acquiring. I saw many Goblins die for the sake of my people's future. If I die in this Tomb there won't be anymore High Priests of the Dark One as the Crimson Mantle will be stuck in this tomb and without the High Priest armies of adventurers and Azurites will attack and slaughter my people just like many years ago. If you turn around and inform your friends about what I just said and tell them to leave I will allow you to leave with your life" Sometime later the Order teleports to the Azurite's new home and confront Hinjo. Roy will ask if the Sapphire Guard did inscrimately slaughter Goblin villages. Hinjo will say yes and Roy gets mad and tells Hinjo that the Sapphire Guard was responsible for the rise of Redcloak and the fall of Azure City. Roy gets into a Reason You Suck speech and tells Hinjo that if it weren't for the Sapphire Guard wasn't wiping out the Goblin villages both in and out of their Pantheon's lands Redcloak would've never risen to become the High Priest and Azure City would've never fallen. Hinjo gets angry and says he wasn't the leader of the Sapphire Guard back then. Roy says that Hinjo as the nephew of Lord Shojo could've easily stop the violence by pleading with his uncle to stop attacking innocent Goblin villages. O-Chul then agrees with Roy and says that when he first met the Sapphire Guard they were cruel and arrogant seeking to purge the knowledge of the Snarl which led to Azure City falling and the death of many humans who was killed by the Goblins now occupying all of the land that Azure City had control over so it's on the hands of Soon Kim and his Paladins. Roy then says" Only the honour of a Paladin is unbreakable? More like the arrogance of a Paladin is unbreakable? I thought you were serving the forces of good. You could've just killed the High Priest instead of wiping out entire Goblin villages" Hinjo says" You guys killed Goblins too" Roy then replies" We did in self defence at the time because we didn't even know about the Snarl or the Dark One. Listen the actions of the Sapphire Guard's actions have claimed many lives in the North and the South the former of which was out of bounds for your people. I am taking my people to try and defeat Xykon but after that we are going to help Redcloak with his Plan because let's face it the gods don't have our best interests at our heart. When I went to the Godsmoot I saw that many gods were willing to throw all of us under the cosmic bus. When we defeat Xykon I will take Redcloak to the Godsmoot where the Dark One will cast the deciding vote and when he does Durkon will inform Thor that the Goblins just wants equal rights and when this is all over and done with you are going to disband the Sapphire Guard and stay on the islands" Hinjo says But what about the slaves in Gobbotopia? Roy says" I will make sure that Redcloak lets them go" Then the Order departs on the Mechane.

Serini is a shapeshifted Sabine

The IFCC talked about having a proper "vessel" for Sabine. It could be an example of Kill and Replace.

The Beholder from page 32 is the same as the one in Rusty and Co

When Mike R had a legal issue with a certain Wizard from a Coastal area, Rich Burlew helped him out. One of the characters that Mike had was a friendly orange beholder with a green eye, and a friendly beholder with a green eye appears in comic 32 of OOtS. They are the same beholder.

There is a method to Eugene's un-Lawful un-Good behaviour.

He's not trying to get into Celestia, because the only family member he's on speaking terms with is True Neutral and he wants to be where Julia will end up.

Elan will have befriended Sunny by the time either are revisited.

After all, Elan has an 18 Charisma and has already shown he has an effect on Sunny, who gets pissed when Elan uses the magic word ("Please"). Also, Sunny probably doesn't get to chat with people much, and probably is eager to have a conversation with someone who isn't Serini.

• Confirmed in #1252.

Serini named the Trapper "John"

After all, she named the Piercer "Franklin".

Oona could have cracked Serini's dungeon at any time.

She and the Bugbears have been going in and out of "Monster Hollow" for years; either she or Greyview, possibly both, have all the necessary tattoos, she's just never had any reason to actually complete the trip before and doesn't realize that's what Redcloak really wanted from this.

• Unlikely. She's been walking through the dungeons together with Redcloak and Xykon for days; she's bound to have been in the final room with them at some point, and then a portal would've opened. Until Team Evil arrived, Oona was only interested in the caves as a source of food and materials. She didn't have to go through all of the dungeons to do that, she could pick just a few to do again and again since the monsters replenish fast enough.