The Order of the Stick

Hey, question. Are Belts of Giant Strength rare? For how useful and powerful it seems to be, kinda weird that Roy never got around to getting one until a random NPC handed it to him.

Well it's a magic item, so I imagine it's not something you could just pick up at just any local armorer.

Yeah, it depends strongly on the level of magic-item-accessibility you have in a given campaign. Stat-boosting items like a Belt of Giant Strength are pretty "standard" as magic items go, but magic item availability is pretty much entirely up to the DM.

Note that in the Stickiverse, there are magic item shops where you can pick up things like Belkar's fancy new Cloak of Resistance with the Protection from Evil clasp, which is on a similar level. Obviously not every shop would have them, of course (magic items tend to be pretty expensive, if nothing else).

edited 9th Feb '16 9:37:34 PM by Shinziril

So, uh, how did the whole "Hailey is half celestial" thing get started? Because I was looking through the comic's forum at an old thread and people kept going on about how Haley said "Mommy went to heaven last year" was evidence of it and I was going "what?" So how did that get started?

At one point during her scrambled speech arc she was going to reveal a secret to Elan. It started with "I might not be what you'd call..." and then it was cut off. For some reason people think she was going to say human.

Haley Starshine being a Meaningful Name, along with one of her confessions to Elan while she was speaking Cypher-Gibberish being something like "I'm not exactly what you'd call-" (it was cut off), plus so little info about her mother led people to believe that all of these things were connected.

Or in short, a WMG. Not the most plausible, but not so ridiculous that it could be ruled out.

Edit: Partially 'd.

edited 10th Feb '16 5:04:03 PM by TotemicHero

It's not impossible but I feel like the appropriate time to reveal that sort of thing has passed.

There's also the fact that Rich said that Sabine and Haley are parallels in ways that have yet to be revealed. Part-Celestial contrasted with a demon.

When did he say that?

"I feel like the appropriate time to reveal that sort of thing has passed."

Well, Haley's arc with her father is still going on, on the back-back-back-burner. And if it is connected to Sabine somehow (even if only thematically), she's had some setup for her own revenge plot. And both of those plots would be connected to Tarquin's downfall, another loose end that will presumably be tied up at some point. (Yes, it will. Not because it's important to Tarquin, but because it's important to Elan.)

So I can definitely foresee a time when that sort of thing could become relevant again.

Apparently it was in the commentary to Dungeon Crawling Fools.

I had always figured that Haley was going to say that she wasn't completely straight, given other references to that effect.

Also, while I wouldn't say the part-Celestial thing is impossible, I tend to think that Girard jossed that. Because it was theorized that he was related to Haley, and he did have non-human ancestry, but not only was he not related to her, but that ancestry meant that none of his family is alive (thanks, V).

Err... Haley's celestial bloodline would in fact be entirely unconnected to Girard's dragon bloodline. Especially because Girdard's bloodline was of black dragons, which are Always Chaotic Evil while Celestials are Always Good.

I know that. Sorry, wasn't clear. I more meant that in light of the fan theory that Girard would be related to Haley, the way in which Girard's "mixed ancestry" played out makes me think that it's not an element Burlew wants to introduce.

My impression is that it's only going to be tertiary characters that have that kind of character build that players find cool and it's not going to be introduced with any of the Order's members.

Sabine is Haley's mother

Sabine is Haley's mother's sister's niece's cousin's former roommate.

Sabine is Haley and has been the entire time.

Wasn't there a Celestial that looked similar to Haley? I wonder if it had something to do with that theory.

Edit: Found it.

edited 11th Feb '16 1:44:03 AM by GAP

Hasn't Rich himself confirmed that the "celestial Haley" theory isn't true? I remember him specifying that the way Haley and Sabine were opposites had to do with loyality or something.

Sabine was as loyal to her respective Tarquin-spawn as Haley is, non?

The hairstyle theory was explicitly shot down, there aren't that many hairstyles around. As for the other opposite, I think it was less loyalty and more the romantic situation, which obviously stopped being an opposite situation as things went on.

There was also a human woman who looked like Haley's mom. And was depicted dying in Ian's arms in a flashback while they were talking about "when Mom died".

Sooo there's that.

The "Haley is half-dragon" theory is substantially more credible than the half-Celestial theory. And it's still not credible.

I still think the appropriate time to reveal this would have been during one of the two books that had plot arcs directly related to her. Doing it now would seem out of left field.

I mean, Sabine is still in play. The idea that the plot could eventually revisit this in a natural, unforced way, especially with a book and change left, is not out of the question.