Goblins: Life Through Their Eyes

Well, first of all I'm kind of surprised there isn't already a thread about this comic.

Second of all, I'm catching up right now and just wanted to say that the whole mess with Yala the Kobold and the Big Dumb, Deaf, Blind Ogre was some of the most heart-wrenching stuff I've ever read. And I've read quite a bit.

I like the writing and the characters, but this thing updates at a snail's pace. I'm pretty sure that if he stopped adding things right now it'd still take him years to wrap up all the plot thread's he's begun—the main goblin party's business in Brassmoon, and Dies and company, the eventual inevitable faceoff with Duv, some way of weaving the formerly-drow party back into the plot's path, Forgath and Minmax's rivalry with the main party, Forgath's prophesized encounter with Kore, and oh yeah, last but not least: KORE!

I'll say this though: During the Kore plot I think Thunt set speed records on attaching the reader to new characters just so he could kill them. He is very good at writing engaging characters.

The pace is disappointing, but it isn't too much of a problem with me since I tend to wait months before I read it again. Like, half a year. Then, I have a small binge read.

Goblins is one of the perfect examples of both what's awesome and what's sucky about the webcomic medium.

Awesome = fantastic characterization, great art, compelling plot, clearly planned well in advance. Sucky = The pain of waiting for each new update, combined with Schedule Slip.

For whatever it's worth, Thunt's promised a 4 page update this week. And I must like it, since I just bought the online PDF books.

edited 19th Jun '09 7:06:52 AM by Fighteer

I love the comic, but the update schedule drives me bonkers.

The new one is very satisfying. It was a long time coming.

It Is Awesome.

Don't be Mohinder, Thaco! Just do a coup de grace! It only takes six seconds.

Am I the only one who wonders how this could possibly happen within Dn D rules? Yes, a critical hit is certainly possible, but I assumed that just meant extra damage and maybe a round of stunning (haven't read the rules). Are there really rules for a critical hit causing you to get skewered and therefore trapped on a conveniently sharp part of the environment?

It's nice to see Thaco win, but not if it requires breaking the very rules the universe is built on to do so.

The PDF books you can buy have a wealth of extra material, including the rather elaborate fumble tables that Thunt uses in his D&D games. I assume the critical hit table is equally elaborate.

Edit: Just to clarify, there are plenty of house rules in his games. The comic is true to those rules, and not necessarily the letter of the rulebooks.

edited 21st Jun '09 8:57:50 AM by Fighteer

Hurray, Ironic Echo!

Also, does anyone else think Dellyn's Slasher Smile looks like it belongs on a heavy metal album cover?

@Brickman: Now, I haven't played D&D yet, (I read a bunch of AD&D material when I was younger though.) but there's always Rule 0 which in this case would be the Rule of Cool if you don't use it too many times, and I'm certain quite a few Dungeon Masters would use it kill Catgirls in their games from time to time, rather than slavishly only subscribe to what are in the rulebooks.

great ending to the fight◊

That only gives you the first page. both pages.

Nice. Hope that doesn't come back to bite him and others later, though. It probably would have been better to kill him so he can't torture or kill anyone else.

Truly a Fate Worse than Death for the egotistical Goblinslayer.

Anyone notice that Thunt still has issues drawing characters in profile? The perspective in the first panel doesn't look right.

(FYI, I'm well aware of the danger of hypocrisy in criticizing someone else's art.)

Wow. This doesn't quite reach the standards of stupidity set by Heroes when it comes to dealing with the most dangerous guy around, but it's up there.

Nice speech, but I do rather hope that the next bit is "Alright, alright, will you shut up if I kill you? *coup de grace'd!*"

Kore is the "most dangerous guy around", not this guy from a character's backstory. I personally think Thac0 is just sick of this story arc.

By the way, Mr. Badass Grandpa probably did get EXP from this, despite his bragging. Good roleplaying and all that.

edited 30th Jun '09 6:26:53 PM by mrsaturn

By the way, Mr. Badass Grandpa probably did get EXP from this, despite his bragging. Good roleplaying and all that.

[geek]Since Third Edition, XP has been awarded for overcoming monsters, not killing them. I believe this comic uses 3E rules, so he should get the points.[/geek]

So, I unofficially call this strip Ogre Ex Machina.

I hope the ogre survives the arc. There's nothing I can think of at this point that should be able to kill him but wouldn't cause a Total Party Kill, but it doesn't seem like Thunt's style to keep a character like this alive for much longer.

"Am I the only one who wonders how this could possibly happen within Dn D rules? Yes, a critical hit is certainly possible, but I assumed that just meant extra damage and maybe a round of stunning (haven't read the rules). Are there really rules for a critical hit causing you to get skewered and therefore trapped on a conveniently sharp part of the environment?

It's nice to see Thaco win, but not if it requires breaking the very rules the universe is built on to do so." It is worse. Not only it is statistically impossible according to the rules (remember, high-level characters technically can survive anything up to unprotected orbital reentry), lots of previous plot poits hanged on power relationships between characters of certain levels played completely straight. It was Ass Pull, it was What An Idiot moment (chances of Goblinslayer's survival clearly are 100%, why the hell you are just leaving psychopatic mass-murderer there, old dumbass?), it was Character Derailment moment, in short, it was about the single worst strip in this webcomic.

We have no idea how high Goblinslayer's level was, though. I doubt it was in the "Nigh immortal" range. What's the level of one of those snake-people like the one he had on a leash? We can probably assume him to be one or two higher than that, since he had to defeat one of those.

@Fat R: The rules for doing this were posted, by Thunt, in the blog, exactly because people were complaining about it. He's not using Dn D rules. He's using his own house rules tacked onto the Dn D system.

But that would work perfectly fine in a Dn D game by the book. If the guy to be skewered was low on HP, you could describe the final blow however you like. That's why I like powers with strictly defined mechanical effects like you do Xd Y damage, you can fluff them however you like.

I like fluffing stuff too, but again I should point out that Goblinslayer's fall onto the pipe was a valid result of the rules Thunt created for fighting in the sewers. I won't repost them verbatim, but basically any hit carries with it a chance of stumbling or falling proportional to the damage done. If you fall there's a chance of landing on something nearby, like a rusty pipe, inflicting damage and requiring a Strength check to get loose.

My point is that it's silly to debate the verisimilitude of the events in the story relative to strict D&D rules when you already know (or should know) that the author is not using them.

Okay, now that I have that off my chest. Does anyone else feel like the latest set of strips are playing up the inversion of What Measure Is a Non-Human? just a wee bit too much? I guess it's partly a reaction to the update schedule and just wanting the story to move on, but it seems like we've been watching the poor monsters trying to escape forever.

...What about that off hand comment that the soldiers in blue are innocent conscripts? When's that going to bite our heroes in the ass?