Dominic Deegan: Oracle for Hire, Mk. XXVII: God Has Nothing to do With This

[Thanqol]

To be fair, Karnak played a central role in the War in Hell arc. It would be more than trivial to remove him from that.

Is the story of Dominic Deegan significantly diminished by removing Karnak from the War in Hell, or replacing him with another demon?

[Deme]

Or art or humor. Or awesome theme music.

Rant Time!

One particular quote has been growing on me for a long time now, to the point where it is now a core part of my ideology and philosophy.

"Most stories succeed or fail during character generation. Some can go on for a long time after that, some can even finish, but that's where their fundamental flaw will always lie."

Positive examples include Firefly, which is all about the group dynamic between a group of space smugglers to the point that the story is simply a vehicle to showcase the character's own takes on the universe, and Tales of the Otori where Shigeru's position is designed to be one of extreme isolation with everyone in the world against him all the time.

This philosophy was originally used as a tabletop gaming statement, and it applies critically there - think about the difference between a GM-driven plot-based story, and a character driven story. Think about the character development in Fate: Stay Night that is only possible because the world is structured to focus exclusively on how it relates to Shirou's sense of morality and dream to be a superhero. Think of The Wire - what sets it apart from being 'another cop drama' is that all the characters have very strong roles.

And now, think about stories that fail, or fall flat. Think about how this is due to bland, uninspiring characters that don't interact with each other rather than lack of creative plotting. Compare Henry the Fifth to Romeo and Juliet. Henry V is much less popular than Romeo and Juliet because Henry simply does not interact with any other character in any meaningful way. Think about Ctrl-Alt-Del (yes, I did just compare Shakespeare to Buckley) and the lack of character emotion or role. And then think about Dominic Deegan.

What role does Karnak play in the story? Occasional villain, sure, but could we cut him or replace him with any other villain and get the same result? It takes a few seconds to justify Snuggly being behind the Infernomancer and gay Szark's cursed wounds, and the narrative is suddenly stable. That's it. We don't lose any emotional resonance, save an infodump from Dovonan that he used to know him. This means Karnak is a bad character.

That's just the character. That we can look at multiple scenes, plots and even arcs of Dominic Deegan, ask if we could remove them and have the core narrative unchanged, and get multiple loud "Yes" answers means it's a bad comic, but that's a rant for another English lecture.

Debatable, but only somewhat. On the level of character conception, Karnak isn't inspired -- but he's not bad. He's a man who loved a woman who was in love with another man, and became a demon. He's a man who, put simply, likely never had a sense of belonging, and this is what really prompted him to spend the rest of time hating and killing, particularly his old friends and their families. Not bad.

In execution, none of this character matters. In other words... His character generation isn't terrible. That's not where he fails, and not where Mookie fails. Where Mookie fails is not being able to actually use characters as they'd best be used, to display gracefully developement, growth, and interaction. So while Mookie's failure is his characters... the only place he doesn't explicitly fail is in generation. It's when he has characters that he screws them over.

[colonelslime]

Debatable, but only somewhat. On the level of character conception, Karnak isn't inspired -- but he's not bad. He's a man who loved a woman who was in love with another man, and became a demon. He's a man who, put simply, likely never had a sense of belonging, and this is what really prompted him to spend the rest of time hating and killing, particularly his old friends and their families. Not bad.

In execution, none of this character matters. In other words... His character generation isn't terrible. That's not where he fails, and not where Mookie fails. Where Mookie fails is not being able to actually use characters as they'd best be used, to display gracefully developement, growth, and interaction. So while Mookie's failure is his characters... the only place he doesn't explicitly fail is in generation. It's when he has characters that he screws them over.

Most importantly is that Karnak's history has had little to no effect in his overall behaviour. We learned about it when Dominic had his vision of the past, but the revelation did nothing to explain his overall motivation.... which until the war in hell amounted to basically nothing.

[M84]

Heyall,

I think Mookie is capable of coming up with good ideas. He just doesn't know how to use them very well because he is still at heart a humor writer. DD started out as a humor comic, and a pretty good one too I think. The gradual transition to more serious plots w/ added gorn has not been kind to DD at all. Now the attempts at humor seem out of place.

His artwork, which most of us agree is...well, yeah, also isn't doing DD any favors.

The one character I think Mookie failed with, in generation and execution, is Luna. She was an annoying character from the start that should have just been one of Dominic's customers that somehow became the major Love Interest and then a Mary Sue.

[Trazoi]

Is the story of Dominic Deegan significantly diminished by removing Karnak from the War in Hell, or replacing him with another demon?

"Significantly" is a qualifier that is inherently debatable . But yeah, War in Hell would be changed if it was just Random Baron Shmoe in Karnak's place. The connection of Karnak to the Deegans was important to that story, both in how it led to Karnak's victory and to how Karnak rubbed Dominic's face in it at the end. Remove that, and there's a significant chunk of the story missing (the Pyrrhic victory is one of the better parts of DD).

Debatable, but only somewhat. On the level of character conception, Karnak isn't inspired -- but he's not bad. He's a man who loved a woman who was in love with another man, and became a demon. He's a man who, put simply, likely never had a sense of belonging, and this is what really prompted him to spend the rest of time hating and killing, particularly his old friends and their families. Not bad.

I agree. Most of the characters in DD have promise, but they don't reach their potential. Take Karnak for example; his victory in War in Hell didn't mean much because he never used it to act on his grudge against the Deegans. It's Siggy that has been the bogeyman; Karnak has been sitting on this throne giving the Deegans a free pass. Sure he might have had a higher priority of TIM stealing his infernal cable, but he's the frickin' King of Hell - he can multitask!

Edit: I also disagree that Luna doesn't have a significant impact on the comic. She makes it oh so much worse.

[CurlyKitGirl]

Analysing Dominus Deegan

The Golden Age*
A Frail Hope of Adequate Enjoyment
21/05/2002 - 17/07/2002 Arcs covered: Oracle for Hire, The Curse
The First Signs of Serious Psychological Issues Appear
18/07/2002 - 4/12/2002 Arcs covered: The Curse, Luna, Into the Woods
In Which Teh Great Dominus Indulges in Torture and Terrifies Me
5/12/2002 - 21/02/2003 Arcs covered: Into the Woods, Couch Forts and Crying
Dominatrix Luna. Oh, and The Dominus is More Feared Than A Necromancer
22/01/2003 - 11/03/2003 Arcs covered: Makeover!, Mob Mentality
Thing Are Looking Up
12/03/2003 - 30/04/2003 Arcs covered: Visions of Doom Parts One and Two
Siggy Is Iesus. Make of That What You Will
01/05/2003 -23/06/2003 Arcs covered: Visions of Doom Parts Three and Four

The Great Dominus Is Officially A Marty Stue an It's THRILLER! THRILLER NIGHT!
24/06/2003 - 19/08/2003 Arcs covered: Visions of Doom Parts Five and Six

Spoiler

Show

So Vilrath and Barkeep have a confrontation, ending in a cliche; nice to see that stereotypes are running strong. I can't help but love the the Great DOminus thinks that a cat should do all the work for him, as if saving them from the evil imp wasn't good enough for him. I mean, Spark IS A CAT. You should be lucky that Spark even bothered to splat him rather than sleep.
I've never thought of the Great Dominus as actually being stupid before, but this clinches it. He expects a whimsical talking cat whose only care in the world is fish (see the Curse arc and numerous other stand-alones) and his "Death from Above" attack. For a great and midly powerful seer and Chosen One of the arc, the Great Dominus is pretty dumb. Even Spark's attitude in the present strip should give the GD a clue and that asking about an interrogation would be fairly gormless. But instead of acknowledging his own idiocy he instead blames Spark for acting true to his nature. That of a cat.
Since when could the GD initiate his own visions sans crystal ball? In every single vision so far it has either been random or possibly sent to him by another. And now the GD can pull visions out of thin air like that?
There are two options: a power up. But Mookie didn't tell us the GD got one, nor is it explained, or treated as being a new power. OR:
Mookie can't write and this is an ass pull.
Because the only other option is that the Great Dominus has always been able to freescry on his lonesome, bringing up such questions as: where is Iacob right now? Why doesn't the Great Dominus keep scrying on Barthis-town and The Chosen to gather their names and further information before running off half-cocked? Why did he bring his crystal ball along? Why does he even need it? And that's iust to name a few issues.
So the Great Dominus can freescry, meaning that for this entire arc he's been needlessly putting his companions into danger. He could simply give the names of The Chosen to the Royal Knights of Callan, or some other suitable authority rather than run off to SAVE THE WORLD, thus giving the Great Dominus another ego trip.
Still, at least he's begnning to learn how to empathise with people. Somewhat. That or he iust really wants to know how to make Command Runes because, well, talk about power perversion there. And we've seen in previous arcs that the Great Dominus likes being in control of people. Perhaps he wants to take these runes and learn to make them.
Welcome to the pity party. Village-wide. So why isn't the Great Dominus affected?
BECAUSE HE'S SO GREAT! And no offence to to any of the primary, secondary or tertiary characters, but you tried your best; grow up, get some balls, and get on with it. And really Luna? "I cn't save my friends because I'm ugly."
That's the weakest reason there. Gregory's is iustified: he's a cripple and worthless in a fight. Lord Dan is the muscle, couldn't save his best friend. Lady Iayden, Gregory and Nurse Nun should be able to heal him, but there's the Blight (I keep having flashbacks to WoT whenever I read or think about the illness) and so they're iustified in their inability to heal Siggy.
Except for Gregory.
I think he's being a doorknob because Siggy beat him unconscious with his own walking stick.
Ooohhhhh, the Great Dominus is able to see through illusions and enchantments. That's a pretty big category of magic right there of Great One. And technically all magic is an enchantment, meaning you're only weak to actual physical force. Furthermore, remember when Dirk the Mighty shows his true form? Well, I'd consider that an enchantment. Or what about the fact that he didn't know Lord Dan was a 'spellwolf'? Because, oh, under the stipulation you iust gave of Great Dominus, you should have been able to see Lord Dan's true nature! Because the human form of a werewolf is not his full true form, and is therefore an illusion!
I could go with the "impervious to illusions" because it makes sense - although it would mean he wouldn't value Luna properly as a magician because he would see right through her spells.
My main nitpick is "enchantments". 'enchantment' (as well as 'enchant' and 'enchanted' is variously defined as "a magical spell", "influenced as by charms or enchantments", "to cast a spell over; bewitch"; "to be under a spell"; "bewitched"; "magical"; "a magic spell or form of witchcraft"; "to chant or utter a magic form over someone; to bewitch"; "to get control of by magical forms or rites"; and those are iust some of the definitions from the first four results when you type "define enchantment" into Google.
By this logic the Great Dominus is immune to all types of magic ever including others who scry on him.
Two words: Marty. Stue. Perhaps even a God Mode Stue. And no, this isn't a minor quibble, this is a very, very maior problem. Maybe it was unintended by Mookie, but now every time the Great Dominus is affected by any other person, being, deity, demon or other casting any type of magic on him it ruins his own characterisation. And by extension, any seer is essentially invincible to magic. Which means he's retroactively screwed himself over as Gregory shouldn't have been able to heal his brother. If it is a form of magic that is trying to actively change how the Great Dominus is, feels or how he sees the world, it shouldn't be able to affect him, and therefore the Great Dominus should be dead.
I will say that casting an illusion spell upon the Great DOminus is valid as it was to change someone else's perception of reality, not his own. And if magic is used to indrectly harm him it should work. i.e. a spell is cast on a spear to fly across the room and stab him; because the magic isn't being cast on (or around) him directly, and therefore it would work.
Let me repeat: any magic that has a direct affect on how the Great Dominus perceives himself or the world does not affect him whatsoever.
And now I'm bookmarking that comic, because every time someone else's magic affects the GD or another seer I'm linking to that page.
Mookie should have looked up what "enchantment" made. because I don't know about you, but I've known that an enchantment was (and can easily be twisted to mean any sort of) a magic spell since I was very, very young.
Oh, and yes, the GD is now The Chosen One and Saviour. And despite the fact that we now know that the GD is immune to about 90% of magic he still needs luck. So what? Almost complete magical immunity isn't good enough for you.
Next comic is nice and dramatic, even though that stupid "!" ruins it a bit. I have the feeling Mookie only does that because he can't draw a :smallsurprised: But despite that, the art in the comic is quite good for Mookie. Except fingers do not bend like that (p.1) and is that a female Siggy? Hello Siggette! Nice to meet you.
This is pretty funny, but ventriloqism isn't even a spell. Also; the GD's being a ierkbutt again. Nice to see he's back on form, dicking about with everyone nearby.
Admittedly, his strategy is fairly good. Distract, entrap and break the spell (07/07/2003). But I don't like how Vilrath does nothing, and then the creepy super-pose and the words "See the truth!" of what? Let's take Gregory's example: he's a cripple. This is the truth. And he couldn't help Siggy because he wasn't there, and even if he was he's a crippled teenager. How could he defeat a man who mutilated and crippled a trained ROYAL KNIGHT OF CALLAN?! He was useless! THIS IS THE TRUTH.
Is it a self-esteem spell telling everyone, "No, it's okay. You're not worthless,"? And for his ambiguous spell, he's drastically weakened.
Vilrath has a point, The Chosen should have been able to stop one weak man. I like Vilrath, even though he's so transparently evil he might as well be invisible. Wait.
Wait.
The Great Dominus, knowing the dangers of the command runes didn't dispell them?! What. The. Hell. GD? You ran up to their rooms to tell them of the danger, people started acting sad, so you devised a way to free complete strangers, but not to save your friends from the initial danger.
By the way, it is physically impossible to have created that scenario. Assuming Vilrath is about six foot high, and the GD looks about half a head smaller, that branch must be fourteen or fifteen foot off the ground!
How did they get the GD up there without breaking his neck? How is Vilrath holding the GD up with one hand and thus supporting a full grown, healthy man with no strain whatsoever? And don't forget, it can't be magic because "enchantments and illusions don't work on [him]". And a gravity defying spell would involve changing the GD's perceptions of the world i.e. that he can float/fly. I will give points though for the GD actually shaking in fear/from the strain of holding perfectly still.
And how is Gregory keeping up with a trained spellwolf, and two normal humans? He should be trailing behind them.
I do like the facial expressions in that comic though, they look very realistic. Also: hai Siggette. She's a spellcaster you know.
And so the GD's 'perfect' plan has failed utterly. Because he got an over-inflated ego that made him completely forget about the runes on his companion's clothing. WOuld it really have taken that long to hide their cloaks (not underwear or anything difficult to remove) or remove the spell?
And The Chosen - all four of them - easily defeat two associates of the Royal Knights of Callan, both of which are spellcasters, and another two powerful spellcasters. By the way, the GD should be dead here, not waving his legs around as if someone had hung him up in the cloakroom like a wet coat. Oh, it's a slow choking hanging rather than a quick snap of the neck. That's okay then. And note how our infallible GD is dying for the second time in about a week's time.
This will undoubtedly shake the GD's world view, and make him more concerned for his own personal safety. Then again, given that his freescry meant he didn't have to be here in danger in the first place, perhaps the GD hates himself and is subconsciously suicidal, hence his many, many actions wherein he deliberately throws himself at Death's feet, begging to die.
And a legitimate twist: Vilrath is Iacob. I sort of suspected it, but it's still quite a good twist. Even if Iacob is now a zebra.
What's up with that hair?
Iacob is now a zebra necromancer. In a people suit. I'm sure there's a geeky reference I could make about this, but let's not. I think Iacob has the Blight ("In the Blight he courts death as a suitor courts a maiden"), and he has claws? Okay. Why not.
Plus I call incestuous love on gregory's behalf. Seriously. Look at p.7. And need I remind everyone that Iacob once tried to kill him? Or that mere moments ago he saw Iacob-the-Zebra hang the GD? And presumably killed Vilrath himself. Gregory has issues. And he's admiring someone who looks like Iacob? And it took the GD until the last panel of thenext page to figure out Iacob-Zebra was wearing a people suit. Despite Iacob making it perfectly clear in the previous comic.
The GD is a stupid seer.
Iacob is a necromancer, so he has power over death and the dead. So why can he rip someone's spine out? That sword is too much. It's iust stupid. If he'd shaped it out of rib bones, or the thigh perhaps it'd be intimidating; but the spine. The spine isn't pointy. I call stupid. On the other hand, the last panel made me giggle. It's a shame that Siggette is dead though.
She looked very much like Siggy. And her friend is tuskless Luna with longer hair. And another morbid giggle. Iacob-Zebra is very much doing that to you on purpose oh GD. He knows that you're not his real brother.
See, I figure that Vilrath-as-Iacob-Zebra tried to tell Siggy that he was his brother, but Siggy was all het up over this murder thing and tried to kill Iacob. So he had to defend himself.
And gregory get a clue. And what should have been dramatic, and world shaking (for Gregory) is ruined by a crude vomit ioke. Tasteful Mookie. And I'm going to be right in assuming that Gregory's revelation is never adressed again. After all, seeing your brother and/or idol do something atrocious that utterly changes your view of him is nothing whatsoever!
Why does Iacob look and act so endearingly cute here, it's the wibbly smile in the first panel. So on the one hand, he's a mass murdering necromancer; on the other hand, he does hold some affection towards his little brother. By the way, iacob is now my favourite character, he consistently makes me smile with his morbid humour. Iacob has a sense of humour, is powerful, aside from the whole 'dissolving his flesh thing' he looks pretty handsome, and he has a woobie-licious backstory (even if it is one I mostly crafted out of wholecloth). What's not to like? Aaawwww, he really does love his little brothers. I'd make that kind of threat myself. But without the crucifixion.
Not to mention Iacob's smart; he outthought two separate people's plots, outwitting a seer, and he healed his littlest brother. The art in the last panel is awful though. I think Gregory's leg is meant to be floating? Either way, the Blight ("In the Blight he courts death as a suitor courts a maiden") is no longer in Gregory. On the downside, he's bleeding out; and the priestess can no longer heal. Oh wait: Chekov's Gun! Remember back in Into the Woods when Gregory killed TIM and healed the GD at the same time? I bet that's what happens next.
With a kiss. How . . . teenaged.
And the GD has that uncannily evil smirk in the middle panel again. And Gregory is a God Mode Sue. I adore Lord Dan's reaction in the middle panel. After all, killing or arresting someone who iust murdered five people, attempted to murder both you and your big brother, caused a priestess to desecrate herself and attempted the murder of three nobles of the realm (Lord Dan, Siggy and perhaps Luna) amongst other crimes is worth a slap on the wrist.
Oh sweet! Iacob's gone all Doctor Frankenstein on us! A believable, and really good motive for a villain. Excellent! And he can animate corpses?
Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And noone's gonna save you from the beast about to strike
You know it's thriller, thriller night
And then a scary-cool exit preceded by a funny one-liner.
Iacob is my favourite character.
Also, the GD shows his callous side by making his love interest carry him, putting her at risk and enabling himself to live.

*Ages as defined by Trazoi here.

I am officially, 100% snarking now.
Oh, I can see the good points still, but I have now lost all respect for this comic.

[Thanqol]

Debatable, but only somewhat. On the level of character conception, Karnak isn't inspired -- but he's not bad. He's a man who loved a woman who was in love with another man, and became a demon. He's a man who, put simply, likely never had a sense of belonging, and this is what really prompted him to spend the rest of time hating and killing, particularly his old friends and their families. Not bad.

In execution, none of this character matters. In other words... His character generation isn't terrible. That's not where he fails, and not where Mookie fails. Where Mookie fails is not being able to actually use characters as they'd best be used, to display gracefully developement, growth, and interaction. So while Mookie's failure is his characters... the only place he doesn't explicitly fail is in generation. It's when he has characters that he screws them over.

Character generation doesn't mean interesting ideas. That gets you a bunch of interesting people who can't relate to each other. Even in the modern world it's possible to take five different people from different walks of life and not have them be able to hold a meaningful conversation with each other.

Character generation can't be done in a void. You've got to work out what Karnak's role and relation is to the PCs as well as his backstory. You've got to say that Karnak is the brute force that Dominic cannot overcome directly, ever, and shatters his confidence whenever they clash (not that Dominic has ever lost to him, but another essay, another day.

(Oh, and I posted another essay that was the last post on the previous page that people might have missed)

[Thanqol]

Edit: I also disagree that Luna doesn't have a significant impact on the comic. She makes it oh so much worse.

Would the story suffer if we removed Luna entirely, a la Garfield Without Garfield?

[CurlyKitGirl]

Thangol, iust a note, but double-posting is frowned upon. There's a reason there's an edit button.

I do enioy your essays by the way; they're nicely thought out and well structured, but they could use some examples, or analysis of an actual section of the comic.
Continuing with your Luna example (which I happen to agree with by the way, although please note I'm only up to 19/08/2003 in the comic's run), so far during the Visions of Doom arc Luna has done nothing whatsoever of import to the story, and you could honestly write out the few lines she has, and there's no real change.
The only thing she has done is be someone who knows Lady Iayden. And then Lady Iayden vouches for them. Realistically, it could have been done by anyone else.
And that's six months of comic time. A comic which updates six days a week!

[Trazoi]

Would the story suffer if we removed Luna entirely, a la Garfield Without Garfield?

Suffer? Nooooooo. But it would be a significantly different comic.

My view is the comic would have been much better if Luna had disappeared after her arc, or at least was only an occasional reoccurring character for several arcs rather than immediately shacking up with Dominic. Dom needed to be established as a grumpy anti-social loner and for his potential love interest to slowly see past the prickly exterior to appreciate the heart of gold within. Instead Luna was all head over heels immediately, leading to a very unhealthy relationship. That's why I liked all the secondary relationships in the comic - they seemed more natural in comparison - and why I got so cheesed off when those secondary relationships were cast away so frivolously.

[Coidzor]

Would the story suffer if we removed Luna entirely, a la Garfield Without Garfield?

I dunno if it would or could suffer.

I want to see the results of such an undertaking though.

[TheLaughingMan]

Thanqol and Koorly are now officially the Tirade Twins, until I can come up with something better.

I dunno if it would or could suffer.

I want to see the results of such an undertaking though.

We could make her suffer.

MWAHAHAHAHAHA

HA

[Coidzor]

Thanqol and Koorly are now officially the Tirade Twins, until I can come up with something better.
We could make her suffer.

MWAHAHAHAHAHA

HA

It would be Fangloriously devoured.


To Thanqol:
Subject: Re: <3
Karnak is a bad guy, bad guy, bad guy.
Karnak is a bad guy, bad guy, bad guy.
Karnak is a bad, bad man.
Karnak hates Donovan!
Karnak's got a master plan,
To spear a custom DRAGON MAN!
Karnak is a bad guy, bad guy, bad guy.
Karnak is a bad guy, bad guy, bad guy.
Snuggly is a bad guy, bad guy, bad guy.
Siggy is a bad, bad guy!

[averagejoe]

As a student twice over of English (pursuing a bachelor's in writing and another in literature) I'd be glad to read more of those rants, thagnol.

And as someone who occasionally speaks something that's kind of like English, I rather enjoy them as well.

Ooohhhhh, the Great Dominus is able to see through illusions and enchantments. That's a pretty big category of magic right there of Great One. And technically all magic is an enchantment, meaning you're only weak to actual physical force.

Actually, Mookie is a D&D player, and I think he meant "Enchantment," in the same way that game does, which is to say mind affecting spells. Not that there isn't a lot wrong with that statement, and I think it's just kind of ignored later anyways, but I don't think it's quite as bad as you make it out to be. More of an English language fail than a sue thing.

Thangol, iust a note, but double-posting is frowned upon. There's a reason there's an edit button.

Actually it's outright against the forum rules. Not a big deal if you get dinged, but you really shouldn't do it.

[Thanqol]

Thanqol and Koorly are now officially the Tirade Twins, until I can come up with something better.

Promotion!

Trazoi: Being a very different comic is an acceptible thing if the comic is currently terrible. Your point is valid, though - it's an example of giving her a role in the story, making the relationship between Dominic and Luna a point of interest rather than a non-point.

That's what I mean by character generation - not coming up with "Ugly sorceress who hates herself and here are the three reams of backstory I prepared earlier"; but coming up with "Dominic has to make a concerted effort to overcome his own flaws before he can be in the same room as the girl he likes without embarassing himself and earning her contempt".

One of the better examples of this in DD is Jacob as a villain, and his relationship with Greg - briefly. Jacob's role here was "Destroy Greg's simpleminded, everyone-is-good worldview", and he did it by beating up his own brother who looked up to him while using excessive force.

Since this is Dominic Deegan, it stuck for all of one punch. But Mookie's inability to write his own characters isn't what I'm examining here; it's the fundamental story defects.

[Palmer]

I dunno if it would or could suffer.

I want to see the results of such an undertaking though.

For at least Luna's introduction, all you'd have to do is replace her name with Barnet.

Barnet: Hello, my name is LunaBarnet.

Sigfried: ...Not my type.

Barnet: *wangst*

Barnet: *become Oracle Hunter*

Considering her backstory, it actually fits rather well.

[Humbug]

Actually, Mookie is a D&D player, and I think he meant "Enchantment," in the same way that game does, which is to say mind affecting spells. Not that there isn't a lot wrong with that statement, and I think it's just kind of ignored later anyways, but I don't think it's quite as bad as you make it out to be. More of an English language fail than a sue thing.

Mookie forgot about this little plot point. Dominic says he is immune to illusions, and yet he was pretty fooled by the Miranda's illusion later in the Ecstasy and Evil arc. So yea, Mookie already had this habit of rewriting characters to fit the plot right from the beginning.

[Palmer]

Oh look, Sneaky Gate revealed there really is some form of a story like substance here.

Future Link

[Trazoi]

The way he's wandering, the way he's killing other demons, it's almost as if he was... raised in Maltak?

...EXPECTO PATRONUM!

[Humbug]

Is that what orcs do in Maltak? Wander and kill? Where did Mookie say state that?

[averagejoe]

Aw man, what bad luck. Those soul hunters interrupted them just as they were about to tell us what's going on. What are the odds?

[Oracle_Hunter]

...what's left of their what now?

[Khosan]

Panel 6 is...wow.

That is amazingly bad dialogue.

EDIT: And panel 8. When did Ursula from the Little Mermaid show up?

[Trazoi]

EDIT: And panel 8. When did Ursula from the Little Mermaid show up?

Those poor unfortunate souls.

[Humbug]

Panel 6 is...wow.

That is amazingly bad dialogue.

That's Silver Age comics dialogue right there.

[Rappy]

I agree. Panel 6's dialogue is just...so bad it's hilarious, really. Plus, the Sarlacc does the digestive torture thing better.

Also, is it just me, or do the soul hunters bear some vague resemblance to a toned-down version of Flukeman from the X-Files?

[Thanqol]

oh god why does he have to get naked to use his tentacles ><

He's clearly disrobing, you can see the black robe silhouetted around his waist in the last panel. Why why why would you do that.

Literary essays will return when the mental image of naked tentacle orc fades.

[Castel]

Panel 3 needs a "If only we had an unwilling female to see how he saves her..."

Is that what orcs do in Maltak? Wander and kill? Where did Mookie say state that?

Weren't the orcs nomads at first? And, well, we've seen that orcs are pretty much all about killing, so...

[Coidzor]

Oh look, Sneaky Gate revealed there really is some form of a story like substance here.

Future Link

3/8 panels of plot isn't too too bad... Maybe...

[Khosan]

Why why why would you do that.

He's hiding a fifth tentacle

If tomorrow's comic (well, tomorrow's Sneaky Gate) shows 5+ tentacles as whatshisname attacks, I will have successfully creeped myself out.