MS Paint Adventures V: THIS IS STUPID

[Devils_Advocate]

Um, what? There's no universe jumping required, she simply went through Paradox Space.

I was under the impression that Paradox Space was outside of traditional space and time, that it was the literal breeding ground for space and time in fact.

Paradox space is the whole Homestuckverse. You probably mean "the Furthest Ring".

TT: Try to learn the lingo.

The thing is though despite it being socially acceptable it could be argue that objectively it is still wrong.

Morality aside, a lot of Vriska's actions could be described as "incorrect" in the sense that they led to outcomes that she considers undesirable. Her overconfidence ultimately killed her. Viewed from a power-idealizing perspective under which success is all that matters, her death was thus self-justifying; she deserved to fail because she failed. One must appeal to some other perspective in order to argue that her failure was undeserved.

Vriska and Tavros each died due to essentially knowingly inviting another troll to kill them. And wouldn't it be rude to turn down that invitation? (Hey, that's a big part of why Vriska was so frustrated with Tavros!) Even setting cultural relativism aside, killing them seems a lot less objectionable than it otherwise might considering that they all but gave Terezi and Vriska permission to kill them. To me, at least.

Just because i'm making a pot of soup and you throw in some beef and vegitables doesn't make it any less my soup.

You can make some pretty great soup from just a stone, eh?

What's your take on the whole Ship of Theseus thingy?

Because then we don't see Scrathmiestah as a evil guy. Just as a guy that made some light alterations.

Those aren't mutually exclusive at all. Maybe you haven't noticed, but we've been consistently shown that subtly nudging events into place is how Doc Scratch operates. He influences events indirectly, by manipulating others. This doesn't mean that his actions don't have, by design, tremendous influence.

:/ The doesn't say anything at all about being biologically built for blackrom, just that they have kismesii(?) and matesprits which we already know

Kismesissitude is (one of the two types of) black romance. We're told that it's part of trolls' reproductive cycle. In what sense, then, are you suggesting that they might not be "biologically built for" it?

We are also told that trolls are "strongly compelled" by "primal forces" to seek out each type of romance, and that that's why they consider them forms of romance (in contrast to the troll disease called friendship).

if incestuous slurry is literal then there is likely a degree of inbreeding, which would cause a genetic shift towards insanity, instability and infertility.

I am virtually certain that you could only reach that conclusion by making at least one unwarranted assumption about how troll genetics works.

I am still unconvinced blackrom is a critical part of troll biology, mainly because it makes the whole thing too complicated.

I am chuckling in contemplation of the phrase "too complicated to be part of Homestuck canon".

Unless they produce different genetic material from the two kinds of romance, blackrom is a vestigial social construct.

... So unless the thing that we're basically told outright is true, the situation is the opposite of what we were led to believe?

When the IMPERIAL DRONE comes knocking, you had better be able to supply genetic material to each of his FILIAL PAILS. If you have nothing to offer, he will kill you without hesitation.

The genetic material - WITHOUT GOING INTO MUCH DETAIL - is a combinative genetic mix from the matesprit and kismesis pairs, respectively.

The human reproductive cycle and various forms of human social interaction seem, on the surface, a lot more complicated than they need to be. And they are, in the sense that it's possible to have far less complicated reproductive cycles and forms of social interaction! Nevertheless, there are reasons for these things being as they are. We are left to imagine that there are reasons for troll reproduction and troll romance being the ways that they are, too.

That trolls' biology and psychology arose from, propagate, and harness both competition and cooperation in a highly complex way does not make them any different from us! A lot of specifics are different, because they're aliens. That's the idea. And part of the humor involved is the degree of surface similarity between trolls and humans despite the fact that the underlying factors leading to the surface details are profoundly different.

The presumed explanation for this is that the entire history of every universe is presumably generated by Sburb, with particular effects hard-coded but their causes left open-ended. This also explains the story's high density of callbacks, even within a single universe or session; such things are like code in a program being reused, with the details changed only as the situation warrants. Think of paradox space as being like a fractal, such that one can observe the same structure by zooming in on parts of the whole that are distant from each other.

Y'know, if you feel like that stuff needs an in-story explanation for some reason.

Then the two buckets are emptied together in the same receptacle anyway, so it could very well have been a single bucket the whole time.

That's like saying that since eggs and sperm are combined together in one place, only one of them is necessary.

"I hate this wimp, i want to hurt him, therefore i want to mate with him in as painful a way possible."

"I hate that wimp. But now Im biologically forced to be with him. Now I hate him even more. Now Im suffereing and he is suffering. And now Im taking out my suffering onto others"

I'm not convinced that Vriska's relationship with Tavros wasn't deranged even by troll standards. Karkat opines that it makes no sense for her to hate him, and that if anything she should pity him.

[tyckspoon]

How? I was under the impression that Paradox Space was outside of traditional space and time, that it was the literal breeding ground for space and time in fact.

How does traditional FTL (even psychic boosted FTL, which she no longer has) get you into Paradox Space and back out the other side into an entirely different universe?

It is possible to be physically outside a universe- Jack destroyed the Kid's universe from the outside. So, take your spaceship, and shove it through the 'skin' of your universe-frog. Where are you now? I'm thinking Paradox Space.. which means if you know how to navigate and are patient enough, you can get to any other session's universe.

[Capt. Ido Nos]

I am so increadibly happy to have finally convinced one of my friends to read Homestuck. He plowed through Problem Sleuth of his own will in about three days, and has spend a good portion of the last month cranking through the Homestuck archives.

In the last day, he has finally hit: Gamzee: engage Hero Mode, [S] Jade: Wake up, and [S] John: Rise up.

He is flipping his proverbial lid right as we speak. I'm so proud of him :')

Also, I've been honking at him for weeks, and I'm still waiting for that to send him into cold terrors.

[Gez]

That's like saying that since eggs and sperm are combined together in one place, only one of them is necessary.

Absolutely not, since the combination is the whole point.

The whole justification for troll romance is this:

This doesn't mean the initial combination was for naught, however. In the slurry, more dominant genes rise to the fore, while the more recessive find less representation in the brood. Especially strong matesprit and kismesis pairings yield more dominant genetic material. The more powerful the complement or potent the rivalry, the more dominant the genes.

[Capt. Ido Nos]

SPECULATION THEORY TIME part 1!

Observation 1: Gamzee is wearing the illustrious garb of the Cod Tier.
Observation 2: Gamzee is also wearing the facial scars from Nepeta's claws.

Fact: We have seen that players ascending to God Tier are healed of their wounds. John no longer has gaping holes in his chest. Vriska has all her limbs and eyes. Rose isn't quite as grim or dark as before.

While we don't know a lot of the nitty gritty specifics about the God Tier ascension process, like eyegear, or wings vs not-wings, across the board those we have seen ascend are in a better physical shape than before.

So this begs the question: why does Gamzee still have facial scars?

Hypothesis: Gamzee ascended to the God Tier long ago, before his sober rampage, before the fight with the Black King, possibly even earlier than Vriska's ascension.

We never specifically saw his dreamself die, and he was almost constantly off doing his own thing during the duration of SGrub. Vriska was able to hide her wings and wear different clothes to cover her ascension, or at least not flaunt it. Gamzee could easily have done this. He has been God Tier this whole time.

[Androgeus]

Hypothesis: Gamzee ascended to the God Tier long ago

Wasn't there a image that showed Gamzee in his land with what could be his quest bed in the background floating around this thread a few pages ago?

[Devils_Advocate]

Scowling Dragon, it seems that there is a considerable probability that you are hung up on particular prescriptivist definition of the word "hate". If so, you might find it helpful to substitute the phrase "intense dislike".

I think that "hate" may be a far more vague and/or more flexible term than you give it credit for. This is probably even more true among trolls than among humans. In particular, their romantic hatred may not be a subset of the sort of hate you are thinking of in much the same way that romantic love may not be a subset of some prescriptivist definitions of "love" (which is not to say that there is no overlap).

On the other hand, if you're just convinced that it's not possible for intense dislike of someone to be enjoyable, then I think that you're assuming too much about what sorts of psychological similarities must exist between two individuals, particularly of different species. We are hardly even talking about something utterly removed from the scope of human experience here. Ever heard the expression "the one you love to hate"?

Now, you could say that this sort of thing inevitably leads to a lot of suffering, but you could say the same thing about romantic love. That doesn't mean that it can't ever be positive, or that the benefits can't outweigh the costs.

What you say about sadism and masochism in particular suggests to me a sort of intolerance for others' preferences that is arguably as dangerous as hating people, for many of the same reasons.

Absolutely not, since the combination is the whole point.

What do you mean? You could say the same thing about human reproduction. Without the combination, it doesn't work.

Look, human reproduction requires the combination of two different types of gamete.

Is it inconceivable that troll reproduction could require two different types of reproductive material, each of which is in turn a combination produced by pairs of partners?

That only makes it, like, one level more complicated than human reproduction.

[Capt. Ido Nos]

Wasn't there a image that showed Gamzee in his land with what could be his quest bed in the background floating around this thread a few pages ago?

Very likely, I would say!

[Scowling Dragon]

Scowling Dragon, it seems that there is a considerable probability that you are hung up on particular prescriptivist definition of the word "hate". If so, you might find it helpful to substitute the phrase "intense dislike".

I KNOW the definition of hate. Its this dark ball of crushed glass of destruction that begs to be released. It scars your insides and destroys your mind as it takes shape. It taints other things inside with cuts of poison blood and only madness or forgiveness are the way to make it stop hurting. It still hurts even after many years. And I am not kidding still makes me crave for the feeling of sharp object puncturing flesh.

Thats why I found the troll relationships so interesting and unnatural. So twisted and perverted.

Hate is to "Intense dislike" as Love (Platonic or otherwise) is to "Mild apreciation".

When you tame down troll hatred into this ***** "Not all the way" shtick it becomes this dull fanfic type thing.

Yes we spam the word "Hate" every once In a while because intense dislike is harder to pronounce. Yet TRUE hate is true.

Love can hurt, but thats not its intent. Its a risky buisnes that may pay off or not.

But hate? Or intense dislike (Which WILL turn into hate)? Relationships based on that? Its an enigma. And outside of terrible fan fiction or horrible sit coms these things don't have a comedy soundtrack. These are horrible painful experiences.

Loathing and intense dislike are different from HATE!

Trolls are powered by intense experiences. If they did not FEEL the intense experience, then they would not feel hate thus what they would be feeling was not hate.

What you say about sadism and masochism in particular suggests to me a sort of intolerance for others' preferences that is arguably as dangerous as hating people, for many of the same reasons.

Yes. I am horribly prejudiced against sadists. I would not talk to anybody who I knew was a sadist.

Masochism I don't care about. Whatever. Its your body. Knock yourself out.

[Devils_Advocate]

I KNOW the definition of hate.

Your use of the definite article illustrates my point.

You know a definition of "hate". You know your definition of "hate".

What would it even mean for your definition to be the definition? What would that entail?

Hate is to "Intense dislike" as Love (Platonic or otherwise) is to "Mild apreciation".

When you tame down troll hatred into this ***** "Not all the way" shtick it becomes this dull fanfic type thing.

Yes we spam the word "Hate" every once In a while because intense dislike is harder to pronounce. Yet TRUE hate is true.

It sounds rather like you believe in true hate but not in true love.

If so: WOW.

I don't agree that the strongest malice is stronger than the strongest kindness, if that's what you're getting at. Maybe your strongest malice is stronger than your strongest kindness, but I don't think that that's normal. It certainly doesn't seem to be the case with me, to admittedly limited extent that I can measure two different emotions on the same scale just by experiencing them.

Loathing and intense dislike are different from HATE!

Not according to the dictionaries I've consulted. You are insisting upon a non-standard definition of "hate" which is not in accordance with common usage of the term.

Besides which, the description of troll romance doesn't even use the word "hate"! We are simply told that

RED ROMANCE, comprised of the flushed and pale quadrants, is a form of romance rooted in strongly positive emotions. BLACK ROMANCE, with its caliginous and ashen quadrants, is rooted in the strongly negative.

So it's obviously not reasonable to assume that your definition of "hate" is being used there because the word "hate" isn't being used at all.

Nor do I see anything suggesting that the emotions associated with black romance are stronger than those associated with red romance.

When the trolls themselves use the word "hate", the default assumption should be that they are using the word as it is normally used. That should be the default assumption for the use of every word! Most of the times that a word is said, its most common meaning is being used. That's a frickin' tautology!

Like... look at this discussion we're having right now. We are engaging in a largely pointless internet argument about semantics. Arguments of this nature can drag on for a pretty long time, in part because they can get surprisingly heated! It can be so easy to get caught up in the desire to "beat" one's "opponent" and in negative, antagonistic feelings towards the other person. Partly because, in a weird way, that can be kind of fun.

Such sentiments are, in the broadest sense of the term, black feelings.

<3<

I am horribly prejudiced against sadists. I would not talk to anybody who I knew was a sadist.

Understandable, but try not to conflate the desire to inflict physical pain with the desire to cause suffering. The two are not so inextricably linked as one might suppose. Looking at masochism can help one to understand this.

[Lord Magtok]

What a kismesis looks like.

We're talking about two individuals who punch, slap, and scream at each other before abruptly breaking down and sloppily making out. Really, folks, you're reading far too much into it, it's just ridiculous alien nonsense.

[mizzim]

I KNOW the definition of hate. Its this dark ball of crushed glass of destruction that begs to be released. It scars your insides and destroys your mind as it takes shape. It taints other things inside with cuts of poison blood and only madness or forgiveness are the way to make it stop hurting. It still hurts even after many years. And I am not kidding still makes me crave for the feeling of sharp object puncturing flesh.

What people above said, and also...
We know the general human definition for pity - feeling sorry for someone. If this is turned into a relationship, it ends very badly, as shown in many stories. But the troll definition of pity is closer to the human definition for love. We're just using completely the wrong words. Human words =/= troll words. Simple as that.

[Grytorm]

SPECULATION THEORY TIME part 1!

Observation 1: Gamzee is wearing the illustrious garb of the Cod Tier.
Observation 2: Gamzee is also wearing the facial scars from Nepeta's claws.

Fact: We have seen that players ascending to God Tier are healed of their wounds. John no longer has gaping holes in his chest. Vriska has all her limbs and eyes. Rose isn't quite as grim or dark as before.

While we don't know a lot of the nitty gritty specifics about the God Tier ascension process, like eyegear, or wings vs not-wings, across the board those we have seen ascend are in a better physical shape than before.

So this begs the question: why does Gamzee still have facial scars?

Hypothesis: Gamzee ascended to the God Tier long ago, before his sober rampage, before the fight with the Black King, possibly even earlier than Vriska's ascension.

We never specifically saw his dreamself die, and he was almost constantly off doing his own thing during the duration of SGrub. Vriska was able to hide her wings and wear different clothes to cover her ascension, or at least not flaunt it. Gamzee could easily have done this. He has been God Tier this whole time.

Carefully avoiding the latest flame war I would offer an alternative explanation. Not for why he is Cod-tier now, but why he would maintain the scars. Self identity, what if Gamzee retains those scars because he sees them as part of himself like how Terezi's dreamself is blind. Perhaps?

[AgentPaper]

I don't think anyone is saying that blackrom would have a comedy soundtrack. We're just saying that trolls are biologically and psychologically built to handle hatred in a different way than humans are.

[Capt. Ido Nos]

Carefully avoiding the latest flame war I would offer an alternative explanation. Not for why he is Cod-tier now, but why he would maintain the scars. Self identity, what if Gamzee retains those scars because he sees them as part of himself like how Terezi's dreamself is blind. Perhaps?

Maybe! But we don't really know if ascending would specifically heal her eyesight or not. But I still would like propose that they're still there because he had ascended before that moment.

It is a shame though, having Terezi or Tavros in God Tier would answer a lot of these questions for us.

[Scowling Dragon]

Whatever. I dont have a monopoly over hate so eh.

[AgentPaper]

Whatever. I dont have a monopoly over hate so eh.

For the record, everything you said is very much true...for humans. It's just that trolls are aliens, so you can't assume even something as basic as how hatred works.

[Lord Raziere]

What I think of Homestuck:

I have read the entire archives to the present.

I was not impressed.
First of all, it started off with random trash and garbage that had nothing to do with anything else, making the beginning uninteresting.

Then it quickly turned apocalyptic. At the same time, we are introduced to some nonsensical war between two peoples, Prospit and Derse, a conflict which does not seem to have a point, and is why all of humanity was killed….because of some stupid game with a stupid conflict.

Then things quickly start becoming needlessly convoluted and full of time-travel shenanigans that seem to do nothing but make things seem more complex and intricate, for the sake of looking complex and intricate. When all it really is, is just introducing a deux ex machina, then cleverly claiming that was how it was supposed to happen all along, or making up random stuff, then later making up a reason for said random stuff happening. This is not, in fact clever, this just holding back the explanation until a later time, while confusing the audience and thus making you look smarter than you are.

All of course is the background for mostly just a bunch of people talking to each other on a chat log in screwed up ways and generally being unhelpful to each other for no reason, when communication is needed to be clear and understandable to actually get anything done.
This boring endless parade of dialogue, is occasionally broken up by flash animations of things actually happening. Yippee.

Oh and, we learn that all this is fated and that things MUST happen a certain way, or it just goes dead-end, thus destroying all free will and making all our characters actions pointless, because no matter what, things will inevitably happen in a certain way, no matter how much you try to change things, or heavens forbid, make things better. Nice to know that our characters are nothing but puppets to predestination and the stupid entity that is causing all this stupidity, read: Skaia.

the goal of said entity seems to do nothing but reproduce universes endlessly in a pointlessly stupid cycle of war, apocalypse fighting and fated time loops, with no end in sight, making me question what the point of it all is, if all thats going to happen when a new universe is created is that its just going to start the cycle all over again and try to reproduce more, thus just causing more of this over and over for no reason.

speaking of said worlds and universes, I don't actually feel anything for them. Mostly because we don't interact with them. we only ever interact with the protagonists doing all this, while all the people who they are supposedly fighting for, either seem to be nonexistent or have some flavor of terminal stupidity. Instead we get screwed up conversations that never help, ambiguous pseudo-romance that we receive little to no evidence of, among time loops that only tell us what we already know, with predictions of the future that only set things in stone and suck away all uncertainty from the story.

oh and it gone from bad to worse and pointlessly became even more grimdark, and now we have transitioned to watching the rebooted universe or whatever, doing more pointlessness while the actual protagonists have to wait for three years to do anything, while we are stuck watching a bunch of people, the Nobles, we know are doomed or going to get help from the first versions, so either way they aren't going to be very useful no matter how you slice it, just to do……………what? fulfill the game and perpetuate this endless stupidity of universe reproducing universe over and over again with its stupid game over and over again, to have all this pointless time traveling and stupid conversations over and over again?

Overall…….this entire comic seems pointless, they won't actually change anything. Why should I care?

[Draconi Redfir]

Wasn't there a image that showed Gamzee in his land with what could be his quest bed in the background floating around this thread a few pages ago?

I thought so too, but then i realized: Trolls have quest cuccoons, not quest beds.

[Oracle_Hunter]

the goal of said entity seems to do nothing but reproduce universes endlessly in a pointlessly stupid cycle of war, apocalypse fighting and fated time loops, with no end in sight, making me question what the point of it all is, if all thats going to happen when a new universe is created is that its just going to start the cycle all over again and try to reproduce more, thus just causing more of this over and over for no reason.

Yes... a reality in which the only large-scale purpose is procreation; all art, culture, and poor-quality webcomics are merely pointless distractions when you take a bigger look at life.

Why, I would call such an outlook absurd, would you not

* * *

Anyhoo, I'm sorry you didn't enjoy the themes or narrative structure of Homestuck. Obviously it isn't for everyone but I think if you look a bit deeper into, say, the content of the relationships in the series rather than the surface of the Pesterlogs you might find something worth reading.

Or not, of course -- nothing is for everybody. Still, I can understand how it would be frustrating to have spent all that time reading something you didn't end up enjoying. Ah well, live and learn.

N.B. Lots of folks who read Homestuck enjoy it for the combination of "what is going to happen next" and "how did I not see this coming." IMHO, few exhibit the mastery of this particular technique better that Hussie.

One could say that you cannot hope to beat Andrew Hussie in a troll-off. He is simply the best there is

[JadedDM]

Overall…….this entire comic seems pointless, they won't actually change anything. Why should I care?

Are you asking that we tell you why you should care about Homestuck? What an odd request.

If you don't like it, you don't like it. Simple as that. There's really not much else to talk about. There's nothing anyone can say that will suddenly make you like it. Such is the way of things. *shrug*

Anyway, some new updates. So now we know why Jake's last name is English and why he has a computer that looks just like Lord English; and also, possibly his like of skulls.

[Scowling Dragon]

About the guy that dislikes homestuck: Eh, whatever man.


About the comic: *Grabs theories. Throws them into a fire*


HUSSIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE *Shakes fist*


Also" Jane is wearing god tier outfit. Huh.

edit:

Makes me wonder why the batterwich was on pre-scratch earth...

[AgentPaper]

Overall…….this entire comic seems pointless, they won't actually change anything. Why should I care?

I'm disappointed in you. You read through the whole story, and you haven't learned even the first rule of Homestuck: Things never play out how you think they're going to.

Other than that, it all sounds about accurate to what Homestuck is. Your point?

[Yuki Akuma]

I thought so too, but then i realized: Trolls have quest cuccoons, not quest beds.

...So the fact that we've explicitly seen some of the trolls ascend to God Tier on Quest Beds means absolutely nothing?

[LoneStarNorth]

...So the fact that we've explicitly seen some of the trolls ascend to God Tier on Quest Beds means absolutely nothing?

The planets (Land of Blah and Blah) have quest beds. Vriska's quest bed was inside a cocoon-like building, hence quest cocoon.

There are quest slabs inside the moon of Derse (probably also Prospit?). I distinctly rememeber Hussie himself using these as separate terms, but I couldn't tell you where.

[Lord Raziere]

@ AgentPaper:Too bad I never expect anything then. expecting things only lead to disappointment and life screwing you over for doing so, because you made an assumption about the future. and assumptions only lead to jumping to conclusions. therefore don't assume, don't expect. both are useless.

What? you think I was going around making up guesses as to what would happen next while I was reading? Nope. I didn't need to. I have various people in the comic telling me what the future will be like all the time and being right every single time, at a certain point, I just stopped doubting any word about something from the future and figured that everything leads to some sort of time loop, so obviously, its all just people from the future being right and time loops in some way.

I wasn't surprised when this stuff happened. I was just bored and said "Well, of course." because all of it was all predicted. Mostly by the trolls. That and everything felt repetitive after awhile.

Sorry, but its not my thing, I'm out.

[guttering flame]

the goal of said entity seems to do nothing but reproduce universes endlessly in a pointlessly stupid cycle of war, apocalypse fighting and fated time loops, with no end in sight, making me question what the point of it all is, if all thats going to happen when a new universe is created is that its just going to start the cycle all over again and try to reproduce more, thus just causing more of this over and over for no reason.

My impression was that while the species that lives on the central planet (like the humans or the trolls) gets wiped up by meteor showers each time, the rest of their universe continues to exist. The destruction of the last two universes in order to create the Green Sun was a special one time thing.

So presumably the purpose of this cycle is to create new universes and the people living in them are just temporary caretakers that are wiped up once they're no longer necessary.

[irenicObserver]

How? I was under the impression that Paradox Space was outside of traditional space and time, that it was the literal breeding ground for space and time in fact.

How does traditional FTL (even psychic boosted FTL, which she no longer has) get you into Paradox Space and back out the other side into an entirely different universe?

Paradox Space is outside the temporal universe, it allows travel between sessions giving the means to leave ones session and travel to another. It's what the guys on the meteor are doing. It doesn't have to, all one has to do is reach the Medium (which we know is possible) and leave.

I'm Sorry I Thought That Was Obvious. Since Were You Under The Impression It Was Any Different?

Also guys, plain and simple:

Spoiler

Show

[Tectonic Robot]

Yeesh you guys have crazy arguments.

Hate is, uh, complicated. I'll just leave it at that.

Yay update more English stuff~

@Raziere: Yes, probably not for you. Adios!

[irenicObserver]

Maybe! But we don't really know if ascending would specifically heal her eyesight or not. But I still would like propose that they're still there because he had ascended before that moment.

It is a shame though, having Terezi or Tavros in God Tier would answer a lot of these questions for us.

He would pretty likely have to ascended before that moment, since everyuthing was destroyed. There is no possible way for him to have ascended beforehand with the knowledge we have now.