Speculation about Belkar's development

[dsollen]

I've spoiled my real prediction, but even some of my preliminary reasoning could potentially ruin some of the fun of the story if someone uses it to deduce the same thing I did (and I'm right), so read at your own risk.

First, I think Belkar is certainly doomed. The Oracle alluded to Belkar's death numerous times in numerous different manners. Not only does it make it harder to get a satisfying ending that meets all of these prophecies, but more importantly it doesn't make sense for the Oracle to make these prophecies otherwise. Yes he screwed with Roy once for the sake of entertainment, but he learned not to do that again and more to the point every other prophecy was completely accurate except for the one where he had strong personal motive to twist the answer (belkar's). More importantly, the Oracle wasn't making a prophecy he expected to be remembered! He expected everyone to forget it and was making off handed comments, something he apparently does often enough to have put in place a complex system to avoid people remembering them. It doesn't really make sense for him to screw with a prophecy he wasn't asked to make and hadn't expected people to remember originally, it would not be logical for the oracle to have said everything he said unless the Oracle believed them to be accurate. All since also point to the oracle's ability to see the future being very exact and accurate, even if his prophecies to other's aren't, so it's unlikely the Oracle was misunderstanding his own prophecy.

If we 'meta-game' some and look at things from a narrative perspective, what would make a good story, it seems even more likely that Belkar isn't going to live much longer. narratively I don't see a reason for creating the prophecy otherwise. Yes I know cheating prophecy has a big narrative tradition, but that's for the main hero when he is focusing extensively on it. If Rich wanted to cheat on the prophecy he would first need to spend enough time eluding to it to have it matter as a big character moment when they find a way to cheat it. However, little focus has been put on the phrophecy so far, and since it looks unlikely that Roy will tell Belkar about the prophecy it's hard to see much character focus going into it in the future, the only one that knows about it isn't very upset over it. This means cheating the prophecy wouldn't feel like a genius heroic moment that Belkar earned, it would feel like a cope out by making a lazy method of creating drama and then ignoring it. Rich is too good an author to go that way.

If we assume Belkar is doomed, as I believe is likely, from a narrative convention this works much better if it happens right at the end of the story. Having people die at the end of a story is common, and it is actually brilliant to fully acknowledge it ahead of time if your going to do it, so the audience knows that a character isn't necessarily guarded by character shields and worry about him from then on. Belkar is in many ways the most obvious one to kill off as well, if for no other reason then because you can't give a 'happy ending' to a blatantly chaotic evil character without the audience asking rather that character went on to hurt and kill others later and potentially subverting the rest of your happy ending.

I would also point out that a large part of OOTS is in some way a commentary on Good vs Evil in D&D world and how morality is far more grey then the clean lines on a D&D alignment chart. So far Rich has r showing that good & bad characters can sometimes have bad/good motives and traits opposite of their alignment, such as evil still having loved ones they would sacrifice for. He has also shown that stereotypically evil/good races can have members of the opposite alignment. Finally he showed with Miko a good character falling to evil (or at least falling, let's ignore the debate as to rather she is actually evil please). The obvious next step to this theme is showing the opposite, an evil character being redeemed to good. If we look at Belkar we can see that Rich has clearly put in the start to this sort of development, numerous examples were already quoted in this thread. At this point I think it's almost guaranteed that Rich is going go move forward with this arc, as it is in keeping with one of his main themes and besides which leaving it incomplete after investing so many character moments towards progressing it would just be poor writing. I am going to say that Rich plans to have some sort of redemption for Belkar.

In a way this would be good for Belkar, as the only way Rich can really let Belkar live in a happy ending is if Belkar is redeemed enough that were confident he won't go on any more murder sprees after the story completes, ie the only way I could ever see Rich letting Belkar cheat his destiny is if Belkar first was redeemed. This would also make cheating a prophecy more narratively acceptable as Belkar would have in a way 'earned' the right to cheating destiny through his redemption. Unfortunately it's also well known that Redemption Equals Death.

Thus I believe that redemption will happen, and that Belkar will die, and it wouldn't be taking these narrative threads to their most moving conclusion if the redemption and death weren't linked in some way.

Finally the audience is going to need some sort of proof that Belkar has actually been redeemed. That is to say that he has made a truly selfless act that isn't because he is acting or hopes to benefit from it. In a system like D&D where alignments are clearly defined values the audience will never fully agree that Belkar was truly redeemed unless we see a mechanical demonstration that Belkar is not considered Evil in universe. Notice I didn't say he was considered Good, I expect Belkar will only make it to Chaotic Neutral, but the key thing is proving he isn't Evil. Of course I can't help but notice that Rich has already taken the time to create the perfect method to demonstrate this mechanically.

Thus putting them together I'd say narrative Belkar's fatr looks something like this:

Spoiler

Show

Belkar continues his growth for a little while longer, the actual death doesn't happen until close to the end of the comic during the climax or right before it.

During this climax a point will occur where Belkar is in the position to do something to save the day, and most likely direclty or indirectly save the OOtS or the world entirely with his actions, but in a manner which requires obvious sacrifice to him. This is a moment where acting is clear Good, not something anyone evil would do. Belkar's character development will lead him to deciding to step up and act out of good intention, even as he hates himself for it.

I don't see Belkar acting just to save the rest of the OOTS, it's not personal enough to be that moment of Good for him, and isn't different enough from the time Belkar saved the day for selfish reasons. Instead I think one person's fate will be what matters, and that someone won't be his cat; the cat helped him to grow better but to show true growth he has to demonstrate empathy outside of his pet to everyone. Given that Durkon is the biggest step towards redeeming Belkar I would say that Belkar is acting specifically to return the favor. He needs to save Durkon somehow! This could be to save a revived Durkon from dying, but I think it most likely for him to act to stop/killl vamp-Durkon before he gets away, thus securing remains so Durkon can be revived. There is a lower chance that the act isn't specifically to save Durkon, but simply one with strong analogies of the same situation, where Belkar needs to sacrifice himself to save another; still I think it's highly likely that Durkon will be in danger in some form to drive the Good act.

The story will no doubt draw attention to the analogy between this and Durkon's sacrifice. Belkar will be acting to emulate Durkon in some way, trying to be the better person Durkon was. Though again Belkar is not necessarily Good, just not evil, so he could have some other motives as well, such as killing not-Durkon out of hatred, that further help to push him towards his Good act, so long as the act is primarily about sacrifice to help another other factors could still come in to play to help push him to it.

Whatever the act of self sacrifice is Belkar needs to prepare for it, and one of those preparations is to guard himself against the Evil attacks of his foes. This is where the Protection from Evil amulet comes into play! As he did last time he was fighting not-Durkon last time Belkar will activate it despite the pain to defend himself. However, Belkar will be shocked to discover that the amulet no longer hurts him! In deciding to stand and fight the Good fight he has officially managed an alignment change from Evil to Neutral, causing him to no longer be affected by the amulet. He will be shocked by this and very interesting character moment will occur as he registers what this means, probably some part of him not wanting to give up the easy life of Evil, a joke about not losing his 'rep' or something perhaps, but another part of himself surprised that he is happy to not be Evil, maybe even a meta moment as he reflects that the fact that he is happy to not be Evil shows he is loosing his 'mojo'. Lots of approaches could be taken here depending on where his char development took him before this moment and the details of the moment. What is certain is that he will be interrupted before he finishes reflecting on the moment by whatever threat caused him to activate the amulet.


The amulet almost has to be used like this, it's just too obvious. Rich went out of his way to justify why Belkar would have something that appears so counter-intuitive for him to be using, in a manner that further demonstrated his character growth even. Rich also demonstrated why it could be tactically useful to use against not-Durkon, so it wouldn't seem out of place for Belkar to use it in his final Good fight, and also demonstrated how the amulet burns Belkar when he uses it so that we the audience could see the difference when the amulet is used later and doesn't burn non-evil Belkar. This is just too perfect a Chekhov's gun to not have been added just for this reveal! It also serves the character point so well by showing a clear cause and effect, that the act of doing this Good deed made him change alignment, and allowing us to see how Belkar responds to discovering he had redemend himself in the eyes of...well the world as a whole?

Quite possibly the only reason Belkar manages to save the day is because the amulet no longer burns him, that the fact that he isn't affected by protection from evil allows him a mechanical advantage he wasn't expecting to tip the odds, but that depends on what mechanical disadvantage his being affected by Protection from Evil was, ie does this play like RAW rules or does the burning affect he feel demonstrate some other harm to Belkar; it doesn't matter too much either way though.

Eventually Belkar will get a true Crowning Moment of Awesome by winning a fight he thought was hopeless to save the day, but he will also die from the same fight in some manner. This will give the full emotional impact of the Redemption Equals Death trope. It will be further touching if the audience was afraid Belkar would lose since he was destined to die here that Belkar at last manages to save the day before he dies. Belkar may get some final moments of reflection to realize that he is going to a better after life, or hope he may get to see SHOJO in the after life, maybe even realize he and Mr Scruffy now will be going to the same afterlife. Whatever it is the point would be to end his death on a happy note by showing that his alignment change lead to something better for him, that even though that last Good act killed him he still will benefit from it and doesn't regret it.

I think the most likely battle here is fighting vamp-durkon of course. It justifies the use of the amulet, explains how wining the fight can save Durkon, and allows Belkar to indirectly save the universe by stooping vamp-durkon right before he finishes whatever plan would have led to destruction of the world. It also gives Belkar a little move motive to act, his general hatred of vamp-durkon, since Belkar still isn't at the completely-selfless good stage of things, there is just enough personal reason to help Belkar justify his Good act by claiming he is doing it for selfish reasons since he doesn't want to admit to himself the Good he is doing. If this is the case I suspect Belkar will also manage to resist Dominate ability, this too could show some character development if it's done in a way to show that Belkar has stronger motives that drive him to resisting harder (perhaps the vampire orders him to do something that Evil Belkar would do but is repulsive enough to character development Belkar to give him a +2 to saving throws etc), plus we already saw Belkar buying equipment to give him resistance to the ability to it pays off that small charckov's gun moment as well. Still, I don't know for certain this is the fight that kills him, so long as Belkar dies in a Good act it would fit my prediction.

*IF* Belkar gets saved in the end it will only be after he believes he died, and likely take the form of a partial cheat, he doesn't necessarily get to keep living, but he gets some better after life instead, or maybe even that he gets to 'live' in a manner similar to the deathless paladins but with some restrictions to make it not as good as just being revived. Still, I think that there is going to be no cheating of the prophecy at all, this will be Belkar dying for a cause because he chooses to and Rich will not ruin the impact of the moment by negating the sacrifice Belkar chose to make.

[Ruck]

Does anyone else see a critical distinction between "answer which the questioner could recognize as useless before the Oracle said the last word or two" and "answer which deliberately and successfully misleads the questioner"?

I want to say "yes," but I'm not sure what you're trying to imply in the context of this discussion.

dsollen,

Durkon is a good choice for your argument; I should have included him in my list when I mentioned O-Chul.

[Samzat]

Guys, Belkar is only as Evil as 1000 Nazis! He's surely going to a neutral afterlife!

I said less than one, and possibly zero or lower by the current date. Remember that the graph ended with belkar at just about 0 4 or so months prior to the current OOTS time

Edit: and besides, in a world where a hypothetical offspring of cruella deville and sauron is an average for evil, belkar is relatively good

It actually reel hard get in abyss samzat needed try extra hard

[Peelee]

I said less than one, and possibly zero or lower

Sig figs. -2. See me after class.

[Riftwolf]

It's worth pointing out that, for the 0-1 kNz reading, Belkar was under the Mark of Justice which stopped him from senseless violence. The chart doesn't show how far the gnome and Oracle's murder bumped the ratings.

[Kish]

Edit: and besides, in a world where a hypothetical offspring of cruella deville and sauron is an average for evil, belkar is relatively good[/B]

I'm sorry, where on earth are you getting that the hypothetical offspring was supposed to be a moral "average" in some way, rather than an exemplar of horrific evil?

[Samzat]

I'm sorry, where on earth are you getting that the hypothetical offspring was supposed to be a moral "average" in some way, rather than an exemplar of horrific evil?

I meant that it was an average for evil aligned characters. I think its a joke about 'fur teh evulz' characters

[Kish]

And yet my question goes unanswered.

Anyway, it's pretty extreme wishful thinking to point to a chart that pegs him as as evil as five hundred Nazis and say that because he didn't manage to equal multiple thousands of Nazis with Roy watching him he's surely stopped being evil entirely by now.

[Random Sanity]

It's worth pointing out that, for the 0-1 kNz reading, Belkar was under the Mark of Justice which stopped him from senseless violence. The chart doesn't show how far the gnome and Oracle's murder bumped the ratings.

I doubt the Oracle's death did much, considering the guy's enough of a prick that he needs to advance-schedule multiple resurrections to deal with the violence he provokes out of adventurers.

[Peelee]

I doubt the Oracle's death did much, considering the guy's enough of a prick that he needs to advance-schedule multiple resurrections to deal with the violence he provokes out of adventurers.

Yes, how dare the oracle tell a guy his wife is cheating on him when that guy literally pays the oracle to tell him.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I doubt the Oracle's death did much, considering the guy's enough of a prick that he needs to advance-schedule multiple resurrections to deal with the violence he provokes out of adventurers.

"Hey, who's the least popular person here? Turns out it's OK for me to kill them if everyone agrees on it!"

GW

[Samzat]

Ok I think we thoroughly overthought a one use gag. I will concede that even if Belkar isnt evil anymore, in the highly paraphrased words of Hinjo, you cant just "put on a white hat" and be forgiven for everything

[marciovicente]

I appologize if this has already been discussed.

But wasn't the Oracle fooled by Girard's Epic Phantasm on Roy while seeing his future?
Belkar died during Roy's (Elan's and Haley's) happy ending. Wasn't the ilusion strong enough to make the Oracle see it as an actual future?

[martianmister]

I appologize if this has already been discussed.

But wasn't the Oracle fooled by Girard's Epic Phantasm on Roy while seeing his future?
Belkar died during Roy's (Elan's and Haley's) happy ending. Wasn't the ilusion strong enough to make the Oracle see it as an actual future?

No, and no.

[Peelee]

I appologize if this has already been discussed.

But wasn't the Oracle fooled by Girard's Epic Phantasm on Roy while seeing his future?
Belkar died during Roy's (Elan's and Haley's) happy ending. Wasn't the ilusion strong enough to make the Oracle see it as an actual future?

There's nothing in the comic to indicate that, but it's a better theory than most about Belkar's fate.

Also, it wasn't Epic, just high-level.

[GreatWyrmGold]

...every other prophecy was completely accurate except for the one where he had strong personal motive to twist the answer (belkar's).

Technically, he told the truth about that all the time. Belkar did cause the death of all those people in the way the Oracle described. The fact that he was also going to cause the Oracle's death is irrelevant to that.

I want to say "yes," but I'm not sure what you're trying to imply in the context of this discussion.

That the Oracle giving one type of answer doesn't mean he'd give the other? Which is exactly what the comparison there implies?

[Peelee]

Technically, he told the truth about that all the time. Belkar did cause the death of all those people in the way the Oracle described. The fact that he was also going to cause the Oracle's death is irrelevant to that.

I agree he told the truth, but Belkar didn't cause the death of any of the others. Belkar asked if he would cause the death of a list of people, using "or," not "and." Any death fulfills the prophecy. He killed the Oracle. Prophecy fulfilled. Belkar was correct that it hadn't yet come true at the time.

[marciovicente]

There's nothing in the comic to indicate that, but it's a better theory than most about Belkar's fate.

Also, it wasn't Epic, just high-level.

Actually I take as evidence a few things:

1: The Oracle predicted Belkar's death when Roy visited him alone. We can't say that the Oracle saw in BELKAR'S future to say that. He may have seen in ROY's.

2: The strip where they get rid of Girard's Spell was named "Happy Ending" and may indicate that Elan's prediction has already happened and the ilusion was so strong that may have fooled the Oracle's future reading.

[GreatWyrmGold]

I agree he told the truth, but Belkar didn't cause the death of any of the others. Belkar asked if he would cause the death of a list of people, using "or," not "and." Any death fulfills the prophecy. He killed the Oracle. Prophecy fulfilled. Belkar was correct that it hadn't yet come true at the time.

I'd argue that Belkar was a cause of death for those people, enough to qualify those statements the Oracle made as not-quite-false.

Actually I take as evidence a few things:
1: The Oracle predicted Belkar's death when Roy visited him alone. We can't say that the Oracle saw in BELKAR'S future to say that. He may have seen in ROY's.
2: The strip where they get rid of Girard's Spell was named "Happy Ending" and may indicate that Elan's prediction has already happened and the ilusion was so strong that may have fooled the Oracle's future reading.

You are making a lot of assumptions there. Let's start with #2: What makes you think that the strip was named that because of Elan's prediction and not, say, because the entire purpose of that spell was to give everyone a happy ending? And as for #1, what makes you think the Oracle would be that careless? And let's not forget the origins of the Oracle's powers, which are a bit above your typical divinations (especially since he's an expert); they come straight from Tiamat herself. Even if mortal divinations would somehow be fooled by an epic illusion which only affects the minds of people, and not even the mind of the most relevant person for this prophecy, there's no way a god would be that weak.

[Peelee]

Actually I take as evidence a few things:

1: The Oracle predicted Belkar's death when Roy visited him alone. We can't say that the Oracle saw in BELKAR'S future to say that. He may have seen in ROY's.

2: The strip where they get rid of Girard's Spell was named "Happy Ending" and may indicate that Elan's prediction has already happened and the ilusion was so strong that may have fooled the Oracle's future reading.

1.) And several other times before, as well.

2.) Except that goes against why the Giant said he put in Elan's prophecy, so it is unlikely to be true.

I'd argue that Belkar was a cause of death for those people, enough to qualify those statements the Oracle made as not-quite-false.

And I would argue against. They're weak stretches at best. Regardless, once he killed the Oracle, the prophecy was unambiguously fulfilled.

[marciovicente]

What makes you think that the strip was named that because of Elan's prediction and not, say, because the entire purpose of that spell was to give everyone a happy ending?

Lets not forget "The Wrong Reasons" the strip where V fulfilled his/her prediction.
I know it is a lot of assumptions. But is a lot of coincidences.

[Kish]

The Oracle predicted Belkar's death when the whole Order visited him, too.

As for the "it was in the illusion" thing, that's an assumption supported by an assumption. You would first need to prove that the Oracle was fooled by Girard's illusion for any of it; you can't skip straight to "the Oracle was fooled for his prediction about Belkar, just like it's already known he was fooled for his prediction about Elan."

[Jasdoif]

Belkar died during Roy's (Elan's and Haley's) happy ending.

I don't think Elan realizing his family won't ever be magically fixed, and that none of the really good things since the pyramid actually happened, really constitutes a happy ending.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Lets not forget "The Wrong Reasons" the strip where V fulfilled his/her prediction.
I know it is a lot of assumptions. But is a lot of coincidences.

Not really. Let's look at your two pieces of evidence...
1. Only Roy was around when the Oracle predicted Belkar's death. Inaccurate, since he clearly knew about it at earlier points when Belkar was around, but probably not important either way. He's predicted the future with relevant people absent before.
2. So what if the strip was named "Happy Ending"? Would you expect "Death Actually IS Too Good For Them" to be about Belkar's prophecy, just because it mentions death? If a strip was titled something like "Going Home" and had Durkon going somewhere more familiar, would you assume that was fulfilling his prophecy, even if there was no evidence that he was home or dead?
Those aren't coincidences. Those are things that don't directly contradict your idea.

[Ironsmith]

Given the evidence at the beginning of this thread, what I see happening is Belkar returning the favor Durkon spent on him. That is to say, Durkon died to prevent a vampire from killing Belkar, and so when Belkar dies, it will be with the intent of rescuing Durkon from the vamp in his body.

[KorvinStarmast]

Given the evidence at the beginning of this thread, what I see happening is Belkar returning the favor Durkon spent on him. That is to say, Durkon died to prevent a vampire from killing Belkar, and so when Belkar dies, it will be with the intent of rescuing Durkon from the vamp in his body.

Here's hoping that if the sexy shoeless god of war goes down, that's the style of it.
We'll see.

[ErebusVonMori]

Pretty sure Belkar's death will be a subverted variant of the 'Heroic Sacrifice', possibly with some absolute rules lawyer getting him into LG heaven and Belkar being outraged.

[The Pilgrim]

Belkar is going to die in a final heroic sacrifice to defeat the Ultimate Evil. Probably preventing Roy or/and Durkon from doing it. A final selfless act that will show his evolution from total monster into an actual person has been completed.

And a final act that will keep the Forum arging forever about if he won a good/neutral afterlife, or his soul was still dumped into the Abyss.

[Peelee]

Pretty sure Belkar's death will be a subverted variant of the 'Heroic Sacrifice', possibly with some absolute rules lawyer getting him into LG heaven and Belkar being outraged.

LG afterlife? The Good I can at least see the reasoning for, even if I think it's wishful thinking. But why Lawful?

[Ruck]

Given the evidence at the beginning of this thread, what I see happening is Belkar returning the favor Durkon spent on him. That is to say, Durkon died to prevent a vampire from killing Belkar, and so when Belkar dies, it will be with the intent of rescuing Durkon from the vamp in his body.

I don't think this will happen largely because I think we will get Durkon back at the end of this book, and I think Belkar won't die until nearly the end of the series (probably the climax). I do think Belkar will play an important role in bringing Durkon back, though.