top 3 heated debates: Miko? Prophecy? MITD?

[Forbiddenwar]

New to the forum, I thought I'd do a quick poll.

What are the top three most discussed topics in the OOTS forum?

Off hand it appears to be:
V's Gender
Prophecies
MITD's species

but I just started reading the forum, so don't know if this is accurate.
What do you think?

[rainbowjo]

Alignment, more specifically: Vs, Haleys after the crystal incident, and for an unfathomable reason, belkers.

Also any mention of Miko or Celia

[Pyron]

I think a better question would be: what's not a heated debate. :-)

[Zevox]

I wouldn't describe MitD as a debate per se, more like speculation. Nobody has anything but off-the-wall theories at this point due to lack of enough specific evidence.

Miko is definitely #1 historically. I wasn't even a member while she was alive, just a lurker, and yet I still remember enough of that to have no doubt that no other debate topic has come close to her. The fact that some debates over her can resurface even now, this long after her death, ought to tell you that as well.

After that, alignment in general, more specifically V's and (historically) Belkar's, as rainbowjo said. Belkar's has died over time, and only people who make fun of those who once thought he was CN or some other non-CE alignment still even bring it up, but it was big once. And V's I hardly need to explain, since hers is pretty recent. And Miko's, but that I just lump in with her controversies in general.

Zevox

[Ridureyu]

Miko debates had the highest ratio of Godwins-per-posts that I can think of, s well as at least one person who actually cried when Belkar set her on fire during their fight.

[Optimystik]

The Eugene debate is fairly new, but rapidly gaining steam :smalleek:

[Pronounceable]

Reddy and his plans generates a lot of steam when things focus on him.

But actually
I think a better question would be: what's not a heated debate

[Surfing HalfOrc]

Most heated? Miko by a mile! V's gender arguments usually start with:
"Hey! I just noticed that a character once said male/female pronoun in this strip, so V must be male/female! Why didn't anyone ever notice this before?"

We did, and it was argued over back then.

The MitD argument usually follows this format:
"I think it's a baby (Fill in the blank). What about the rest of you?"
"No, I think it's (Composite creature with X number of templates stacked on top of it)."

But Miko? Page after page of post dissection, all done in the spirit of "Someone is WRONG on the internet, and I'm going to change their minds to the CORRECT answer!" Sometimes it's a good debate, but usually it ends up so tedious my eyes glaze over.

[Jair Barik]

I think a better question would be: what's not a heated debate. :-)

A good question

i feel out of all the debates that could possibly be worthwhile that are hardly debated at all, the most important least heated debate may be how is the comic going to end.
But thats just my opinion

[ResplendentFire]

But Miko? Page after page of post dissection, all done in the spirit of "Someone is WRONG on the internet, and I'm going to change their minds to the CORRECT answer!" Sometimes it's a good debate, but usually it ends up so tedious my eyes glaze over.

I'm new here and Miko debates already hurt my soul. Not just because I'm fine with her story arc, but because there seems to be many mildly epileptic trees in those threads.

[Slimslamer]

Wait, what controversy surrounds Celia of all characters?

[Samurai Jill]

She's insufficiently ruthless for the tastes of certain forumites. Also, certain forumites take any NPCs' disagreement with the Order as an opportunity to hoot incoherently and hurl faeces at said NPC...

[Random832]

She's insufficiently ruthless for the tastes of certain forumites.

I doubt it's that - it's more that she's unbelievably stupid - "insufficiently ruthless" isn't nearly enough to account for the poor assumptions she made in Greysky, and not explaining how to break the necklace (Humans may not be in the MM anymore, but that implies she's read the monster manual, from which she should have taken away the fact that her own SLAs are not at all typical)

[SadisticFishing]

Mhmm. Celia is my least favorite character in the strip when Roy's not around.

She's significantly less annoying when he is.

[EmperorSarda]

Miko debates had the highest ratio of Godwins-per-posts that I can think of, s well as at least one person who actually cried when Belkar set her on fire during their fight.

Someone cried? That's hilarious. But that's merely 1d6 damage. If that person cried after a little fire, I wonder what werf's thoughts were when the Mitd "tapped her gently" out of the tower.

[EmeraldPhoenix]

I think a better question would be: what's not a heated debate. :-)

Ice Cream!

Oh crap, now there's going to be an ice cream debate...:smallmad::smalltongue:

[Ted The Bug]

Actually, this thread could become one of them, lol.

[Frogwarrior]

Actually, this thread could become one of them, lol.

No it couldn't! :smallfurious:

[Kish]

Someone cried? That's hilarious. But that's merely 1d6 damage. If that person cried after a little fire, I wonder what werf's thoughts were when the Mitd "tapped her gently" out of the tower.
Some of the reactions (on the other side) right after Miko beat up the Order and put them in chains were also rather...extreme.


Ice Cream!

Oh crap, now there's going to be an ice cream debate...:smallmad::smalltongue:
Chocolate! :smallfurious:

[Ytaker]

Alignment always gives the longest debates. People disagree massively on what constitutes an evil act, people are quite willing to speculate on people's motives, with opposite views about what they are.

And of course, good and lawful and evil and chaotic aren't especially well explained. Are they rigid categories, with a set of lawful behaviours, chaotic behaviours? Are they guidelines to aid roleplaying? What guidelines are appropriate? How far can you deviate from whatever it is, without changing alignment? Where can Hitler be slotted in?

With V's gender, you can only say so much before everything has been said. Everyone's interpretation of a prophesy is valid, until 99% are proven wrong. Likewise with the mitd. And there is ample debate on what the author's views are, with huge amounts of evidence for whatever view you take, so, real complex. And of course, there are many sourcebooks with complex and on occasion conflicting ideas, which make it more complicated.

So, Miko.

Evidence.

From long threads on the main page,

We have character stats. You can have long debates on exactly how the mechanics work out. Whenever there's a big fight, you'll have someone arguing that some should have died.

These are the debate threads in the first two pages.
Mitd. Newish thread.

V's gender. Very old. 2006.

V and Xykon. Fairly new. Xykon got ignored. Alignment.

Ochul lying, alignment, Miko.

If Roy didn't reject Miko. Alignment

Burning the report is lawful and good, Alignment.

Haley's alignment
"It seemed totally out of character for Haley. Now I'm not going to touch the what alignment is Haley thing..." Nazi germany came into it.

And on the third page there's just one over four pages, about Belkar and the prophesy.

[Forbiddenwar]

Ice Cream!

Ice Cream? Are you trying to kill me? (from buffy)

[Llama231]

What's not a heated debate?

Roy's Alignment. O-Chul's Alignment. No one else, really.
Everyone but the MitD or V's gender.
Durkon's beard.
Thog's awesomeness.
Stuff that Rich has stated.

That is all that I have got.

[Pyro]

Ice Cream!

Oh crap, now there's going to be an ice cream debate...:smallmad::smalltongue:

Vanilla sux!!

Chocolate rulez!!!

Ninja'd

[Frogwarrior]

Roy's Alignment. O-Chul's Alignment. No one else, really.
Everyone but the MitD or V's gender.
Durkon's beard.
Thog's awesomeness.
Stuff that Rich has stated.

That is all that I have got.

Don't forget Roy's sister what's-her-name. Kinda hard to argue when she says it herself.

Unless she's LYING!!!

[Jagos]

Most heated? Miko by a mile! V's gender arguments usually start with:
"Hey! I just noticed that a character once said male/female pronoun in this strip, so V must be male/female! Why didn't anyone ever notice this before?"

We did, and it was argued over back then.

The MitD argument usually follows this format:
"I think it's a baby (Fill in the blank). What about the rest of you?"
"No, I think it's (Composite creature with X number of templates stacked on top of it)."

But Miko? Page after page of post dissection, all done in the spirit of "Someone is WRONG on the internet, and I'm going to change their minds to the CORRECT answer!" Sometimes it's a good debate, but usually it ends up so tedious my eyes glaze over.

I just got here and I'm learning this one slowly...

[Kaytara]

You forgot something. A huge huge HUGE debate topic that inevitably springs up whenever someone even alludes to it is what happened with the black dragons and more specifically the attitude of adventurers towards monsters in general. That partially ties into alignment.


Incidentally... What exactly WAS so bad about the Miko debates back in her time? I only discovered the comic at all a year ago and have seen some grisly debates since then, but then I have people saying that those are nothing - NOTHING - compared to the old Miko wars. Suffice to say that the notion is mind-boggling.

I'm... curious. In a horrified way. Would someone please gently enlighten me?

[hamishspence]

I looked back at the discussion threads around Miko's Fall- didn't seem that much harsher than the V's Familicide thread. indeed, had a very similar flavour.

[Thajocoth]

First off, it's quite obvious that no one is debating how V found Ultimate Comic Power, as the comic was quite clear on the answer to that. So that is certainly not a heated debate. Notice I said "Cosmic", not "Arcane". Now go look for the Doily filler comic.

Secondly, Chocolate + Coffee flavored ice creams together, with Hot Fudge and Whipped Cream (no cherry) is ice cream perfection. You could, maybe add sprinkles... If anyone says otherwise, their opinion is clearly wrong.

Note: Opinions can't actually be wrong because they're not facts.

[Jagos]

You forgot something. A huge huge HUGE debate topic that inevitably springs up whenever someone even alludes to it is what happened with the black dragons and more specifically the attitude of adventurers towards monsters in general. That partially ties into alignment.


Incidentally... What exactly WAS so bad about the Miko debates back in her time? I only discovered the comic at all a year ago and have seen some grisly debates since then, but then I have people saying that those are nothing - NOTHING - compared to the old Miko wars. Suffice to say that the notion is mind-boggling.

I'm... curious. In a horrified way. Would someone please gently enlighten me?

To be honest, Paladin Blues explains it a LOT better. Miko was basically a cop and you either liked her or hated her with little if any middle ground. She could be a victim of her circumstances or she was an inept bully. But I'm not arguing for or against, merely telling what seems to have occurred back in the day.

[Gamerlord]

You forgot something. A huge huge HUGE debate topic that inevitably springs up whenever someone even alludes to it is what happened with the black dragons and more specifically the attitude of adventurers towards monsters in general. That partially ties into alignment.


Incidentally... What exactly WAS so bad about the Miko debates back in her time? I only discovered the comic at all a year ago and have seen some grisly debates since then, but then I have people saying that those are nothing - NOTHING - compared to the old Miko wars. Suffice to say that the notion is mind-boggling.

I'm... curious. In a horrified way. Would someone please gently enlighten me?

Me too, I have read the comic only since #510, and I registered on the forums a few months later,and I never saw the Miko wars i hear of(Well OK I got myself into a VERY nasty argument, but it was not about Miko, It was about paladins in general.)

[Berserk Monk]

I think a better question would be: what's not a heated debate. :-)

The fact Belkar is a sexy shoeless god of war.

[Ytaker]

He's not that sexy. Thinking about it, he's the only character who hasn't scored.

[Gamerlord]

He's not that sexy. Thinking about it, he's the only character who hasn't scored.

Don't you remember jenny from the thieves guild?

[Random832]

First off, it's quite obvious that no one is debating how V found Ultimate Comic Power, as the comic was quite clear on the answer to that. So that is certainly not a heated debate.Notice I said "Cosmic", not "Arcane". Now go look for the Doily filler comic.

...

Well-played.

[FlawedParadigm]

Stuff that Rich has stated.

Not true. Belkar's alignment debates went on LONG after Rich stated point-blank he was Chaotic Evil, up to and including Belkar himself stating he was CE, and people still saying he might not know his own alignment or could be chaotic anything and lying. I'm sure we'll find out he's a Paladin of Sharess undercover in the end of the comic.

As to the Miko wars...wow, it's hard to really think back and remember half the current posters weren't here for them. I started on comic #76, although I didn't actually pop on the boards until a comic some time in the 200's. Anyhow.

Miko...spawned dozens and dozens of debates. Some liked her, some hated her, there were constant arguments about how Miko acted versus how people thought a Paladin should act, whether Belkar was going to make her Fall, whether or not she was going to become a member of OotS...anything and everything that could have been debated about Miko either has been, is, or probably will be debated.

I liked her at first, much like Roy, although I stopped liking her a lot more quickly than he did. Then I hated her, and wanted to see her Fall. While I already liked Belkar before Miko was around, his championing her Fall kept him on my good side for a long, long time. I could hardly express my joy when she Fell, I might add (and in the strip she did turn beige, there were debates as to whether or not she Fell until the next comic went up, I might add...anything and everything, I tell you.)

But...I didn't want to see her die. Redeemed as a decent being, becoming an antagonist, joining the Linear Guild (another popular theory), even defecting to Xykon. She was a lot more interesting being alive but irritating than dead. If I recall, Rich even originally intended for her to be around until the end of the strip (which spooked me when she died), but I think I either misremember that part, or Rich just got sick and tired of the CONSTANT wars and killed her off in hopes of their cessation. Really, during the height of Miko wars, probably 3/4ths of all topics on the first page would in some way or other be about Miko. And that might be lowballing it. As in, we saw way more Miko threads than MitD or Comic 666 threads. WAY more.

The Miko debates bordered on (appropriately) religious zeal, and long-time cool-headed posters turned into frothing dogs when it came to Miko. People often debated things like Rich not knowing what real Paladins were and such, her character build, general issues with that one Paladin class feature she had involving a lack of compromise...yeah.

I personally think that, though it was necessary for the plot Rich was following, one of the biggest mistakes that made/make Miko the subject of animus that she was/is was Rich's introducing her as the strip's first "Paladin." If we'd seen other Paladins before to know they weren't all like her in Rich's world, and to assure us that Rich knew what Paladins should be and whatnot, it probably could have cut the number of debates down quite a bit - a very large number of the threads were about the Paladin Code in regard to Miko's actions.

Anyhow, here's to hoping Miko comes back and continues on in being a complex and interesting character.