Cleric of Loki [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Lemonus

2011-01-20, 07:57 PM

How did the Cleric of Loki know the passcode to remove Belkar's mark of justice in this strip? http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0610.html

Cen

2011-01-20, 08:07 PM

panel nine (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0602.html)

Lemonus

2011-01-20, 08:11 PM

Yeah, but wouldn't it make sense for Shojo to change the passcode for different people?

JoeSkull

2011-01-20, 08:17 PM

Yeah, but wouldn't it make sense for Shojo to change the passcode for different people?

it would, if Shojo thought that anyone could figure out the code.

Lemonus

2011-01-20, 08:22 PM

True. It's a pretty unlikely code.

NerfTW

2011-01-20, 08:29 PM

Yeah, but wouldn't it make sense for Shojo to change the passcode for different people?

It would have made sense for Shojo to do a lot of things, but he didn't. Hindsight is 20/20, after all.

Durgok

2011-01-20, 09:19 PM

Yeah, but wouldn't it make sense for Shojo to change the passcode for different people?

Answer: No

Reason: Plot.

:)

Lemonus

2011-01-20, 09:27 PM

Yeah, but how did the cleric figure out the passcode in the first place?

veti

2011-01-20, 09:57 PM

"Divination"?

Or possibly "Knowledge: Obscure Magical Complaints That I Can Maybe Get Paid For Curing?"

Traab

2011-01-20, 10:04 PM

His god told him? I mean, Loki isnt really the kind of god that cares about law and order right? He would likely find it hilarious to give out the secret to bypassing the mark of justice to his priests, so criminals could laugh, and go back to killing.

NerfTW

2011-01-20, 11:01 PM

Answer: No

Reason: Plot.

:)

That response wasn't clever the first ten times someone used it, and it never will be. You might as well be responding with "because". :smallyuk:

Yeah, but how did the cleric figure out the passcode in the first place?

Given that Shojo isn't a magic user, more than one person has to be in on the Mark of Justice situation. The cleric is an associate of the thieves guild. Money isn't the only thing that can be stolen. They could have had someone spying on Shojo, they could have paid off one of the clerics involved, any number of reasons.

Jan Mattys

2011-01-21, 06:24 AM

That response wasn't clever the first ten times someone used it, and it never will be. You might as well be responding with "because". :smallyuk:

As you wish.
"Because".

And anyway, it IS a valid answer. You don't like it anyway, more power to you. But in a work of fiction, it is valid nonetheless.

Cizak

2011-01-21, 07:30 AM

That response wasn't clever the first ten times someone used it, and it never will be. You might as well be responding with "because". :smallyuk:

To be fair, it's actually a valid answer.

faustin

2011-01-21, 07:46 AM

Cleric of Loki´s class skill: hacker :smalltongue:

veti

2011-01-21, 08:01 AM

Maybe Shojo believes this is a good all-purpose moral value, and once the victim has figured it out, they no longer need to be cursed.

Or maybe Shojo can't change the passphrase. He's not a high-level cleric, he can't be casting the spell from his own resources, maybe he's using a scroll or something and the passphrase is hard-coded. And maybe the cleric happens to know the guy who sold Shojo the scrolls.

Thing is, we don't know. All kinds of scenarios are possible, but it's pretty unlikely that we're going to get any more clues to this one, so there's not much to choose between them.

Lemonus

2011-01-21, 08:34 AM

Ok! I understand that we'll never really know. Thanks guys!

Durgok

2011-01-21, 08:37 AM

That response wasn't clever the first ten times someone used it, and it never will be. You might as well be responding with "because". :smallyuk:

Would you have preferred that "No it wouldn't have made sense because then Haley, Celia and Belkar would have been slaughtered and the story never would have progressed past that storyline leaving people with what most would call a dissatisfactory ending?"

Psyren

2011-01-21, 08:49 AM

Cole's a badass, that's how.

"Brainy Pete" :smallbiggrin:

Tass

2011-01-21, 09:02 AM

As you wish.
"Because".

And anyway, it IS a valid answer. You don't like it anyway, more power to you. But in a work of fiction, it is valid nonetheless.

It is ALWAYS a valid answer. That means that its value is zero. You could go around spamming that answer in every thread on the forum, but it doesn't ad anything to the discussion.

Fact is that internal consistency helps suspension of disbelief and enjoyment of the work. When questions like these are posted there often are a valid, in-universe, reason that the asker had missed.

Other times there is obviously no in-universe answer and everybody knows it, but we still like to nitpick and to make up obscure reasons and explanations.

In both cases answers like "Reason: Plot" or *Link to FAQ* contributes nothing, and gets tiring after a while.

Merellis

2011-01-21, 09:31 AM

Funny part was that he was going to explain how he had managed to find it out when he was interrupted by Haley. So, his God, contact overhearing something, Divination Spell, maybe a paper in Azure City that has it written down in-case the ones who know the codes die?

And as for why the passcode would be the same. Who knows how many thieves/murderers/criminals pass by the city, who would want to write down the new passcode with a description for each and every criminal that goes by and gets this mark placed on them? Makes it easier on the people handling the spell to just use the same one, which is hard to guess by itself as it is a phrase, and would not normally be associated with the crazy scatter-brained Lord Shojo.

Swordpriest

2011-01-21, 09:32 AM

Well, I always kinda wondered how he pulled it off, myself. :smallwink: Even with other thieves coming through with the Mark on them, it's hard to imagine how he could get it. I suppose there's some kind of divination spell he could use, though.

(To tell the truth, when I first read it, I thought it was a plot hole, but was willing to let it go because the story was a dead end -- literally "dead" -- without it.)

Merellis

2011-01-21, 09:36 AM

Querzis

2011-01-21, 11:53 AM

(To tell the truth, when I first read it, I thought it was a plot hole, but was willing to let it go because the story was a dead end -- literally "dead" -- without it.)

As people have already said, its not that there isnt any way Cole could have known about the password, its indeed that there are too many ways he could have known about the password and we have no way to know which one it is. But I do find the idea that his god told him to be more likely, it is Loki after all.

And yeah, I have to agree that writing this:

Answer: No

Reason: Plot.

:)

Is very tiresome and about as revelant to any discussion as literally posting a blank space. Would you post a blank space? Then stop posting this.

Thor Person Guy

2011-01-21, 02:01 PM

"Now, I've seen a few of these over the years on thieves that come up from Azure City. It seems the lord down there--" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0602.html)

Question answered. Good day.

NerfTW

2011-01-21, 02:33 PM

As you wish.
"Because".

And anyway, it IS a valid answer. You don't like it anyway, more power to you. But in a work of fiction, it is valid nonetheless.

Valid or not, it adds nothing to the discussion, because there still has to be an IN STORY REASON for it. You can't, say, have Belkar suddenly summoning giant death demons and say "plot" as the reason. There has to be a reason he has that ability all of a sudden.

Or, look at it this way. "Why is the sky blue?" "Because it is.".
That's not answering the question in any way, shape, or form.

Posting "Plot" or "because" with nothing backing it up is no better than spam, and personally, I wish it were treated as such.

Kain05

2011-01-21, 03:01 PM

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0420.html

My only concern with this is how many times would Shojo have used this since the mark of justice isn't used in Azure City's legal system, as shown by hinjo in the above link. How many times could he single out thieves to release and give the mark of justice before someone noticed.

Thanatosia

2011-01-21, 03:58 PM

I'm gonna go with Veti's explanation

The Passcode is part of the spell, and even for the cleric casting the mark of justice for Shojo, changing the passcode would require tinkering with the spell itself, which is just impractical as long as the passcode appears to be reasonably secure.

This is not unreasonable to suggest because normally Mark of Justice has no passcode mechanic... this is a custom feature, and a very potent one, it stands to reason that just adding a powerful feature like that should be balanced with limitations like not being able to set random custom passwords every cast. Because the passcode is protecting the spell from removal, it stands to reason that the passcode is part of the spell's construct, not just a blank space where anything can be inserted.

Occasional Sage

2011-01-21, 04:04 PM

Also, the passcode is spoken when the Mark is removed, so when two people both cite the same phrase, a clever member of the Thieves' Guild knows how to get all of the Marks off.

Darth Hunterix

2011-01-21, 05:11 PM

Ok! I understand that we'll never really know. Thanks guys!

Unless it's Chekhov's gun and The Giant is going to reveal some more informations about it. It may become a major part of the plot, or it can be one-panel joke in a bonus stripe in a book. With The Giant you simply never know anything for sure.

TimelordSimone

2011-01-21, 09:59 PM

Cole's a badass, that's how.

"Brainy Pete" :smallbiggrin:

When did we learn his name?

Or is Cole simply an acronym of Cleric Of Loki?

Swordpriest

2011-01-22, 11:50 AM

When did we learn his name?

Or is Cole simply an acronym of Cleric Of Loki?

That's a good question. I suspect it's an acronym of Cleric of Loki, but I would be interested to know if his name was revealed in one of the bonus strips in the book I don't yet have. :smallsmile:

Kish

2011-01-22, 12:03 PM

CoL=Cleric of Loki. Otherwise nameless Cleric of Loki.

Swordpriest

2011-01-22, 12:37 PM

CoL=Cleric of Loki. Otherwise nameless Cleric of Loki.

Interesting. Thank you.

Lemonus

2011-01-22, 04:21 PM

CoL=Cleric of Loki. Otherwise nameless Cleric of Loki.

Oh. I thought his name was revealed and I missed it.

martianmister

2011-01-22, 06:09 PM

CoL=Cleric of Loki. Otherwise nameless Cleric of Loki.

Then who is Cole? :smallconfused:

LuPuWei

2011-01-23, 01:37 AM

Then who is Cole? :smallconfused:

Cleric of Loki EXTREME!!!

Nimrod's Son

2011-01-23, 02:02 AM

Cleric of Loki EXTREME!!!
Man, that bonus strip where five clerics of Loki join together to make MEGA-CLERIC slays me every time... :smallamused:
This didn't really happen.

Psyren

2011-01-29, 09:08 AM

Then who is Cole? :smallconfused:

That is the fan name for him, based (as Kish said) on Cleric of Loki since we don't know his real name.

Incompleat

2011-01-29, 09:36 AM

My answer is that Lord Shojo wanted Belkar to be able to get rid of the Mark - after all, not being able to dish lethal damage within a city would severely reduce his usefulness, and Belkar is assisting Roy in an quest of vital importance.

If a random rogue cleric of Greysky City knew the password, then chances are that other seedy clerics of other cities also know it: probably, Shojo expected Belkar to get rid of the curse in the first city the Order visited, anyway.

MoonCat

2011-01-29, 01:24 PM

Man, that bonus strip where five clerics of Loki join together to make MEGA-CLERIC slays me every time... :smallamused:
This didn't really happen.

There was a bonus strip?!?!

Sneaky, sneaky, child of Nimrod. MEAN!

Lemonus

2011-01-29, 02:13 PM

Man, that bonus strip where five clerics of Loki join together to make MEGA-CLERIC slays me every time... :smallamused:
This didn't really happen.

Where is this bonus strip?