What difference does it make? (SoD Spoilers)

[Emanick]

For a while, I've been relatively mystified by the assumptions people have been making about the Snarl. Many people seem to take it for granted that it doesn't exist, that the gods or the Scribblers have been lying about nearly everything, or that, at least, some fundamental premise of the information Shojo and/or Redcloak have provided us with about the Snarl, or any other part of CrayonTime, is wrong. I suspect that some of those assumptions are actually correct. From a storytelling perspective, Belkar's and V's reactions to seeing the world inside the rift certainly indicate that somebody, at some point, has been telling whoppers. If not Big Macs.

But, dramatic convention aside, why is this necessarily the case?

The only things that we've learned about the rifts between the publication of Start of Darkness and #900 is that there is a world inside of them. A world with water, I guess. And that they grow after the Gates are destroyed, and don't seem to attack anybody anymore.

The latter, at least, can be explained. Redcloak's speculation that the Gates are preventing the Snarl from noticing the rifts seems plausible. My pet theory is that the Snarl won't attack from the rifts until it has been awakened or aroused by being "fed" - in SoD, the goblin who discovers the rift in the elven lands isn't attacked until after he sends a chicken through the portal, despite having previously stood near it for long enough to cast "several divination spells" on it. If this is the case, Redcloak probably saved his own soul, the souls of other hobgoblins, and possibly the souls of every other creature in Azure City by deciding not to drop any human slaves into the rift. If he ever realizes that his mercy to a group of human slaves likely saved tens of thousands of goblinoid souls, including his own, it will be a fascinating moment.

Either way, even if my crazy pet theory is totally off base, the behavior of the rifts still does not require any of us to challenge anything we've heard about the Crayon-Smeared Past of Stickworld. They MAY be defying expectations because somebody lied about the exposition. But there are other explanations that fit the facts and don't require us to make that assumption. That leaves the world inside the rift.

What exactly is inconsistent between a) a planet existing within the rift and b) the exposition we have been given being more or less accurate? When I first read Strip 672, I assumed that the rift simply contained the essence of everything that the Snarl had devoured, including OOTSWorld 1.0. Now, that would probably be rather dull, so I doubt this is the case. But the Snarl is allegedly a being born of deific frustration and strife, with power seemingly exceeding that of any single god. If it could, I would expect it to have surrounded itself with something, and not to simply have bided its time in a vacuum for over a thousand years, doing absolutely nothing.

Chaos is not idleness. Chaos is chaos. It makes sense - to me, at least - that a being of godly power and ultimate chaos, having nothing else to do, would create something to toy with, or at least regurgitate something it had consumed if it was incapable of creation. Yes, this is a slight contradiction of what Shojo implies the Snarl is capable of, but not a major one. And how would anybody know what the Snarl is capable of, really? It's not as if anybody seems to have sat down calmly to engage in a long, in-depth conversation with it.

I mean, it doesn't seem odd at all to me that a rift containing the Snarl's prison just happens to open up over a body of water. So the god-killing monster managed to rebuild, recreate or simulate the planet it destroyed, and it can't reach through the rift until either the gates are destroyed, a soul is sent through to it, alerting it to the fact that a rift is now open, or something else happens. That's interesting and mysterious, but not necessarily confusing. Not every story revelation has to be a twist.

I suspect that there's a reason why most people seem to think something is very wrong with the lore of the Snarl as we know it. But I'm honestly not sure what that reason is. Why should we automatically assume that Shojo, Redcloak, the gods, the Scribblers or some other entity are lying, or even badly mistaken? Clearly not everything has yet been revealed. But why are so many people taking it for granted that the Crayon Mythos is somehow false? Am I missing something really obvious and basic, are a lot of people making baseless assumptions, or is the truth somewhere in between?

[Tebryn]

Why do you assume someone has been lying up to this point? What if everyone's story is correct and something changed. The Gods wouldn't know because they're not focused on The Snarl. The mortals won't know because almost no one knows about them. There doesn't have to be misdirection or misinformation.

[Lombard]

Why must Shojo, Redcloak, the gods, the Scribblers or some other entity be lying, or even badly mistaken? Clearly not everything has yet been revealed. But why must something already revealed be necessarily untrue?

I wouldn't say 'must' or 'necessarily' untrue. I've been surprised that some have phrased it that way...

On the other hand, if you would say that the explanation that's been presented 'must' be true, it's pretty easy to make a good argument against it. And haven't we been shown enough that we'd have to be pretty dull not to be wondering about that explanation by this point?

In summary.. change the word 'must' in the quote above to 'could', and there's an interesting discussion to be had.

[Saturosian]

I'm gonna have to side with V on this one.

:vaarsuvius: perhaps we do not know everything we ought to regarding the task that we are undertaking. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0672.html)

I haven't jumped into any of the big discussion because I hate getting drawn into arguments, but it seems like everybody has a theory, and since it looks likely that someone, somewhere has told an untruth (it would be odd for Belkar to lampshade like that if it wasn't true, IMO), some people are taking the angle that we can't trust any of the witnesses, so they discard them all. After that, it all becomes speculation, and pet theories (like yours :smallwink: ) and some people are particularly verbose in defending their pet theories. I've read quite a few of those discussions, and to answer your question, if you're missing something really basic, I must be missing it, too, because I think it's all 100% speculation on what fantastic things are running through Mr. Burlew's mind.

As for your theory about the Snarl waking after being 'fed', you've got some evidence for that idea, but I think it's not the case, simply because it looks likely (to me, anyway) that the OOTS' only chance after #900 is to chance running into the rift, and it's an odd place in the story for a TPK on the protagonists at the hands of a god-killing monster. And it would be a little odd to reveal a whole planet like that, and then have it serve as nothing more important to the plot than a sort of red herring or bait-and-switch device.

But then, I'm not a very good storyteller, so I should probably shut up and just wait for the giant to tell me what it actually is. :smallredface:

[Emanick]

Why do you assume someone has been lying up to this point? What if everyone's story is correct and something changed. The Gods wouldn't know because they're not focused on The Snarl. The mortals won't know because almost no one knows about them. There doesn't have to be misdirection or misinformation.

At this point, I'm not assuming anything. That was actually my main point - there's no reason, at this point, to think that somebody must *necessarily* be lying. I'm glad somebody feels the same, at least - maybe I'm not as insane as I've been assuming. :smallsmile:


I wouldn't say 'must' or 'necessarily' untrue. I've been surprised that some have phrased it that way...

On the other hand, if you would say that the explanation that's been presented 'must' be true, it's pretty easy to make a good argument against it. And haven't we been shown enough that we'd have to be pretty dull not to be wondering about that explanation by this point?

In summary.. change the word 'must' in the quote above to 'could', and there's an interesting discussion to be had.

It's a rhetorical question. I guess that wasn't as obvious as I had thought.

Thanks for pointing that out! I'll go back and edit the first post to try and make that clearer.

[Lombard]

I can't find any holes in your pet theory, Emanick. It would fit the circumstances without contradiction, I think, just like several other ones I've seen would.


What exactly is inconsistent between a) a planet existing within the rift and b) the exposition we have been given being more or less accurate? When I first read Strip 672, I assumed that the rift simply contained the essence of everything that the Snarl had devoured, including OOTSWorld 1.0. Now, that would probably be rather dull, so I doubt this is the case. But the Snarl is allegedly a being born of deific frustration and strife, with power seemingly exceeding that of any single god. If it could, I would expect it to have surrounded itself with something, and not to simply have bided its time in a vacuum for over a thousand years, doing absolutely nothing.

Chaos is not idleness. Chaos is chaos. It makes sense - to me, at least - that a being of godly power and ultimate chaos, having nothing else to do, would create something to toy with, or at least regurgitate something it had consumed if it was incapable of creation. Yes, this is a slight contradiction of what Shojo implies the Snarl is capable of, but not a major one. And how would anybody know what the Snarl is capable of, really? It's not as if anybody seems to have sat down calmly to engage in a long, in-depth conversation with it.

Sorry to snip but your initial post is long and I think the above summarizes what I wanted to address, because you've got both the 'pure Chaos' and the 'world creator' bits pretty close together there. To me, it tends to clearly portray a contradiction that exists in the narrative we've heard from Shojo etc. and what we've observed especially in the last strip. Which is to say, I disagree that the nature of a purely chaotic being full of hatred would be to create a world. In my view that requires at least some minimum degree of planning and orderliness; at least from what we've seen so far the world in the rift looks to follow similar physical laws as Stickworld. Maybe I'm off base here but there seems to be a strong contradiction between the Snarl- portrayed as a purely destructive force- and a being that would create a world.

I would however be open to the idea that the Snarl evolved and learned. I believe that would be another scenario that would fit without anyone lying about anything. I do tend to think that a big lie somewhere would match the general themes of the comic more, though.

[Tebryn]

At this point, I'm not assuming anything. That was actually my main point - there's no reason, at this point, to think that somebody must *necessarily* be lying. I'm glad somebody feels the same, at least - maybe I'm not as insane as I've been assuming. :smallsmile:

I don't think anyone's lying no. I think everyone, including the Gods, are in the dark on some things that have progressed since their second battle and recreation of the world with the Snarl. I don't think The Snarl made the world inside the rifts however.

[Throknor]

I can't look it up right now, and don't even remember if it was shown on or off line, but I don't recall Soon's wife explicitly sending anything through the rift before being attacked. If she was acting as a scientist it seems she would have; I just don't recall if it was shown.

But I think that was the only other direct comment we've seen of the snarl reaching through the rift. Redcloak mentions others, but I don't think they were in-comic.

[Oko and Qailee]

The only gripe I have is that a being of pure "chaos" would not decide to create a world.

Yes, Chaos isn't idleness, but it isn't structure either.

[Emanick]

I can't look it up right now, and don't even remember if it was shown on or off line, but I don't recall Soon's wife explicitly sending anything through the rift before being attacked. If she was acting as a scientist it seems she would have; I just don't recall if it was shown.

But I think that was the only other direct comment we've seen of the snarl reaching through the rift. Redcloak mentions others, but I don't think they were in-comic.

Soon's wife didn't send anything through the rift, IIRC. It was a goblin cleric who sent a chicken through the rift, according to Redcloak in SoD. The Snarl kills him immediately afterwards.


The only gripe I have is that a being of pure "chaos" would not decide to create a world.

Yes, Chaos isn't idleness, but it isn't structure either.

Normally I would agree, but if you have nothing to work with, you have nothing to mix or muddle, either.

Perhaps the Snarl learned to create purely for the sake of being able to cause chaos more effectively. As an analogy, imagine creating a universe purely for the sake of creating as much entropy as possible - without matter you have no entropy either, but if you cause the Big Bang, technically an action of creation, you make a universe of matter and energy only (after trillions of years, perhaps) to ultimately turn the entirety of reality into a mess of entropic heat in the end.

In the physical universe we're familiar with, at least, everything eventually comes apart. It can be argued that Chaos can occur only when Order exists to be disrupted, if you start off with nothing to work either order or chaos with. Perhaps the Snarl created RiftWorld as an act of desperation - if it didn't recreate the world it had destroyed and rule it as a despot of perpetual chaos and discord, it thought it would ultimately turn in on itself and disrupt itself into nothingness.

I don't actually think the above is that likely, but it at least makes sense to me as a provisional theory.

[Sir_Leorik]

The only gripe I have is that a being of pure "chaos" would not decide to create a world.

Yes, Chaos isn't idleness, but it isn't structure either.

In the backstory for the D&D 4E cosmology, the World was created by the Primodials, beings from the Elemental Chaos who had no concept of stability or permanence. The gods wandered by, saw the beautiful world the Primordials had made, and decided to stabilize the World before the Primordials got bored and reverted the World to its component Elements. The Primordials were pissed by the gods' presumption, and that launched the Dawn War, where the Primordials tried to destroy the World and get their Elements back, while the gods and the Primal Spirits defended the World.

Long story short, the Primordials had both the raw material and the skill to fashion the world, but they were like children building sandcastles just to knock them down. Perhaps the Snarl has learned to create worlds of its own, but the Gates have stabilized the world the Snarl built. Perhaps the Snarl is caught in a series of nesting dolls, made of all the worlds it has made since the OotScribble created the Gates, and destroying Kraagor's Gate really will unleash the Snarl. But this is all speculation; without anyone entering the Rift we won't know what's on the other side.

[Lombard]

It was a goblin cleric who sent a chicken through the rift, according to Redcloak in SoD. The Snarl kills him immediately afterwards.


technically the cleric is portrayed as being kinda suctioned into it, if there was a livable environment on the other side then he/she might have survived...


:elan:

[137beth]

But, dramatic convention aside, why is this necessarily the case?
Because a common trend on the Gitp forums is for someone to make a guess, possibly reasonable, possibly not, about the content of future strips, and then to treat their guess as 100% fact and complain that not everyone axiomatically assumes them to be true:smalltongue:

I'm personally expecting the snarl to exist, but that "something" of the story we have heard is wrong. If the snarl no longer exists (or never did), I wouldn't be surprised, but I don't expect that to be the case.

[ti'esar]

technically the cleric is portrayed as being kinda suctioned into it, if there was a livable environment on the other side then he/she might have survived...


:elan:

Besides, everything in crayon is just what the characters reciting it were told. Not necessarily what actually happened.

[ratfox]

The only gripe I have is that a being of pure "chaos" would not decide to create a world.

Yes, Chaos isn't idleness, but it isn't structure either.

My idea always was that the chaos evolved into a world, the same way that our world was born out of chaos…

Now, I know that the Giant killed the idea that the world inside the rifts is our world, but my prediction is that if ever we get to see the other world, magic will not work there, and rules of physics as we know them will apply. As a corollary, Xykon, Malack and Durkula better not cross if they know what's good for them.