Mrs V goes to town

[Luna_Mayflower]

I know V is obsessively moping about Familicide to not go to hell when she (or maybe he. I'll go with 'it') dies, and to show heaven that it is sorry, but its really going too far now.

Back in the battle for Azure City, V's spells caused or aided in the deaths of thousands of Goblins. That was fine, but killing some humans wasn't? V is meant to have an INT in the 20s, but is seemingly more driven by its heart than head.

By the gods, that's it! V isn't the smart, suave, wondrous, heroic and stupendous person it was now. This makes no sense, as the V from the earlier OOTS wouldn't do all this! I can only assume something has happened which has caused this. Here are my ideas, based on various reasons.


V has lost INT:

This one is a likely one, seeing as it relates to its actions. As we all know, lack of oxygen to the brain can cause brain damage, and therefore lack of intelligence. When Xykon of Many Colours grabbed V by the throat, it lost some intelligence from nearly suffocating.

Being around Paladins:

As we all know, people are social beings, and will often change their behaviour to match those around them. And who was V with for so long: Paladins. Those fools in blue, slowly turning V toward their ideas true goodness and extreme morality.

V is scared:

It knows what's down there, in the darkness of the Abyss and the fires of the Hells. Perhaps, like all of us, she wants to be sure of salvation. But that's probably done by now, as she has said she regretted death. As such, this is less likely.

Roy:

Roy is the leader of the group, and what he says goes. Until recently, he's never felt confused or unsure of himself. V was unhappy after Roy unreasonably treated it from the resurrection, so by explaining Familicide to him, he is tricked into being angsty and unsure of his own mind and its follies.


Which one do you think it is?

[Keltest]

A high intelligence does not automatically equate to a reduced appreciation for right and wrong. when V was killing hobgoblins, they were the aggressors directly trying to end his life and the lives of people he cared about and/or moderately liked. When he cast familicide, a metric ton of innocents got caught in the blast; people who had done nothing to deserve death.

[Luna_Mayflower]

A high intelligence does not automatically equate to a reduced appreciation for right and wrong.

Certainly, but it does equate to knowing that remorse solves little. Action solves.

[Kish]

...I'll go with, "Despite having committed mass murder based on racism, Vaarsuvius is not actually more evil than Belkar."

I would add that a hypothetical person who still clings to the idea that it's morally valid, or at worst a minor peccadillo, to kill black dragons for being black dragons, should never expect to understand the reaction of anyone in the comic ever again, especially Vaarsuvius.

[oppyu]

Certainly, but it does equate to knowing that remorse solves little. Action solves.
I think a judgment like that would be Wisdom, and subjective. It gets tricky if you try to rate various values and morality judgments like that with ability scores.

One person tries to bury their emotional problems to focus on their mission. Another person tries to confront said problems head on because they're afraid said emotional problems could impair their effectiveness if allowed to fester unchecked. Which belief is indicative of a higher ability score? Are psychologists, psychiatrists and assorted counselors the smartest people in our society? (No, they most certainly are not, and I laugh at the imagined notion that they could be.)

[theNater]

Back in the battle for Azure City, V's spells caused or aided in the deaths of thousands of Goblins. That was fine, but killing some humans wasn't?
Do you actually not understand the difference between killing and murder, or are you just pretending not to?

[Ridureyu]

All remorse is bad and all killing is equal!

[Luna_Mayflower]

Do you actually not understand the difference between killing and murder, or are you just pretending not to?

All killing is murder, no matter the case. Is it fairer to kill those who are fighting you? When you're on the side of equally blood-thirsty soldiers?!

A trick, I tell you, V has been corrupted by the monster Roy Greenhilt and the temptress Haley!

[Sylian]

All killing is murder, no matter the case. Is it fairer to kill those who are fighting you? When you're on the side of equally blood-thirsty soldiers?!By this logic, Hinjo should be a fallen paladin, as should Lien. Killing soldiers who are attacking you is different from murdering civilians.

I'm guessing you're not entirely serious, though, but it's the Internet, so who knows? Still, by your criteria, Celia, Shojo, and Roy's mother would be the only ones in the comic that have a shot of a Good alignment, I'd reckon. Most other characters have killed sentient beings, including everyone in the Order of the Stick.

[Luna_Mayflower]

By this logic, Hinjo should be a fallen paladin, as should Lien. Killing soldiers who are attacking you is different from murdering civilians.

I'm guessing you're not entirely serious, though, but it's the Internet, so who knows? Still, by your criteria, Celia, Shojo, and Roy's mother would be the only ones in the comic that have a shot of a Good alignment, I'd reckon. Most other characters have killed sentient beings, including everyone in the Order of the Stick.

You misunderstand. I don't refer to how good or evil an act is, just how one reacts to doing the latter.

And, V wonders how it'll make up for doing the act? Easy, help save the world from Xykon and the heroic Redcloak (isn't he dreamy?). That way, it saves magnitudes more than it killed! Add that to the number it saved from the dragons, and it's on a win. It'll go to heaven as a hero!

[Kish]

You misunderstand. I don't refer to how good or evil an act is, just how one reacts to doing the latter.

And, V wonders how it'll make up for doing the act? Easy, help save the world from Xykon and the heroic Redcloak (isn't he dreamy?). That way, it saves magnitudes more than it killed! Add that to the number it saved from the dragons, and it's on a win. It'll go to heaven as a hero!
Oddly (or not), based on the deva's interview with Roy, it appears that afterlife destinations are not determined by a strictly utilitarian "number of lives you deliberately or accidentally saved - number you killed = positive, congratulations, you're going to an Upper Plane" calculation. Or to put it another way--it seems we will alas not get to see, should we go to Celestia again, the celebratory welcoming of Nale the Vampire Slayer, Savior of the Western Continent and greatest hero of a thousand years (who may have casually murdered a few hundred people before he saved millions, but really, who cares? Well, I suppose they do, but who cares that they care? I'll just stop this parentheses before we get to infinite recursion).

[Bulldog Psion]

All killing is murder, no matter the case. Is it fairer to kill those who are fighting you? When you're on the side of equally blood-thirsty soldiers?!

A trick, I tell you, V has been corrupted by the monster Roy Greenhilt and the temptress Haley!

Your second sentence suggests that this is just a big attempt at humor (falling flatter than a roadkilled flounder, IMO, but that's just my opinion). However, I'll answer the first part as if you really meant it.

All I'll say on the topic is this: there is an infinite difference between shooting someone who is running at you firing an assault rifle, and shooting someone who you don't even know while they're sitting on the couch watching TV. The hobgoblins were equivalent to the former, Familicide to the latter.

[Mrc.]

Also, there's something quite terrifying about the magnitude of Familicide, and the manner in which it happened. Thousands of creatures were struck down without ever having seen V or even heard of the Order. That kind of power is, in my opinion, further than V ever intended. Yes, 'Ultimate Arcane Might' may well be his/her goal, but there comes a point when the sheer ruthlessness of what magic is capable of that anyone could quite feasibly be killed by a complete stranger who lives on a different continent, and what's worse is that their family is also a target. This goes against what we have seen V do in-comic; flaunt his/her magical power and expect others to kneel at such might. Such a stealth kill is far more sinister and entirely unexpected that even those who want 'Ultimate Arcane Might' may question themselves.

[SavageWombat]

Um... this is Luna Mayflower you're arguing with.

It's like asking Ridureyu if he's being sarcastic.

[zimmerwald1915]

As President of the V Hatedom, I give this OP a 4/10. Do better next time.

[Skorj]

Luna threads: always fun.


I would add that a hypothetical person who still clings to the idea that it's morally valid, or at worst a minor peccadillo, to kill black dragons for being black dragons, should never expect to understand the reaction of anyone in the comic ever again, especially Vaarsuvius.

I think that remains a morally interesting question without an obvious or comfortable answer. "Color coded for your convenience" is just one way to avoid thinking deeply about it. Presuming, of course, that there was a justified, true belief that most black dragons were evil, powerful, and likely to commits acts of great evil (not sure we know this about OOTSverse), and that the question is one of failing to judge each dragon individually on its own acts, while being correct about most of them. That's just not an easy question IMO. It's much like the (different) question of whether there can be a "good war" - no comfortable answer IMO.

If instead it's merely a shallow parable for genocide based on rumors and propaganda, with Black Dragons being no more or less evil than anyone else, then of course it's not an interesting question at all (though that's a good story for different reasons).

[Vinyadan]

I know V is obsessively moping about Familicide to not go to hell when she (or maybe he. I'll go with 'it') dies, and to show heaven that it is sorry

I think this is absolutely wrong. Yes, you can think that, but V feels sorry because he's sorry, not because he hopes for some better afterlife. Besides, he believed he had already sold his soul.

V is simply not evil. He committed an unjustified evil act, killing dozens of people. His reaction was even more beastly and exaggerated than that of the ABD, which was likely to be evil. This act showed an horrifying self-entitlement to dispose of innocents and killing beings he didn't even know about.
At the same time, he was intelligent enough to know of the chance of black dragons having intercourse with mortals and giving birth to potentially good hybrids. He also likely knew that sorcerors are said to be descended from dragons, although it is possible that this is restricted info in the OoTSverse.

Is it so strange for people to be sorry for what they did, because they did something wrong? To wish to be able at changing what they did, and, being this impossible, keeping living this again and again?

V is the same who felt bad for leaving the Azurites alone to be slaughtered, and had nightmares about it. He likely ponders his actions a lot, and, being aware of his intelligence and taking pride in it, he probably feels what he did as even more unjustified, because he had the means to tell beforehand how much evil would have come through it.

So yes, V from before would do this.

But the quantity of exclamation marks make me think that this was all just a joke.

[JessmanCA]

character development

[Wolf_Plague]

His reaction was even more beastly and exaggerated than that of the ABD, which was likely to be evil.

I will allow myself to disagree.

ABD was planning on torturing souls of innocent children for indefinite amount of time, in cold blood, with full understanding of what that means. And to skin Inkyrius alive.

With Vaarsuvius, we have a parent going axe crazy at would-be executioner and torturer of his family and using World Wide Selective Fireball of Doom, so to speak, to kill all who could possibly swear revenge against and endanger V's family in a similar way again.

All evil here comes from enjoyment of destroying much hated foe, combined with euphoria of being able to use arcane power to full effect again after prolonged period of V being incredibly stressed about uselessness of his magic arts, resulting in a jump to most powerful, thematically appropriate spell, without spending a single second to evaluate it's side effects, due to common sense suppressed by aforementioned double-euphoria.

As of relative severity of two acts, I cannot help, but notice, that in OotS simple death does not result in complete eradication of a person, but in sending his immortal soul to another plane.

Roy In Afterlife arc explains details of that exhaustingly.

Bearing that in mind, and assuming no soulless creatures were killed during casting of Familicide, said spell seems to be an equivalent of mass forced expulsion, rather then Real Life murder, as some forum members seem to assume for some reason.

Thus the ultimate consequences for those affected by Familicide can be equalled to being thrown out of their homes without warning and sent off to extremely remote location, without the means to return or communicate with those left behind without assistance from still living creatures and a pile of diamond dust.

Given those differences between both motivations of ABD and V - preplanned cold revenge with deliberate torture for former and hot blooded revenge with Shoot First Think Later mentality for latter, and ultimate consequences for victims of ABD and V - presumably endless torture for former and reversible Eviction From Material Plane Notice for latter, I am inclined to treat V's reaction as one that is less "beastly and exaggerated" out of two.

To address the obvious question - my subjective perception of straightforward torture is such, that when comparing it to less suffering inducing acts, such as forced relocation, my negative reaction towards torture is so strong, it completely overshadows said relocation act with no regard to actual number of victims.

Simply said, I cannot imagine there is a number of creatures kicked out of Material Plane large enough to make torture of children look less evil in comparison.

[zimmerwald1915]

With Vaarsuvius, we have a parent going axe crazy at would-be executioner and torturer of his family and using World Wide Selective Fireball of Doom, so to speak, to kill all who could possibly swear revenge against and endanger V's family in a similar way again.
Please clarify what you mean by "axe crazy." Do you mean that V was totally irrational at the time she cast the spell?


Bearing that in mind, and assuming no soulless creatures were killed during casting of Familicide, said spell seems to be an equivalent of mass forced expulsion, rather then Real Life murder, as some forum members seem to assume for some reason.
When the characters in the comic treat death as a traumatic, tragic thing, as, for example, Haley, Elan, and Durkon did with Roy, or the ex-bandit king did with Samantha, don't be surprised when forum members follow their lead. And don't be surprised if, when the author of the comic goes out of his way in commentary that murder is *gasp* actually a serious thing, forum members decide to follow his lead.

[Kish]

Bearing that in mind, and assuming no soulless creatures were killed during casting of Familicide, said spell seems to be an equivalent of mass forced expulsion, rather then Real Life murder, as some forum members seem to assume for some reason.
You cannot have it both ways. Either Vaarsuvius is guilty of mass murder, as Vaarsuvius, Roy, and, oh yeah, the comic's author say...

...or the only problem with the ancient black dragon's acts is that she planned on making the deaths slow rather than quick and Soul Binding the children. For that matter, every time someone in the comic talks about murder, you have to draw a "silly person flipping out over nothing" line under that unless the victim is someone like Celia who just ceases to exist. Tarquin stabbing Nale? No problem, except that he gave a ridiculous reason for it! Nale burning up Malack? No problem at all, and it speaks badly to Tarquin and Laurin that they inexplicably think there was a problem! Eugene and then Roy chased Xykon for years to avenge the death of Master Fyron? What idiots! Some forum people think it reflects badly on Redcloak that he murdered his brother, who was himself inexplicably upset over Xykon showing the only rational reaction to the deaths of Redcloak's brother's wife and teenaged son, that reaction being to laugh and certainly not lift a finger to prevent those deaths? Sheesh, is there anything these forumites won't flip out over?

[Vinyadan]

ABD was planning on torturing souls of innocent children for indefinite amount of time

This is the only detail which could make her actions worse than those of V, because of the infinite amount of time the torture could last.


With Vaarsuvius, we have a parent going axe crazy at would-be executioner and torturer of his family and using World Wide Selective Fireball of Doom, so to speak

Nope, he wasn't selective, because he murdered innocent mothers and children who had nothing against him.



All evil here comes from enjoyment of destroying much hated foe,

Evil here comes from the killing of innocents who were unaware of what was even happening.


combined with euphoria of being able to use arcane power to full effect again after prolonged period of V being incredibly stressed about uselessness of his magic arts, resulting in a jump to most powerful, thematically appropriate spell, without spending a single second to evaluate it's side effects, due to common sense suppressed by aforementioned double-euphoria.

I think you confound euphoria with hybris.


As of relative severity of two acts, I cannot help, but notice, that in OotS simple death does not result in complete eradication of a person, but in sending his immortal soul to another plane.

Tell that to everybody in the comic who gets mad when people are killed, or to the Azurites defending their homes, when they could just allow themselves to be slaughtered by like cattle and end up in heaven.


Bearing that in mind, and assuming no soulless creatures were killed during casting of Familicide, said spell seems to be an equivalent of mass forced expulsion, rather then Real Life murder, as some forum members seem to assume for some reason.

Besides the second part, to which many have already answered, you don't know that.


Thus the ultimate consequences for those affected by Familicide can be equalled to being thrown out of their homes without warning and sent off to extremely remote location, without the means to return or communicate with those left behind without assistance from still living creatures and a pile of diamond dust.

It's good that Belkar will go to heaven after all. I mean, what has he done to be considered evil? Slept with Jenny? Stole a dinosaur?


Given those differences between both motivations of ABD and V - preplanned cold revenge with deliberate torture for former and hot blooded revenge with Shoot First Think Later mentality for latter, and ultimate consequences for victims of ABD and V - presumably endless torture for former and reversible Eviction From Material Plane Notice for latter, I am inclined to treat V's reaction as one that is less "beastly and exaggerated" out of two.

I wonder why Miko fell, she had just relocated her liege.


To address the obvious question - my subjective perception of straightforward torture is such, that when comparing it to less suffering inducing acts, such as forced relocation, my negative reaction towards torture is so strong, it completely overshadows said relocation act with no regard to actual number of victims.

Besides the fact that the comic doesn't handle killing people like relocating them, this is a very difficult subject to discuss, as I have never been neither tortured, nor forcibly relocated. You shouldn't think, however, that forced relocation isn't often inflicted through use of torture (IRL).


Simply said, I cannot imagine there is a number of creatures kicked out of Material Plane large enough to make torture of children look less evil in comparison.


As I already said, you handle death in OotS wrong.

I don't know if a murderer is worse than a torturer. But killing an undetermined, possibly unlimited quantity of people - men, women, children - while they are completely innocent and unaware, with their own separate lives and no allegiance to your enemy, on one side for the unreasonable assumption that all people with a marital or blood relation to the enemy may attempt revenging her, and, the other side, because you believe that to be the price you enemy has to pay, doesn't look all that better.

Edit: funny typo :smalltongue:

[Wolf_Plague]

Please clarify what you mean by "axe crazy." Do you mean that V was totally irrational at the time she cast the spell?

"Totally irrational"? Not sure I understand. I used my idiom as to refer to state of mind when violent actions are committed with complete disregard to possible collateral damage.


When the characters in the comic treat death as a traumatic, tragic thing, as, for example, Haley, Elan, and Durkon did with Roy, or the ex-bandit king did with Samantha, don't be surprised when forum members follow their lead. And don't be surprised if, when the author of the comic goes out of his way in commentary that murder is *gasp* actually a serious thing, forum members decide to follow his lead.
First, I never said OotS-murder is not serious just because it does not bear same unreversible consequences as Real Life-murder.
Second, if someone mixes those up, they are objectively wrong, for those are two different things.
Third, if we speak about examples of attitude towards death, this comic shows characters treating own death as minor inconvenience and even Roy(Origin of the PCs spoilers) dismisses his father, who came to him to say that he(Roy's father) is dying, mentioning it can be fixed by resurrection, like a number of times before
And with the literal revolving door in the afterlife and suits for "one night in afterlife" it seems pretty obvious to me that it is the violent circumstances of one's death, not death itself, what can make OotS-death tragic.


You cannot have it both ways. Either Vaarsuvius is guilty of mass murder, as Vaarsuvius, Roy, and, oh yeah, the comic's author say...
He is guilty. But the word "murder" in OotS almost always refers to something, that is fundamentally different from murder in Real Life.
Switching those around is factually wrong.


...or the only problem with the ancient black dragon's acts is that she planned on making the deaths slow rather than quick and Soul Binding the children.
My post was comparing the severity of those two acts. I never claimed V's act was non-evil. In fact, I mentioned it being evil explicitly and you could not possibly miss that.



For that matter, every time someone in the comic talks about murder, you have to draw a "silly person flipping out over nothing" line under that unless the victim is someone like Celia who just ceases to exist.
"silly person flipping out over nothing" is a phrase I never used, use or have intent to use. You've read my post and know well, that I never claimed that OootS-death is "nothing".
You just made up ridiculously sounding phrase and pretend I said it. This is a Strawman Fallacy.


Tarquin stabbing Nale? No problem, except that he gave a ridiculous reason for it! Nale burning up Malack? No problem at all, and it speaks badly to Tarquin and Laurin that they inexplicably think there was a problem! Eugene and then Roy chased Xykon for years to avenge the death of Master Fyron? What idiots! Some forum people think it reflects badly on Redcloak that he /.../ Sheesh, is there anything these forumites won't flip out over?
Give me my direct quote with "murder in OotS = no problem at all" statement which you are trying to so blatantly pin on me or you will be ignored from now on.



What idiots!

I neither attacked you, nor insulted you. Apology is in order.

[zimmerwald1915]

"Totally irrational"? Not sure I understand. I used my idiom as to refer to state of mind when violent actions are committed with complete disregard to possible collateral damage.
A common statement on these boards, that I have to assume you've encountered based on your join date (there's a recently-active thread that is to a great degree taken up with this question), is that V's actions are to some extent excusable based on her state of mind. The only state of mind I see which would excuse her actions to any extent would be if her actions were not governed by the reasoning part of her brain. Since you seem interested in excusing V's actions, I want to know whether you want to have that argument.


First, I never said OotS-murder is not serious just because it does not bear same unreversible consequences as Real Life-murder.
Second, if someone mixes those up, they are objectively wrong, for those are two different things.
Third, if we speak about examples of attitude towards death, this comic shows characters treating own death as minor inconvenience and even Roy(Origin of the PCs spoilers) dismisses his father, who came to him to say that he(Roy's father) is dying, mentioning it can be fixed by resurrection, like a number of times before
And with the literal revolving door in the afterlife and suits for "one night in afterlife" it seems pretty obvious to me that it is the violent circumstances of one's death, not death itself, what can make OotS-death tragic.
For the vast majority of people, death is what it is in real life. As Don't Split the Party showed, resurrection is hard to come by. Even a creature as rich and well-connected as the mother dragon couldn't resurrect her son, who because his dust was lost in the swamp would have required the even rarer true resurrection, or husband, whose remains were not disintegrated but was skinned and thus would have required resurrection.

As for Roy dismissing Eugene, well, I've already brought up counter-examples. But there are reasons why that specific case is not a good one...

Roy wanted to sting his father with his words (their relationship isn't exactly healthy), and he wanted Eugene to go away and leave him alone forever. Of course he'd treat death more lightly than he might in other cases, or than most people ordinarily would.

[SavageWombat]

How about this: we create some symbol and put it in the Poster Identity part on the side, that means "I think Familicide is by definition an Evil act" and another that means "I think it depends on the circumstances" so that, when someone makes a post, we can skip this level of the issue and go to the nuances of their opinion.

[zimmerwald1915]

How about this: we create some symbol and put it in the Poster Identity part on the side, that means "I think Familicide is by definition an Evil act" and another that means "I think it depends on the circumstances" so that, when someone makes a post, we can skip this level of the issue and go to the nuances of their opinion.
In order not to overburden the forum staff, we could try watermarking our avatars in the hope of starting a trend.

[Kish]

How about this: we create some symbol and put it in the Poster Identity part on the side, that means "I think Familicide is by definition an Evil act" and another that means "I think it depends on the circumstances" so that, when someone makes a post, we can skip this level of the issue and go to the nuances of their opinion.
How about, "I think mass murder, even of members of an 'evil race,' is by definition an atrocity"?

The symbol you're suggesting would separate what strikes me as a very small group--those people who think what matters about Familicide is that it can be presumed to be a spell with the Evil descriptor--on one side, and the vast majority of people on this forum on the other side, the people who think Rich would be writing a better and more comprehensible story if no one was weirdly giving Vaarsuvius a hard time for the just and necessary extermination of evil black dragons mixed in with people like me who think that Familicide would be simply irrelevant if it was cast on a dead creature whose relatives were already dead.

[Luna_Mayflower]

I can't help feeling V looks so cute sitting on that little stool with its hands on its lap. I just want to pet it and cuddle it!

I tell you, in my dream world, I'd be married to Redcloak and we'd adopt V as our son/daughter!

Also, if you're interested in more of my ideal world: Malack would be my brother and be still alive, Haley would shave, Xykon would be my uncle and teach me how to dance and use magic, and my best friend would be MitD.

[Wolf_Plague]

This is the only detail which could make her actions worse than those of V, because of the infinite amount of time the torture could last.
...And the fact that it is torture, not change of the living area.


Nope, he wasn't selective, because he murdered innocent mothers and children who had nothing against him.
Spell was selecting victims by blood relations.


Evil here comes from the killing of innocents who were unaware of what was even happening.
I was talking about motivations, leading to evil decisions. Not results of said decisions.


I think you confound euphoria with hybris.
If someone was deprived of something for long time, causing great suffering and then suddenly got incredible amounts of it in a short period of time and started to show signs of great enjoyment, I'd say that person got euphoric from getting what he needs finally.
Or are there some linguistic details I'm missing? English is not my native language.


Tell that to everybody in the comic who gets mad when people are killed, or to the Azurites defending their homes, when they could just allow themselves to be slaughtered by like cattle and end up in heaven.
Tell what? They already know that. Getting mad is a normal reaction to violence, no matter there is afterlife or there isn't.


Besides the second part, to which many have already answered, you don't know that.
I already used the word "assuming" to indicate I do not know that.
And what about second part?
Am I wrong that death results in your soul going to afterlife? Am I wrong that V caused multitude of souls to be expelled from the Material Plane, now forced to live on some other Planes?


It's good that Belkar will go to heaven after all. I mean, what has he done to be considered evil? Slept with Jenny? Stole a dinosaur?
He kills people. That makes killed people lose their homes and bodies forever, unless they have a cleric, ready to raise them.
He also enjoys hurting people for the sake of hurting.
So, I guess your assumption on Belkar going to heaven is wrong.
And using Strawman is wrong too.


I wonder why Miko fell, she had just relocated her liege.
Yes, she did. Against his will. You will contest that? If you will, do tell, what really happened to him. Raising attempts failed not because his soul was unmade, but because he refused resurrection deliberately, indicating that not only Shojo was still existing somewhere, but that he also enjoyed being dead more then rotting in the cell.
And I will reiterate, that what makes OotS-death range from tragedy to opportunity to bang that hot chick from two centuries ago are circumstances of your soul leaving your body.


Besides the fact that the comic doesn't handle killing people like relocating them,
This is an outright lie. Comic, on multiple and abundant occasions showed openly and clearly, that upon death souls leave the body and go to afterlife.
Roy's soul did that. You saw that. You saw him away from Material Plane. You saw him climbing Mount Celestia. Which, might I point out the obvious, is a different location from Material Plane.
You saw him fishing in lake with his dead grandfather. You saw his mother enjoying pleasures of love with some neighbour.
All happening in a place different from Material Plane.
From which they went to their current location through death.
Did not seize to exist. Moved to different place. And characters, witnessing deaths of other, acknowledge that. Multiple times.
So your words about characters of OotS treating death not like the soul going away from the body to another place, are unexplainable and confusing lie.


this is a very difficult subject to discuss, as I have never been neither tortured, nor forcibly relocated. You shouldn't think, however, that forced relocation isn't often inflicted through use of torture (IRL).
Do not imply I think something that you don't know if I am actually thinking, please. It is rude.


As I already said, you handle death in OotS wrong.
What death is in OotS is objective fact, not a subject of "handling". And the fact is, it's nothing like real life, with few exceptions, so treating it the same way is the error of yours.


I don't know if a murderer is worse than a torturer.
In OotS webcomic murderer will send you to - let's be generous - Mount Celestia, where you will enjoy countless pleasures for as long as you feel like. The downside being not being able to return back without assistance from Material Plane.
Torturer will make your life into a screaming agony.
If I were a character in OotS and was cornered with only those two options to choose, I'd prefer a paradise with the loss of posessions and a chance to get back, rather then indeterminate fate, full of horror.


But killing an undetermined, possibly unlimited quantity of people - men, women, children - while they are completely innocent and unaware, with their own separate lives and no allegiance to your enemy, on one side for the unreasonable assumption that all people with a marital or blood relation to the enemy may attempt revenging her, and, the other side, because you believe that to be the price you enemy has to pay, doesn't look all that better.
I shall reiterate, that subjectively, for me, there is no number of sentient beings denied their bodily existence and sent into afterlife big enough to overshadow unlimited torture. For me, it can never be "balanced out". There is no "proper math" to it. Both ABD and V did bad things. What did ABD planned to do for me is worse then what V did.( I really hope nobody will once again twist my words from "For me, X is more evil then Y" into "Y is all fine and dandy all the time, no exceptions", for that is both rude, disrespectful, pointless and unintelligent, to put it mildly.)

Try to change the perspective. Try to flip it around.

Instead of thinking what you would condemn most - torture of someone or making souls of a bunch of people to leave their bodies - try to think what you would support most.

To save couple of kids from being endlessly tortured or to help Greenhilt family and a bunch of Azurites from Mount Celestia to get back to their bodies? From that point of view, which seems like a fate worse then the other?

[Wolf_Plague]

For the vast majority of people, death is what it is in real life.
Their own death? Because I'm talking about what death is for those who die in OotS.

[zimmerwald1915]

Their own death? Because I'm talking about what death is for those who die in OotS.
Comparing post-death experiences in The Order of the Stick to post-death in real life would require violating board rules. I hope you appreciate that I really don't want to do that.

[Katuko]

We don't need to compare it to real life, though. IRL we are all fighting over what the heck happens after we die, while in OoTS it's confirmed what happens when you die. Common folk may not be so sure, but we've seen it directly with Roy and several other dead people that your soul goes to some sort of afterlife.

Now, there have indeed been references to people who die and get resurrected willy-nilly, and we've seen that adventures care less about death than others because they usually have a cleric with Raise Dead or similar available. We've seen that at least the good ones who die get a really happy afterlife. Roy even comments that while he doesn't remember what's beyond the cloudy area, the existence of this happy afterlife is mostly common knowledge because "somebody [can] just Plane Shift over and look". Plus, dead souls can choose not to come back.

I agree with Wolf_Plague. If we take your average "good, innocent person" in OoTS and compare the crimes of "instant murder" vs "torture", then the torture is worse because it inflicts more pain over a longer period of time. As WP said: Murder is still evil. It's just slightly less evil than extended torture in OoTS, because being killed causes shorter-lasting trauma and allows your soul to move into a more pleasant state of being right afterwards. Meanwhile, a tortured and/or soul-bound person will be forever trapped in some painful and/or completely isolated state of being that does not confer the same "bonuses" as going to the afterlife does.

There is of course still all the moral questions that we will bicker about for eternity, about whether or not going to a happy place lessens the evil of killing a few innocents along with the evil beings; and so on. I think we can all agree that it is not an easy question, and it can not have a purely black-n-white answer.

We know mass murder is wrong. We know torture is wrong. We know both V and the Black Dragon did evil in their actions. But can we 100% declare "torture and soul binding of children" as a less/more evil act than "killing innocents as collateral"? I don't think so.

But I agree with Wolf_Plague's point that the effects of killing someone instantly in OoTS and sending them off to a fluffy heaven of eternal bliss is not as taxing on them as torture and eternal soul capture would be. How many "innocents tortured" it takes to balance the scale with "innocents murdered" is another discussion - but I stress that it's pointless to bring real-life ideology about death into it when we've clearly seen how the afterlife works in OoTS.

[Vinyadan]

...And the fact that it is torture, not change of the living area.
Technically, a bound soul find itself into a new area (this is to take also as a joke and not as a counterargument). Sorry if I have to ask about this, but could you link me where it was told that ABD would torture the souls? I made a quick search in the comic, and I couldn't find it. I also took a look at the description of the soul bind spell, because I thought it was part of the way the spell works, but it isn't there.
At the same time, spellbound souls we've seen don't seem in a state of torment, only of imprisonment.


Spell was selecting victims by blood relations.

Instead of danger to V or V's family. That's why it was the wrong spell, and its selection mode was useless, as V notices here (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0843.html).
It's like going to the market looking for apples and using a spell selecting things with seeds. That's what I meant, when I said that it wasn't selective. Let me rephrase and say that it wasn't selective enough, that it was inefficiently selective, that, if I may add part of my reasoning, it was selective the wrong way, because it counted family relations instead of risk factoring. The ABD herself said that her son had very likely unrelated friends.


I was talking about motivations, leading to evil decisions. Not results of said decisions.

He took the decision, without worrying about the fact that, as he notices himself, dragons are well known for their promiscuity, and this is something he knew. I doubt anyone would call killing the ABD an evil deed, although V could have handled the thing differently.


If someone was deprived of something for long time, causing great suffering and then suddenly got incredible amounts of it in a short period of time and started to show signs of great enjoyment, I'd say that person got euphoric from getting what he needs finally. Or are there some linguistic details I'm missing? English is not my native language.

Neither is mine, but I have never heard of murder caused by euphoria. Hybris is a kind of arrogance, the assumption that you are allowed to do something simply because you are able at it. In this case, it was the crushing of uncounted, innocent lives, because he wanted to make a preemptive strike at people who, in the future, had a chance of becoming his enemies.


Tell what? They already know that. Getting mad is a normal reaction to violence, no matter there is afterlife or there isn't.

I think you misunderstood me. The fact is that the Azurites prefer to risk living as a cripple in this world, in their city, because of battle wounds, to being happily killed. They even prefer living as slaves, in a situation comparable to lifelong torture, when it shouldn't be too hard to get an angry Goblinoid to kill them. This makes me think that death, for them, is something worse than a relocation.


I already used the word "assuming" to indicate I do not know that.
Right, you used an assumption to help sustain your idea, and I rejected the assumption. Assuming, of course, that it was your idea, given that it was introduced by the verb "seem"; however, given that it matches pretty well other opinions you expressed, I imagine this is the opinion you hold for most likely.


And what about second part?
Am I wrong that death results in your soul going to afterlife? Am I wrong that V caused multitude of souls to be expelled from the Material Plane, now forced to live on some other Planes?
This is just part of it. The fact is that Elan didn't take Nale's permanent forced extrusion very well, and I don't think it was because he is a big crybaby. People in the comic take killing as seriously as IRL. And it's not like nobody IRL thinks there is life after death.


He kills people. That makes killed people lose their homes and bodies forever, unless they have a cleric, ready to raise them.
He also enjoys hurting people for the sake of hurting. So, I guess your assumption on Belkar going to heaven is wrong.
I thought you'd understand it was a joke. But I made a mistake here, because I thought you took "forced extrusion" less seriously than you do.

And using Strawman is wrong too.

I have no idea of what this means.


Yes, she did. Against his will. You will contest that? If you will, do tell, what really happened to him. Raising attempts failed not because his soul was unmade, but because he refused resurrection deliberately, indicating that not only Shojo was still existing somewhere, but that he also enjoyed being dead more then rotting in the cell.
She also relocated the Order against its will, yet she didn't fall. She fell because she killed her liege, not merely relocated him. And I never said the soul had been undone, that's the Snarl's thing.


And I will reiterate, that what makes OotS-death range from tragedy to opportunity to bang that hot chick from two centuries ago are circumstances of your soul leaving your body.

As Mr. Greenhilt noticed, being a ghost has some harsh prerequisites. But you can hang out with cool people without being dead.


This is an outright lie. Comic, on multiple and abundant occasions showed openly and clearly, that upon death souls leave the body and go to afterlife.
Roy's soul did that. You saw that. You saw him away from Material Plane. You saw him climbing Mount Celestia. Which, might I point out the obvious, is a different location from Material Plane.
You saw him fishing in lake with his dead grandfather. You saw his mother enjoying pleasures of love with some neighbour.
All happening in a place different from Material Plane.
From which they went to their current location through death.
Did not seize to exist. Moved to different place. And characters, witnessing deaths of other, acknowledge that. Multiple times.
So your words about characters of OotS treating death not like the soul going away from the body to another place, are unexplainable and confusing lie.

OotS doesn't treat killing people merely as relocating them, but also as killing them. There is a difference between relocating someone and killing someone, as shown by Miko's case.


Do not imply I think something that you don't know if I am actually thinking, please. It is rude.
"Should" is an auxiliary verb, used in this case to give advice or suggestion. "You" can have an informal (impersonal) meaning. The double negation, also known as litotes, is used as a form of euphemism and with the intention of actually resulting inoffensive. I fear you read too much here. It was actually a side note about a phenomenon still sadly common.


What death is in OotS is objective fact, not a subject of "handling". And the fact is, it's nothing like real life, with few exceptions, so treating it the same way is the error of yours.

The fact is that Haley cried when Roy died, and didn't just say "rez ready". Durkon was happy, because Roy had died on the battlefield, and didn't seem to think of it as a thing of small importance. (The fact that Dwarfs who died on the battlefield only go to "heaven" lets you think that they don't resurrect people very often). He also uses the past tense when referring to Roy. Hinjo and O'Chul talking about the sacrifice didn't look like they thought it was a little thing. O'Chul telling Haley that it could have been her last night with Elan, together with her reaction, also shows a realistic approach to death.


In OotS webcomic murderer will send you to - let's be generous - Mount Celestia, where you will enjoy countless pleasures for as long as you feel like. The downside being not being able to return back without assistance from Material Plane.
Torturer will make your life into a screaming agony.
If I were a character in OotS and was cornered with only those two options to choose, I'd prefer a paradise with the loss of posessions and a chance to get back, rather then indeterminate fate, full of horror.

The problem is that you are, as said, being generous. Dad Greenhilt's case has shown that the OotS afterlife is a variegated reality, where many different results can happen, and some are likely unknown to us. And there also are these guys (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0918.html). Most of them were killed by Roy in self-defense, but others don't belong to the army, and may have been killed although they didn't deserve it, and lost their chance for redemption.


I shall reiterate, that subjectively, for me, there is no number of sentient beings denied their bodily existence and sent into afterlife big enough to overshadow unlimited torture. For me, it can never be "balanced out". There is no "proper math" to it. Both ABD and V did bad things. What did ABD planned to do for me is worse then what V did. (I really hope nobody will once again twist my words from "For me, X is more evil then Y" into "Y is all fine and dandy all the time, no exceptions", for that is both rude, disrespectful, pointless and unintelligent, to put it mildly.)

V may well have damned a lot of people to eternity in hell. I think that the "for me" part here is the important one. I absolutely accept that, and for me V did something worse.


Try to change the perspective. Try to flip it around.

Instead of thinking what you would condemn most - torture of someone or making souls of a bunch of people to leave their bodies - try to think what you would support most.
To save couple of kids from being endlessly tortured or to help Greenhilt family and a bunch of Azurites from Mount Celestia to get back to their bodies? From that point of view, which seems like a fate worse then the other?
To make a bunch of Azurites come back to their bodies, so that they can save their countrymen (present, and, possibly, future, given that slave labour is handy for the goblins and it wouldn't be strange for them to raise a slave caste) from a lifelong torture protracting for generations without a foreseeable end?

[Domino Quartz]

And using Strawman is wrong too.
I have no idea of what this means.


Using a "strawman" means exaggerating your opponent's argument to the point that it becomes easier to refute, and then attacking the exaggerated argument instead of the real one (like attacking a man made out of straw instead of the actual person).

[DeliaP]

I can't help feeling V looks so cute sitting on that little stool with its hands on its lap. I just want to pet it and cuddle it!

I tell you, in my dream world, I'd be married to Redcloak and we'd adopt V as our son/daughter!

Also, if you're interested in more of my ideal world: Malack would be my brother and be still alive, Haley would shave, Xykon would be my uncle and teach me how to dance and use magic, and my best friend would be MitD.

It's no good Luna. At this point the only way you could pull this thread back would be to start on whether Vamp!Durkon is or is not Durkon.

Tell you what, add Vamp!Durkon to your ideal family as your nephew, Malack's adopted son! And then explicitly claim Real!Durkon would perform the wedding between you and Redcloak, with Vamp!Durkon as Redcloak's page. That might do it!:smallwink: