MS Paint Adventures VIII: H8ers Gonna H8

[Oracle_Hunter]

From Gez, Bard of Text:

"I'll pretend for a moment that you don't already know about MS Paint Adventures (www.mspaintadventures.com), Andrew Hussie (http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/)'s experimental more-or-less user-driven webcomic.

"MS Paint Adventures" seems to imply it's adventures in using MS Paint. This is false. None of the protagonists ever try to use MS Paint. It's not adventures made with MS Paint either, there's only one page (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1) ever made in MS Paint, the rest are made in Photoshop or Flash. However, it's true there are several adventures. Four at the moment: Jail Break (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1), Bard Quest (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=2), Problem Sleuth (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=4), and Homestuck (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6). You can pretty much safely ignore the first two, they're immature crap. Problem Sleuth is when it started to get good, and Homestuck is the currently on-going adventure, so it's the one that's going to be discussed in that thread.

Keen-eyed readers may notice the numbers in these URL. 1, 2, 4, 6? What happened to 3 and 5? Well, 3 (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=3) was some sort of easter-egg joke about the Midnight Crew. 5 (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=5) was the first attempt at making Homestuck, with the idea it'd be entirely in Flash. That was dropped as too time-intensive to create, and turned into some sort of in-joke easter-egg as well.

Which brings the next point: in-jokes. The comic is full of them. They constantly reference each other, and are full of callbacks. Here's a few of them:

What (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1&p=000003) Pumpkin (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1&p=000004)? : Jail Break introduced a useless contraption known as the Pumpkin Appearifier (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1&p=000081). It "appearifies" a pumpkin taken from somewhere else. As a result, that pumpkin disappears from the other place. Why anyone would create a teleporter that only works on pumpkins is a mystery; but this legacy has endured and there is a tradition still upheld in Homestuck to have gratuitous pumpkins in the story, here just to disappear without prior notice. Hussie's shop and imprint is called What Pumpkin? (http://whatpumpkin.com/index.html), but they don't sell pumpkin appearifiers there. Just shirts and discs and stuff.

Midnight Crew (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/extras/ps000013.html): during Problem Sleuth's run, one of the reader, known as Mayonaka, paid Hussie some money to star his D&D characters in a PS crossover. Hussie made them into a small-time bunch of thugs, and they become very popular, to the point that readers clamored for a series about them. Eventually, they turned up in Homestuck, although by then they didn't have much in common with Mayonaka's characters anymore.

Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/sweetbroandhellajeff/): This started on the Penny Arcade forum, as a mockery of someone's request for feedback for yet another of these "two guys chatting about games" comics meant to amuse a few of the author's direct friends and that's it. NWS? source, go to second page and look for S_O's posts (http://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/85435/higher-technology/p1). It became a vehicle for in-universe Homestuck memes, shared by the protagonists, which of course became real-world memes too because Homestuck fans.

Hussie used to have a site called Team Special Olympics (hence his PAF name of S_O) where he posted various creepy comics (http://www.andrewhussie.com/comics.php) and articles (http://www.andrewhussie.com/articles.php) about stuff he found on the net that was unsafe for work and mind both. If you dare digging around, you'll find the origins of a lot of other references and in-jokes later used in the comics.



Homestuck Music (http://homestuck.bandcamp.com) can be listened to at Bandcamp. One may also mention the fan music (http://homestuckgaiden.bandcamp.com/) while they're at it. Because Homestuck fans are exceedingly productive. Go on a music-sharing site like Tindeck (http://tindeck.com/) and count how many of the "popular tracks" have a Homestuck-derived avatar. That's usually between 60% and 90% of them. DeviantArt is less homestuckized, but only because there is a much larger userbase. You will still need more than a lifetime to see all pieces of HS fanart on DA.

http://i.imgur.com/dhXMx.jpg

Homestuck fans can be quite gross (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyFXNMVbO5Q). Don't be like them, try to remember how to function normally in society. For example, even if you're dressed-up as a bunch of alien clowns, don't go in a classy restaurant to noisily spit in a bucket. It's rude.

But Homestuck, and MSPA in general, didn't attract such a large number of socially-maladjusted fans if it didn't have some good qualities about it. It is a masterfully-written story, cohesive despite the user-driven shenanigans that shaped it at the start, and very intricate. It makes use of its medium (the web) in ways more clever than just an infinite canvas, as the entire site can change to represent a shift in narrative voice, or to tell a parallel story hidden in a little corner.

Still, there are times when you'll have to wonder just WTF is happening. Why is there suddenly a lengthy essay about troll romance? Why do we need weird made-up names for passionate hatred and platonic friendship? What does that thing about getting locked in the attic have to do with anything? Chances are that at these times, Hussie is trolling his fans. Because he loves to do so. It can be seen in the flippant tone with which he answers the formspring tumblr reddit (http://www.reddit.com/r/askhussie/comments/u0nov/first_seed_post_ask_questions_here_explanation_of/)questions readers ask of him on his tumblr (http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/). Unfortunately, this flippancy means that it's easy for a small controversy to degenerate into complete drama. An example would be when former music contributor Bill Bolin was removed from the music team after a misunderstanding escalated to full-on bridge burning. The most recent drama is about Hussie being racist since he declared his white kid protagonists were "canonically aracial" and you could pretend they were Asian or Black or whatever. Some tumblrers unearthed an old in-universe chatlog between two of the protagonists referring to a third character as being white, and the blogosphere exploded. There was an older, previous dramasplosion about sexism with the "bluh bluh huge bitch" thing applied to Vriska. Chances are more drama will inevitably happen in the future.

So, huh, keep in mind that Andrew Hussie is just an ordinary White American guy, not a perfect deific incarnation of Talent itself, and that he can make mistakes and be clumsy, especially when under the pressure of having to deal with a huge, obsessive, and often creepy fanbase.

So, just be reasonable people and all should be fine."

* * *

Previous threads:
MS Paint Adventures (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=94099)
MS Paint Adventures II: Who's Playing Who Now? (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=160173)
MS Paint Adventures III: [S] Comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=184714)
MS Paint Adventures 4: 13 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=212090)
MS Paint Adventures V: THIS IS STUPID (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=229151)
MS Paint Adventures 6:12 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=244942)
MS Paint Adventures 7: At the Price of Oblivion (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?263975-MS-Paint-Adventures-7-At-the-Price-of-Oblivion)

[Sigh]

Might want to edit that last part, the Caucasian debacle was quite a while ago so I don't think it should be brought up as if it happened just yesterday.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Might want to edit that last part, the Caucasian debacle was quite a while ago so I don't think it should be brought up as if it happened just yesterday.
Fair enough. I made note that it is "the most recent" drama, unless someone has a more recent drama that needs to be added? After all, Homestuck does produce "dramas" on a regular basis so I think noting that fact is relevant to anyone chancing upon this thread.

[Sigh]

Fair enough. I made note that it is "the most recent" drama, unless someone has a more recent drama that needs to be added? After all, Homestuck does produce "dramas" on a regular basis so I think noting that fact is relevant to anyone chancing upon this thread.

Unless you want to count the twice-over Gigapauses as dramas (which let's not kid ourselves, some would), I don't know of any myself.

[The Mormegil]

The first post was actually kind of informative for me.

[Sigh]

Getting back on track, it's good to see the gang back together bantering without it being super heavy. And while I'm still not super clear as to how Vriska knows how everything has played out so far, it's good to see a version of this post-travels adventure that has the crew actually prepared to get stuff done, as opposed to just derping around for 3 years then having their butts handed to them.

[Emperor Time]

I agree this was a good update. But it also worries me since the current situation seem to be going a little too well for our heroes which means there might be some catch to all of this. I think that new Vriska might secretly be working for Lord English since it explains why she made sure that Arquiusprite still occur and explains why she is planning to leave the group by herself to some kind of distant destination.

[Oracle_Hunter]

I agree this was a good update. But it also worries me since the current situation seem to be going a little too well for our heroes which means there might be some catch to all of this. I think that new Vriska might secretly be working for Lord English since it explains why she made sure that Arquiusprite still occur and explains why she is planning to leave the group by herself to some kind of distant destination.
Vriska wanting to be at the center of everything isn't a thing that ever stopped happening. Frankly, I'm surprised she didn't manage to make herself part of the Soul Scramble that makes up Lord English.

I'll agree that everything seems a bit too pat. Personally, I feel a bit at a loss for how Vriska was able to transition from self-absorbed murderer to Queen Auspisticer to everyone -- but I suspect a re-read of Act 5 Act 2 (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=004526) and from Game Over (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/GAMEOVER/) to now would straighten that out for me. I'm not saying the change is unbelievable; it's just a little unreal due to a lot of the action being implied.

[Randomguy]

I have a bad feeling about all this.

One of the things that bugs me is this particular chunk:

VRISKA: Terezi, please. Let's not 8icker in front of the party.
VRISKA: We need to 8e showing solidarity here!
TEREZI: W3 DO?
VRISKA: Yes. We are equally important to the party as its overarching executives. The ones with the most experience in the department of guile and ruthlessness.
VRISKA: I may project my voice louder than you, and 8orrow the spotlight for a little longer, 8ut you were always the soul of Team Scourge!
VRISKA: I couldn't 8e doing this without you. I wouldn't even want to!
TEREZI: 4W
TEREZI: Y34H, OK
TEREZI: YOU'R3 R1GHT... 1'M B3H1ND YOU 4LL TH3 W4Y!


See how Vriska sort of manipulates Terezi into agreeing with her there?
She's also been keeping a lot of her plans secret, which strikes me as odd.

Also, I'm sad that this version of Tavros didn't get to grow a spine (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007944).

[Devils_Advocate]

I could say what I think about Vriska's assessment that it would be inappropriate to favor any of her remaining deceased friends for prototyping, but Terezi already did. Frankly, I'd go so far as to say that Terezi having better judgement than Vriska is a pretty consistent difference between the two Scourge Sisters. Ironically, the Thief of Light is in a way even more prone to absolute thinking than her judgmental, justice-fixated counterpart; treating everything as if it were all the same shade of gray is even more oversimplified than seeing things in terms of black and white, if you see what I'm saying.

I'm kind of surprised that Arquiussprite apparently thinks that Eridan "deserves" revival more than Nepeta. Like, wow. Really, dude? Despite him speaking of two halves of himself having different opinions on the matter, I wonder whether the Auto-Responder's calculating nature might be overriding Equius' personal feelings, albeit in favor of something else that is also only important to the Equius part of him. Either that or, based on how he reacted to Fefetasprite pre-retcon, Arquius might want to avoid facing Nepeta again. Which is pretty sad. It implies that alpha Equius avoided alpha Nepeta in the dreambubbles, too. Which, come to think of it, is also kind of implied by the way that Equius seemed to be talking to Nepeta for the first time since his death when Arquius encountered Fefeta?

Sad. :(

I am unsurprised at Vriska's opinion on using the hemospectrum as a basis for... well, any decision at all, really. She's always been very status-conscious, but that doesn't require thinking that the statuses involved are deserved, just that they're relevant. And Alternia's 8.S. caste system is no longer relevant without the power structure that enforced it, so why should she give a rat's ass? That's the impression that I got from a much earlier exchange between her and Equius (in the Alterniabound walkaround (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=004692)), actually.

VRISKA: I must say, I am really disgusted 8y how you've resorted to following orders from that low class slo8 with the hideous mutant 8lood.
VRISKA: I thought you were 8etter than that! I thought WE were 8etter than that.
EQUIUS: D --> I...
EQUIUS: D --> You're absolutely right, it's disgraceful
EQUIUS: D --> I think it is possibly time to admit I have some sort of problem
EQUIUS: D --> I would very much like to honor my position on the hemospectrum and mistreat those beneath me, and yet...
VRISKA: Whoa, alright! I was just messing with you, dude. As if I really give a **** a8out any of that!
VRISKA: Hahahahahahahaha.

I imagine that her attitude was much more common on Alternia than Equius's and Eridan's. In particular, the idea that blood color itself is more important than its various correlates is obviously manufactured highblood dogma; if Equius intuitively believed this he wouldn't have found Gamzee and Aradia so confusing.

Actually, especially now that he has been merged with Lil Hal, it's... kind of weird that he's still so hung up on this stuff? The way that he refers to "the social order" (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=004121) and later expresses an interest in human class structure (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=004725) implies that his outlook is more culturally relative than one might assume. But then shouldn't he be more open to the idea that the hemospectrum is no longer particularly applicable to anything, if for less practical reasons than Vriska?

Wait...

Could it be that Arquiussprite is plotting to help the Empress?! Because... via the same value system that says that he should favor royalty over his moirail -- the value system that says that he should care about their royalty at all -- he should owe his ultimate loyalty to Her Imperial Condescension. And if Alternian-style civilization is restored, that makes its values relevant again. Indeed, if it can be restored, isn't it his duty to work towards its restoration? As one of the two last "true representatives" of his culture who retain its dominant values, is he not STRONGLY obligated to work with the other remaining such individual to revive that culture? Especially given that she's precisely the one who "should" be in charge.

So.. that possibility definitely stands out to me in light of posts above commenting that things seem to be going to well.

DUN DUN DUN?


See how Vriska sort of manipulates Terezi into agreeing with her there?
I assumed that Terezi was manipulating Vriska into believing that she had successfully manipulated Terezi. And not even subtly. Come on, suddenly saying "1'M B3H1ND YOU 4LL TH3 W4Y!" doesn't strike you as implausibly emphatic unless Terezi's just trying to convince Vriska that she's convinced?

I think that it's important to read this in the context of the background that we've been given, to wit, that Terezi has always been better than Vriska at mind games. Barring evidence that that has changed since Hivebent, I think it's quite reasonable to assume that it's still the case.

[ImperatorV]

So, finally we see some of those "Fast and Loose" panels promised. Seems tolerable.

Vriska's dialogue here is reminding me of Aranea. Uh oh.

If she is indeed conspiring to create Lord English as many seem to think, I'm willing to bet her trip is going to be going after the house juju. She has met her GO-timeline self and knew ret-John and Roxy were going to show up, it's not a stretch that she would be aware of it's existence. And the ultimate hero Vriska, showing up at the last second to defeat Lord English with the ultimate weapon? Tell me that is not classic Vriska. The real question is, how is it going to backfire?

[The Mormegil]

I think this isn't going as well as people make it out. Terezi seems to depend a lot on Vriska, and I'm not sure it's sarcasm when she says she's behind her all the way. Karkat avoiding leadership and responsibility is also bad news - he was a good leader, in his own way. Plus, Dave seems somewhat less motivated than before. Everyone seems more submissive and less interested. More prepared, perhaps, but that's not to say it's better.

Plus, we still need to switch Terezi with !NotBlind Terezi. I think this Terezi being dependent on Vriska is a sign of that happening. Karkat needs to snap back to reality, and I think that's going to happen thanks to John. After Vriska betrays them all, of course.

[Great equalizer]

Plus, we still need to switch Terezi with !NotBlind Terezi.
Not going to happen. Seeing Terezi from GAME OVER is dead and doomed and most likely ceased to exist when John and Roxy left.

What are they going to do with two Roxies?

[Fralex]

Not going to happen. Seeing Terezi from GAME OVER is dead and doomed and most likely ceased to exist when John and Roxy left.

What are they going to do with two Roxies?

Well, the Roxy in this universe was killed. Unless Jane revives her.

Unrelated, and maybe this was covered in a previous thread, but I just read through the latest few Act Act Acts to refresh my memory, and I was reminded of something really baffling. Why doesn't Roxy seem to remember defakifying the Matriorb in the Derse jail?

[Great equalizer]

Well, the Roxy in this universe was killed.
Eh. I completely missed that this timeline is where dreambubble Jane is from.
Then it's strange that nobody mentioned Roxy's recent death.


Why doesn't Roxy seem to remember defakifying the Matriorb in the Derse jail?
She didn't. She made several part Matriorbs, part Perfectly Generic Objects, and that's it.

[The Mormegil]

Not going to happen. Seeing Terezi from GAME OVER is dead and doomed and most likely ceased to exist when John and Roxy left.

What are they going to do with two Roxies?

I think their Roxy is dead.

Also I think Terezi from GAME OVER is going to be reanimated by Jane, and is going to switch with this one (which will die in her place). There is no reason for her to outline herself in blue if not for John to be able to port there when needed.

[Fralex]

She didn't. She made several part Matriorbs, part Perfectly Generic Objects, and that's it.

http://cdn.mspaintadventures.com/storyfiles/hs2/06460.gif

Ohhhh, now I see it. I was trying to figure out if there was something wrong with the egg, but didn't notice the beveled corner at the bottom. Weird that she didn't mention to John she got halfway there, I can't have been the only reader who got confused by that. ...right?

[Draconi Redfir]

I think their Roxy is dead.

Also I think Terezi from GAME OVER is going to be reanimated by Jane, and is going to switch with this one (which will die in her place). There is no reason for her to outline herself in blue if not for John to be able to port there when needed.

It's a police/law thing, when there is a crime scene they outline the victum's body in chalk so they can safely move it off the crime scene while investigating further.

And there's really no reason for alive but blind Terezi to be replaced with seeing dead terezi.Some majour factors here.

not-blind Terezi is dead. We saw her die. she had the big "Dead!" words over her and everything
Blid Terezi is signifficantly alive.
Even if not-blind Terezi wasn't dead, why have John go through so much effort to save vriska and un-make her relationship with gamzee (the source of a lot of problems for her) if she (the one with said problems) was just going to replace the one who never had those problems to begin with?
Terezi always regretted becoming not-blind, she only did it for Gamzee and she preffered BEING blind.
Also not-blind Terezi was on Roxy's planet when she died, not Johns. they never took her body, and only John's planet was safely brought to nowhere, so in essense, not-blind terezi's body has ceased to exist.

[Squark]

Enough debate! There's a new potato!

And, say it with me and John now, d'awww.

[Hytheter]

Jail Break (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=1), Bard Quest (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=2), Problem Sleuth (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=4), and Homestuck (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6). You can pretty much safely ignore the first two, they're immature crap.

Yoooo don't ignore Jailbreak. It's silly, but it's short and mildly amusing. The following adventures also have lots of Jailbreak callbacks; self referential humour is a big part of MSPA, and by skipping you miss out on that.

[Rakaydos]

What has poor feteta done to anyone?
Like, ever? (mooks dont count)

It feels like that statement is reallyhanging a lampshade on how little those two characters are used.

[Calemyr]

What has poor feteta done to anyone?
Like, ever? (mooks dont count)

It feels like that statement is reallyhanging a lampshade on how little those two characters are used.

I hope Terezi gets to prototype Feferi and Nepeta. I always loved the sweet honesty of Nepeta and was really bummed to see her die. And it would be awesome to see Feferi, even as a sprite, get properly pissed off and go into "leader mode". Sort of a "no, this is how you lead your people!" middle finger to the Condesce.

But, yeah, the current situation is not all rainbows and sunshine. Vriska has matured a lot, but not as much as a million years of being dead and irrelevant matured her. I don't think she's going the Aranea route, though. I believe she and Terezi are moirails, both manipulating each other to keep on the straight and narrow. Karkat is being Karkat - he has always been teetering between folding up into a dwarf star of self pity and exploding into a supernova of outrage at everyone else's incompetence. Even in the Game Over timeline, he wasn't acting or thinking as a leader anymore. The fact that he is able to go nova is actually a promising sign - I don't think he could leave the party to fall apart if Vriska was removed from the equation, in spite of his claims to the contrary. And while Tavros hasn't grown a spine, exactly, he's a lot more firm in his statements. Vriska doesn't seem to scare him anymore and he's pretty vocal about his support of her. That isn't the same Tavros we saw before - a different kind of maturation, but maturation none the less.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Vriska is intending to ally with the Condesce, not least because of her kinda-connection with Meenah.

And finally, yes, John is right. That was adorable.

[Rakaydos]

I suspect that johns retcon powers will not change anything that has "already happened" in the Furthest Ring. If he dooned the creation of lord english, you'd still have a doomed timeline lord english rampaging around, because hes a time player.

Clearly, john needs to make Lady Callope a thing, merged with the serket sisters and jade...

[Calemyr]

I suspect that johns retcon powers will not change anything that has "already happened" in the Furthest Ring. If he dooned the creation of lord english, you'd still have a doomed timeline lord english rampaging around, because hes a time player.

Clearly, john needs to make Lady Callope a thing, merged with the serket sisters and jade...

The dream bubbles are outside of continuity. Probably why Lord English despises them, come to think of it - as a Lord of Time, their presence must give him a migraine.

Note that while Doomed Rose ceased to exist (that timeline ceased to provide anything useful after Dave left), the John from that reality was still around to show Vriska around his dream bubble. Also, the entire Beforus troll group is only around because the Scratch (which retcons the universe) can't touch them if they're already in the bubbles.

Ergo, retconning Lord English could possibly work as long as he's still alive and in a place the retcon could affect him. This could include triggering a Scratch while he's in the Cherub Instance, resulting in Lady Calliope instead.

At first I just was trying to work out what you could create with the remaining 5 prototyping slots. Of course that would end with Tavros+Calliope and Vriska+Terezi combined together using the last kernel sprite... Would that create another black hole or an abomination of nature that could rival Lord English?

Of course, if Caliope's corpse is just sitting there in Cherub Prospit... John COULD prototype her, couldn't he? PASSWORD: Twist x3 Combo

[Rakaydos]

Callope, Jake English, and (reprogrammed) Tiaratop Jane merged into Lady English,
vs
Caliborn, Arquis, and (retcon) Half Sollux merged into Lord Engish.

[Great equalizer]

So is Davesprite gone for good now? He died along with John and LoWaS in the new timeline, and what was the last time we saw him in GAME OVER 'line? Maybe he's on LoWaS that John brought back.

[mythmonster2]

So is Davesprite gone for good now? He died along with John and LoWaS in the new timeline, and what was the last time we saw him in GAME OVER 'line? Maybe he's on LoWaS that John brought back.

Update seems to indicate that, yup, Davesprite is gone, as far as we know. I'm expecting him to return somehow, though, since this seems like a really lame way for him to leave the story. I think the last time we saw him was when he left the ship while John was sleeping just after they arrived in the Beta timeline.

EDIT: Nope, search seems to indicate that he was with all the other sprites (http://mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008502) on Jake(?)'s land during Jake's hopesplosion.

[Aquillion]

I believe it's been implied that the sprites are actually necessary to complete the game somehow... and I doubt that Davesprite would be completely written out of the story this way, so we'll probably see a version of him somehow.

[Derjuin]

Has anyone else noticed that the updates for 4/29 and 4/30 keep, like, disappearing? Half the time I go back to the site, and 4/28 is the latest, with no ==> command after John goes "d'aww". :smallconfused:

[ImperatorV]

Has anyone else noticed that the updates for 4/29 and 4/30 keep, like, disappearing? Half the time I go back to the site, and 4/28 is the latest, with no ==> command after John goes "d'aww". :smallconfused:

Yeah there's something up with the site. If you refresh a couple times it comes back.

[The Mormegil]

Yeah there's something up with the site. If you refresh a couple dozen times it comes back.

^My experience

[Oracle_Hunter]

I needed to refresh this Potato a dozen times each page, but it was worth it.
I'm glad that Hussie figured out how to write these pages without massive WALLS OF TEXT eventually. That was by far my greatest annoyance with early-to-mid Homestuck.

But this stuff is all pretty excellent :smallbiggrin:

[zabbarot]

Has anyone else noticed that the updates for 4/29 and 4/30 keep, like, disappearing? Half the time I go back to the site, and 4/28 is the latest, with no ==> command after John goes "d'aww". :smallconfused:

Thank you for mentioning this. I thought it hadn't actually updated at all.

The only page I could see them from was the archive : /

[Fralex]

So, I gotta say.

No matter what the stakes get ramped up to,

No matter what epic battles take place,

No matter what cool lore we learn,

Moments like these are the things I look forward to most in Homestuck. Just a bunch of friends finally getting together to enjoy each other's company.

Throughout the entire story, the kids are usually isolated from one another. Heck, they apparently talked with each other over the internet for years, never meeting face-to-face until after Sburb began. Sometimes two people will come tantalizingly close to meeting, like when John visited Rose while she was asleep on LOLAR, or Roxy's attempts to meet her mother. The whole thing with the way paradox space keeps certain people from coming together in dream bubbles sort of brings this theme to the foreground, but it's always there, a nagging desire to just see these kids all be in the same place at the same time, with no life-threatening circumstances to prevent them from enjoying it. The stated goal is the liberation of all of paradox space, but when you get right down to it, this is a story about long-distance relationships, making good friends over the internet without ever meeting them, and how special it is to meet a good friend in person for the first time.

It's just such a beautiful thing, this human emotion called friendship.

[Great equalizer]

(resists urge to shout "FRIENDSHIP IS NOT AN EMOTION YOU [randomswearing]")

[Sigh]

A new update coming with one of those "Choose your conversation" dealios. Only the top left is "filled in" though.

WELL we're just jumpin right in aren't we? Conversation with John, Dave, and Karkat goes over Dave's new... views? on relationships and how they really work and all that. Super philosophical in ways that I, personally, find unsatisfying. Then we jump into black romance and how it actually works in an interpersonal level, ending up with they Dave and John's views on the whole "alpha kids" thing. Lots of stuff to dig into, can't wait to see how everyone else sees things.

[Oracle_Hunter]

A new update coming with one of those "Choose your conversation" dealios. Only the top left is "filled in" though.

WELL we're just jumpin right in aren't we? Conversation with John, Dave, and Karkat goes over Dave's new... views? on relationships and how they really work and all that. Super philosophical in ways that I, personally, find unsatisfying. Then we jump into black romance and how it actually works in an interpersonal level, ending up with they Dave and John's views on the whole "alpha kids" thing. Lots of stuff to dig into, can't wait to see how everyone else sees things.
Apparently Walls of Text aren't a thing that ever stopped happening :smallsigh:
That said, there are some real gems in this Potato.
Karkat definitely falls into my "I am hilarious and you will quote everything I say" bucket.
I could listen to Troll Romance Talk all day. Which is good, because that is how Hussie rolls.

[Randomguy]

Truly, the clockwork of friendship turns ceaselessly, operating the swing-lever dealies of harassment in perpetuity.


This entire update was magnificent, but my favourite bit was Karkat telling John that what he felt towards Terezi was black romance, and the way it just completely shook his worldview.

I also liked the contrast between John and Dave's ideas on sexuality. John never really had any opportunities to expand his own views, while Dave spent the last three years being the only heterosexual person around, so it completely makes sense for him to have spent a long time thinking about it.

[Devils_Advocate]

I'm glad that I haven't had any trouble getting updates to show up. Although the "LATEST PAGES" section of the page has been quite inaccurate for a while, and thus has pretty much ceased to function as an indicator of how much recent content there is. A relatively minor nuisance, though I can't help but wonder what the deal there is. Now it even lists a 4/30/15 update as 5/1/15. Screwy. The "Adventure Log" page appears to be perfectly fine, which is fortunate, but the weirdness going on here seems even weirder in light of that. Ah well.


I'm glad that Hussie figured out how to write these pages without massive WALLS OF TEXT eventually. That was by far my greatest annoyance with early-to-mid Homestuck.
What the heck are you talking about. The long, rambling conversations between friends freaking make Homestuck.

Also, SPOKE TOO SOON, SUCKER!

Also also, it looks like we will have many, many such conversations to look forward to in the near future.

It is going to be so, so beautiful.

[Aquillion]

Hussie basically confirmed that the entire rest of the comic (until the big endgame) is going to consist of big rambling blocks of teenagers arguing with each other.

[GorinichSerpant]

I am mildly amused about the way in which the alpha and beta kid's family tree thing is convoluted and absurd like say the Egyptian Pantheon, and will get more ridiculous as romances develop.

[zabbarot]

Hussie basically confirmed that the entire rest of the comic (until the big endgame) is going to consist of big rambling blocks of teenagers arguing with each other.

Come for the plot, stay for the teenage squabbling? also shipping.

[Draconi Redfir]

I am mildly amused about the way in which the alpha and beta kid's family tree thing is convoluted and absurd like say the Egyptian Pantheon, and will get more ridiculous as romances develop.

THE family tree isn't all that messed up actually. Jane, Roxy, Jake, and Dirk are each their own singuler parent, Jane and Jake are the parents of John and Jade, Roxy and Dirk are the parents of Dave and Rose, pretty simple actually.

it's the romances that can get a little twisted up yes, pretty sure that's what you ment anyways:smalltongue:

[Squark]

That means the Alpha kids are technically their children's half siblings, though.

[Draconi Redfir]

ummm... How?:smallconfused:

http://i.imgur.com/x2rmPG1.png

Rose, Jake, Dirk, and Jane are litterally their own singuler genetic parent. there are no half siblings in this family.

[Devils_Advocate]

ummm... How?:smallconfused:
By being their own parents.



Roxy Dirk Jane Jake
| | | | | | | |
Roxy +---+ Dirk Jane +---+ Jake
| |
| |
+---+ +---+
| | | |
Rose Dave Jade John



Hmm, maybe this one is clearer:



Roxy Dirk Jane Jake
| | | | | | | |
| +----------+ | | +----------+ |
| | | | | |
| +---+ | | +---+ |
| | | | | | | |
Roxy Rose Dave Dirk Jane Jade John Jake



Of course, that's even assuming that characters "are" their pre-Scratch counterparts, which itself is dubious.

Actually, maybe distinguishing between the two helps to make the point here, so:



Rose's Mom Dave's Bro John's Nanna Jade's Grandpa
| | | | | | | |
| +----------+ | | +----------+ |
| | | | | |
| +---+ | | +---+ |
| | | | | | | |
Roxy Rose Dave Dirk Jane Jade John Jake

[Draconi Redfir]

Genetically speaking, Roxy and Rose's mom are the exact same person etc, ergo Roxy is effectively her own genetic mother, as is the case with the other alpha kids.

and that... that thing you're doing there where you're putting Roxy next to Rose... that's completely unnecessary, and... not really how it works? Rose's mom (roxy) is still Roxy's (biological) mom as well, she is literally her own mother, and her DNA combines to create Rose. shifting her to be beside Rose on the tree doesn't make her half-sisters, it just makes a crooked tree.

They could have been odd STEP sisters if Rose's mom (Roxy) had hooked up with Roxy's mom (Rose) but that never happened so... You're really just over-complicating a very simple family line here.

[Devils_Advocate]

Rose's mom (roxy) is still Roxy's (biological) mom as well
Yeah, that's the point here. ROSE AND ROXY HAVE THE SAME MOM, BUT NOT THE SAME DAD (what with Roxy not even having a dad), THUS MAKING THEM HALF-SISTERS.

I don't see why you seem to be having a hard time seeing how Squark's statement is true.

[Squark]

Yeah, that's the point here. ROSE AND ROXY HAVE THE SAME MOM, BUT NOT THE SAME DAD (what with Roxy not even having a dad), THUS MAKING THEM HALF-SISTERS.

I don't see why you seem to be having a hard time seeing how Squark's statement is true.

Easy, there. Not that big a deal.

Anyway, it ultimately comes down to what the kids decide themselves. Siblings just happens to be one of the options that requires the least adjustment- After all, Rose already learned she had a brother, why not a sister as well.

[Devils_Advocate]

Easy, there. Not that big a deal.
But it's fun getting worked up about things that don't matter.

I mean, come on. Implying that putting all of someone's offspring in one row is somehow twisting things to make it falsely look like said offspring are all siblings and/or half-siblings? Saying that it's "completely unnecessary" to make a diagram illustrating my point, as though he didn't just do exactly the same thing? This obviously demands a response, even if it's actually entirely unimportant, and the entire exercise is little more than an absurd ROLE-PLAYING SCENARIO. It's still fun, though. ;)


Anyway, it ultimately comes down to what the kids decide themselves. Siblings just happens to be one of the options that requires the least adjustment- After all, Rose already learned she had a brother, why not a sister as well.
TT: I didn't actually need the ectobiological verification that she was like a mother and a sister at the same time. I always understood that somehow.
- http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=005538

[GorinichSerpant]

Well the actual family tree isn't particularly tangled the way the people inside it perceive each other is. Rose and Roxy both see the other as a mom who is also the same age her, Dave also sees Roxy as the mother he never had while John sees her as a romantic partner. It's already slightly giving me a headache without even mentioning that there are 4 other people, one of whose stique is being fractured into various versions of himself. The only way their potential relationship web couldn't be more tangled is if it didn't include the trolls.

[Murk]

I find it funny how everyone is "No, it isn't really complex. This dude is his own dad and he's the genetic but not really physical dad of this guy while this girl is her own mom and - etc.", which, to me, screams complex.

This summarizes pretty much my entire experience with homestuck, though. I still understand **** about it, and all the other fans saying "noooo it's pretty simple" only make that more entertaining.

It's got something, though, something I find hugely entertaining for a reason I don't know yet, so I'm in 'till the end.

[Gez]

Fair enough. I made note that it is "the most recent" drama, unless someone has a more recent drama that needs to be added? After all, Homestuck does produce "dramas" on a regular basis so I think noting that fact is relevant to anyone chancing upon this thread.

Honestly it might be time someone went to the effort of writing a new OP. :smalltongue:

[Sigh]

Well THIS update isn't going to re-ignite the Vriska wars or anything, no siree.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Honestly it might be time someone went to the effort of writing a new OP. :smalltongue:
> Gez: Write a new OP :smallcool:

Re: Potato
And that's the Vriska we all know and loathe love :smallbiggrin:

[Randomguy]

She's back.

[Aquillion]

Poor Jape.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Christ I hate Vriska so much.
Like, with Caliborn and Gamzee, while I know that they are technically terrible or whatever, they have an inherent level of absurdity that makes them more tolerable. Like, a split-personality juggalo mass murderer? That's inherently absurd and kind of funny.
But Vriska is at her most terrible when she's doing stuff like this- bullying people to make herself feel better. Like, yes, she threw Tavros off a cliff and that's pretty absurd, but most of her terrible things are just being a petty bully.

Vriska is worse than almost all the other characters (except one, in my opinion) because I can full expect to meet people like her in real life. Much less likely to do so with Caliborn and Gamzee.

The other terrible character is Cronus, because we've all met that douchebag...

[Shogo]

My fondness for ladies who wear glasses can only go so far . . . I must now align myself with the Vriska haters.

Which is actually quite the feat. I've never particularly cared for Jake, but you don't go ****ting all over Tavros' commendable efforts to make the guy actually feel good about himself while he's in this funk.

At least it's still possible to express a fondness for Aranea.

[ImperatorV]

Yeah there was literally no reason for her to do that. Morally ambiguous actions for a possibly greater good is one thing, this is another. If someone else on the team doesn't call her out I'll be annoyed.

[The Mormegil]

Yeah there was literally no reason for her to do that. Morally ambiguous actions for a possibly greater good is one thing, this is another. If someone else on the team doesn't call her out I'll be annoyed.

This is actually more fuel for the "Vriska working for English" idea.

[Squark]

This is actually more fuel for the "Vriska working for English" idea.

Eh, I can see the possibility, but frankly, Vriska doesn't need to be working for a greater cause to be a jerk to Tavros or someone who reminds her of him.

And, for that matter, sabotaging the humans' battle with him doesn't actually benefit Lord English- It's how he got to the position he's in, after all.

[guttering flame]

idk, Vriska may look like the bad guy and Tavros like the good guy but thanks to Vriska Jake will know the truth about Tavros from early on and be taken by surprise: he's lame and not worth much as a friend. Seriously? starting to call Jake 'Jape' after Vriska threw that name into the conversation? Tavros is like a pair of paper crutches. He looks good and makes nice, dare I say empty conversation for Jake but as soon as any pressure is put on he crumbles. He's a ****ty friend.

Jake's ghost friend is a real friend. Not just someone who says some half-assed pretty things.

[Draconi Redfir]

i'll agree that what she said were rude an uneccicary, not going to say i hate her though. there is a reason after all that the "8luh 8luh huge 8itch!" thing started with her.

[Fralex]

Yeah, that's the point here. ROSE AND ROXY HAVE THE SAME MOM, BUT NOT THE SAME DAD (what with Roxy not even having a dad), THUS MAKING THEM HALF-SISTERS.

Wait, but I thought grown-up Rose was Roxy's mom? That's what they've been calling her in the story.

[Draconi Redfir]

kinda sorta not really. She's not Roxy's genetic mother, and she never even raised Roxy. More like she was just this strange historical figure Roxy felt a bond with and started calling "mom" despite the fact that she'd been dead for 600 years.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Potato!
This Vriska is making more sense to me as these pages update. She's got what I'd call "wisdom" -- knowledge of her personal flaws and how ignoring one's personal flaws can wreck that person. Note, of course, that having wisdom doesn't make your flaws go away: at best it gives you the insight to work around them. As we saw from the last potato, she still hasn't gained insight on the hazards of blasting people that you don't respect when you disagree with them :smalltongue:

Also, what are we calling her? Or what do we call former-Alpha-Vriska?

[Randomguy]

I'm starting to think that the wallet that John was supposed to give "her" was really, really important, and things are going to go terribly wrong because he didn't do that last step.

[The Mormegil]

I'm starting to think that the wallet that John was supposed to give "her" was really, really important, and things are going to go terribly wrong because he didn't do that last step.


Maybe. Maybe it's something he has yet to do.

[Devils_Advocate]

This summarizes pretty much my entire experience with homestuck, though. I still understand **** about it, and all the other fans saying "noooo it's pretty simple" only make that more entertaining.
Homestuck as a whole, at least, is definitely not simple. It's not so complicated that it's impossible to understand, but keeping track of everything and how it relates to everything else is a challenge by design.


The thing is, Homestuck is both a story and a puzzle, by design and by definition. If asked to define it, “a story that’s also a puzzle” is as close to true as any answer I’d give.
Should all entertainment be like that? No way. But something should be like that, because something like that should exist. That’s why puzzles exist, because puzzles are cool sometimes, and are challenging. We don’t go up to a jigsaw puzzle and go, “why the **** is this in so many different PIECES, what kind of IDIOT would break this nice picture into TINY LITTLE BITS?!!” Nor do we want all of our nice pictures broken into bits like that. Some we just want to hang on walls and look at.
But unlike a jigsaw puzzle, there’s much to enjoy without having to solve it. Fun characters and silly moments. But if you turn your brain on, you can engage with the complexity and depth. If you turn it ALL the way on, you can get everything, and solve the puzzle. There is a range of ways to interface with it, from the casual to the maniacal. Failing to grasp everything shouldn’t preclude basic enjoyment, nor is it a symptom of failure by either the reader or the story.

Various temporal shenanigans are pretty much gratuitously convoluted in nature, and are rather obviously the time travel counterpart to Problem Sleuth's elaborate network of spacial connections via portals and imagination forts and so on.


I am mildly amused about the way in which the alpha and beta kid's family tree thing is convoluted and absurd like say the Egyptian Pantheon, and will get more ridiculous as romances develop.
Well, they are gods.


Wait, but I thought grown-up Rose was Roxy's mom? That's what they've been calling her in the story.
Yeah, Roxy's Mom and Dirk's Bro were kind of their adopted caretakers despite not being alive at the same time as Roxy and Dirk (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=006763). Roxy and Dirk also presumed them to be their biological ancestors under the Condesce's regime (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=006748), and perhaps Roxy's Mom and Dirk's Bro believed the same thing. But they (all four of them, actually, not just Roxy and Dirk) were actually created in the B1 session (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=006605). Rose's Mom is Roxy's ectobiological "parent". Squark and I were talking about what follows if she is considered their "parent" on that basis.

But something to consider is that (at least based on my understanding) the mother/daughter relationship is genetically symmetrical. A woman's mother and/or daughter shares half of her chromosomes and her mitochondrial DNA. And the relationship between ectobilogical parents and offspring, even if not the same, is presumably still symmetrical. So, if you say that Roxy is Rose's "genetic mother" because Rose was produced using genetic material from a temporal duplicate of Roxy, which gives her the same genes as if the paradox slime had been collected from Roxy herself... then why not also say that Rose is Roxy's genetic mother because they have the same genetic relationship to each other as they would have if Roxy had been made using paradox slime from Rose, rather than vice versa?

For that matter, why not say that all of these characters and all real human beings are "genetic clones of themselves", regardless of how they were produced? That's just as accurate in the same way, isn't it?

The problem here is that the familial relationships between the players are at best analogous to conventional familial relationships, being as their origins are peculiarly different from those of normal human beings. (Indeed, it is questionable whether paradox clones, including second-generation paradox clones like the B1 players, qualify as humans/trolls/etc., given that they are unrelated to their nominal species by heredity.) And, naturally, what conclusions one reaches depend on what analogies one chooses to draw. If we simply discard our preconceived categories and describe the situation on its own terms, it's much simpler.

Rose and Roxy are each other's dancestors (http://mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/Dancestor).

There, now, that wasn't so hard, was it? :P

(Well, actually, if we assume that second-generation paradox clones each receive most their alleles from the ectobiological "parent" whose appearance they mirror, as seems likely, then there's the added complication that John and Jane are each other's ancestors by adoption, as are Jade and Jake, but John and Jake are genetic dancestors, as are Jade and Jane. Also, John's and Jane's guardians aren't their dancestors, and furthermore Jane's Dad may be the one guardian who is still alive at this point? So, in conclusion, it isn't simple at all, really.)


Also, what are we calling her? Or what do we call former-Alpha-Vriska?
How about "alive Vriska" and "ghost Vriska" respectively? Seems simple and straightforward enough.

There may well be other ghost Vriskas, but I don't think that we've seen any, so I think that it's clear enough in context. And, really, just "Vriska" is gonna be clear enough in most contexts. Like how it was unnecessary for John and Jade to call Davesprite "Davesprite" instead of just "Dave" most of the time on their journey across the Yellow Yard. (John even brought this up at one point.)

[zabbarot]

Potato!
This Vriska is making more sense to me as these pages update. She's got what I'd call "wisdom" -- knowledge of her personal flaws and how ignoring one's personal flaws can wreck that person. Note, of course, that having wisdom doesn't make your flaws go away: at best it gives you the insight to work around them. As we saw from the last potato, she still hasn't gained insight on the hazards of blasting people that you don't respect when you disagree with them :smalltongue:

Also, what are we calling her? Or what do we call former-Alpha-Vriska?

I'm starting to think that dying helped her understand that, but I could be misremembering. Before John did his windy retcon, wasn't ghost Vriska mostly more well adjusted than current Vriska?

[Sigh]

Well this was an interesting little bit of fun, Dave getting massive mommy issues at the prospect of a female parental figure that isn't even his, Lalondes being adorable on all fronts, and Rose ultimately coming to the conclusion that everything dealing with herself is meaningless. Also we seem to have replaced Davesprite with Rosesprite???

[guttering flame]

It sounds like John should do some retconning

[Squark]

Or maybe the kids should find something Rose and Tavros are okay with being prototyped with.Or play a game of dodgeball with the sprites. Whichever the sprites refer.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Crazy Lightbulb Moment!
What happens if two single-prototyped Kernels touch each other :smalleek:

[Devils_Advocate]

It took me a while to find the scene, but apparently Jaspersprite showing up at Rose's funeral is something that we saw (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009180). So I guess that he must have journeyed to LOWAS from LOTAK (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008502) at some point? The remaining sprites seem to have converged there for some reason, rather like how the sprites in the B1 session eventually made their way to Skaia.

Maybe they all came to LOWAS before John, uh... pocket-dimensioned it? Yeah, screw it, "pocket dimension" is a verb now, apparently. Anyway, there are presumably two Jaspersprites now, so why not two Nannasprites* and two Arquiussprites, plus a Davesprite and an Erisolsprite, in addition to two different Roses? WHY THE HELL NOT. Sprites seem to be completely exempt from normal rules about who should be dead, even if they're instead subject to special rules of their own.

It's implied that all of the troll's lususprites died at some point. Possibly sprites are doomed to perish before their associated game sessions are over. Or maybe it's a rule that all players have to lose guardians at some point after they enter the game, or maybe even that they have to lose them for good? That's sort of going to happen to the B2 kids when the B1 kids get trapped in Caliborn's juju, unless the two groups are subsequently reunited. But if that's why the lususprites died, that would mean that they were subject to normal mortality rules. Like, unless that counts as the rule still applying to the trolls rather than still applying to the sprites, even though it does apply to the sprites indirectly, despite actually affecting them more directly than to those who it directly applies to, if you can kinda see what I'm saying?

...

This is all so very, very dumb indeed.

*I checked, and Nannasprite wasn't killed when LOWAS exploded. (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008966)
In looking through the archives, I also found a diagram of the individuals who presumably are "still" converging on the Medium post-retcon (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008121). Along with Betty Crocker I guess? We still haven't found out what happened with her "this time" yet. Why hasn't she, say, mind-controlled Karkat yet? As just one example of as-of-yet unexplained lack of influence on her part.

Maybe she's been telepathically monitoring everything that's been going on here instead because she knows now that Vriska would just K.O. anyone she controls?

What happens if two single-prototyped Kernels touch each other :smalleek:
I imagine that they just join together into a sprite that can still be prototyped again. Look at it as either sprite being prototyped with the other; or as each one being prototyped with the other, since the result is the same either way around.

If I'm right about how this works, it's possible to pile an unlimited number of prototypings onto one sprite, provided that you have enough kernels.

You know, in case you wanted to do that for some crazy reason.
There has been some really choice dialogue in these conversations, which really doesn't come as a surprise given their length. Like, if there weren't at least a few pretty good parts in all of this text, that would mark a significant decline in Hussie's writing.

Roxy continues to be the best charater in homestuck (http://mspaforums.com/showthread.php?58596-Homestuck-Character-Popularity-Tier-List-3). I'm not sure why I find it so amusing and adorable just to see her somehow making a typo out loud and using a smiling party hat emoticon but

ROXY: im redy <|:)
HOW IS SHE SO CUTE.

I also like how Dave manages to summarize his entire conversation style.

DAVE: i bring up a lot of things
DAVE: and then have to back track a lot of those things i bring up
DAVE: cause sometimes the things i bring up are ill advised to say or make people uncomfortable or make me uncomfortable
DAVE: its just a thing about me

DAVE: i just say things it is just like this force of nature no one can control or even try to, least of all me
DAVE: we just have to cross our fingers and hope for the best
DAVE: and that my one man verbal slapstick routine isnt too freudian in nature or at least not that often
Interesting to see Karkat expressing an opinion opposite Kanaya's on Vriska's influence over the course of their journey. Kanaya surmises that Vriska probably prevented a lot of drama, as we saw, while Karkat suggests that things would have been peaceful if only she hadn't been there. Although I suspect that that isn't because Karkat seriously believes that per se, and he's just using the best plausible-sounding insult he could come up with. I get the impression that that's a thing that he does.

The trolls are verbally conflating the romantic quadrants with their associated symbols (e.g. "spades-crushing"), which I think isn't something that we've seen them do before, but it is something that we've seen Dave do, so this fits in with what he said about them picking up each other's lingo. Not unlike Eridan and Sollux using aquatic puns as a result of their association with Feferi. (I think that they actually aren't fish puns most of the time, so that's frankly kind of a pretty dumb thing to call them.)

On the other hand, I think that we saw Vriska use "pale" as a synonym for "conciliatory" before, so that's not new, but it is kind of weird, since the pale quadrant covers moirallegiance specifically. That means that trolls sometimes, if only informally, use the word for a thing to refer to a superset of that thing. And it's completely implausible that such ambiguity would simply crop in natural language. I mean come on.

Seriously though, I guess that the emotions involved in auspisticism also might actually be identical to those associated with moirallegiance and/or kismesissitude, in at least some cases? Like, if Troll A has pale feelings towards Troll B and Troll B has caliginous feelings towards Troll C, then Troll A might wind up serving as auspistice to Trolls B and C. This is basically what we saw with Kanaya, Vriska, and Tavros, except it didn't work out because of reasons.

Troll romance sure is weird!

Several similarities to earlier conversations that I noticed:

Kanaya refers to Vriska keeping tabs on her as "spying", which is exactly how Vriska complained about Kanaya doing the same thing to her in I think the first conversation we ever saw between them, even though in both cases that's a preposterous way to describe it, because she's being completely open about it and secrecy is, like, an essential ingredient of spying? Like, spying isn't just observing someone, that's not what the word "spying" means, come on.

VRISKA: What! Why?
VRISKA: No, that's a normal way of putting it!
VRISKA: I mean... it's a pretty normal thing to say, right? When you want... someone... to pipe down?

JOHN: what! why?
JOHN: no, that's a normal way of putting it!
JOHN: i mean... it's a pretty normal thing to say, right? when that's... how... you are?
Man, these textual callbacks are much easier to spot when one occurs so soon after the other.

Vriska once again says that nobody really cares about a secret of Karkat's, although this time it's obvious that she personally does. (It's not obvious that really cared about his blood color.) Although I guess she can't want to know about it all that much if she hasn't just read his mind. Doing that can't be all that unpleasant.

[GorinichSerpant]

Karkat your insecurities are showing.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Potato!

Roxy continues to be the best character in Homestuck.
Also, is Vriska <3 for Arquiusprite? Because that's a bit... odd.

[Sigh]

Flustered Dave continues to be one of the most hilarious things in existence, bar none.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Potato!

Roxy continues to be the best character in Homestuck.
Also, is Vriska <3 for Arquiusprite? Because that's a bit... odd.

Not odd if she's actually on Team LE.

But considering her noted inability to have lasting Flushed relationships, what does that portend? Surely she is open is Kismesis with LE (see Ghost Vriska) and her current attitude suggests Matesprit with Arquiuisprite -- which foreshadows a Double Reacharound! But such would be doomed as LE is purely self-involved.

Once again, the fate of the multiverse will rest on the shoulders of Teen Romance :smallbiggrin:

[Aquillion]

I think that Vriska <3 Arquiusprite is reading a bit too much into it. She finds him attractive, but that doesn't necessarily mean there's anything more there.

[Randomguy]

This update reminded me about the old Vriska Equius shipping, both for kismesis and matespritship. Even if you don't ship them, they did have a pretty close relationship, what with Equius making Vriska's arm, and adding the backdoor into it leading to robo-slaps, and the plotting they did.

[The Mormegil]

I think Vriska is playing a bit with Arquiusprite. I'm not saying she's faking attraction, but she is definitely exaggerating it.

[Devils_Advocate]

Thoughts on the recent character select page (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009386), now that it's complete:

It's kind of weird to see this particular narrative device being used here, because while some of the conversations occur at the same time, there are also clearly several cases where one follows after another. So there's potentially some non-linear storytelling, as seen in relatively early Homestuck, but depending on the order that you read the sections in.

... Now that I think about it, did the non-linear parts in Acts 1-3 mostly or maybe even entirely involve Dave? In retrospect, I think that there may have been some foreshadowing via narrative structure of his role as a time traveler that was subtle enough that I actually never picked up on it until now.

[Derjuin]

I don't foresee any of this planning being useful. At all :smalltongue:

I'm still utterly in the dark on what Vriska could be doing when she leaves. Trying to steal the power of the sun? Looking for the juju again or something? :smallconfused:

[Sigh]

I don't foresee any of this planning being useful. At all :smalltongue:

I'm still utterly in the dark on what Vriska could be doing when she leaves. Trying to steal the power of the sun? Looking for the juju again or something? :smallconfused:


If nothing else it's a good rundown of the situation at hand, we didn't really get much of one the first time this all went down and just look at how that went down.

[Shogo]

Is Dog Jack really even all that big a threat anymore?

It's been awhile, but I'm pretty sure John came pretty damn close to soloing Dog Jack in a Dream Bubble ambush. Only failed because he woke up before he could strike the finishing blow.

[Sigh]

Is Dog Jack really even all that big a threat anymore?

It's been awhile, but I'm pretty sure John came pretty damn close to soloing Dog Jack in a Dream Bubble ambush. Only failed because he woke up before he could strike the finishing blow.

Got a source page on that? Because I've prided myself on my keen memory of the vast majority of the goings on in HS and I don't recall anything like that.

[Great equalizer]

Got a source page on that? Because I've prided myself on my keen memory of the vast majority of the goings on in HS and I don't recall anything like that.
Starting from around here: http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007226
Although what Shogo said is wrong - John just landed a good hit, and Jack absconded before he could continue the fight.

[Shogo]

A good hit that took away almost all of Dog Jack's health.

And it's not like there were some weapon clashes going on.

I mean, I got what ended the fight wrong . . . But I still hold to the idea that John damn near soloed Dog Jack. (One more hit should have been enough to do him in.)

[Hytheter]

A good hit that took away almost all of Dog Jack's health.


Do you mean here? http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007258

I think you're reading the health bar wrong. The white portion is health lost, not health remaining; so Jack has only lost a tiny fraction of his health, nowhere near "almost all". The grey portion, where the vial is still inside the gel, is Jack's remaining health.
You can see what I'm talking about in this early flash: http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=002297
When someone gets hit, the vial is pushed further out of the gel until it gets pushed all the way out (which is death). That's why when they level up their "gel viscosity" increases - a more viscous gel holds onto the vial better so it's harder to eject.
edit: You can see what "almost no health" looks like in this flash: http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=002743

So yeah, John barely did any damage with his attack, and that was using a sucker punch that Jack probably won't fall for again. It's also worth noting that, iirc, Jack can't teleport in the furthest ring, but he can in sessions - so he'll be much more capable when he arrives than he was when John fought him.

[Shogo]

Oh . . . **** . . . Well then, I stand corrected.

I'm so used to health bars emptying from right to left that I always just kind of assumed that John was dominating in that battle.

Well . . . I guess it's still going right to left . . . Just in a different way.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Potato.

Jaspersprite is the best.
Vriska <3 Arquiusprite seems to be more and more a thing.
Also poor Jake. :C

[Aquillion]

I am pretty sure Vriska is underestimating Spades Slick + the Felt. Slick is a lot sharper than he seems (he beat the Felt when they were on opposite sides without using any special powers of his own), and with all their time powers, the Felt is really nasty when under competent leadership. Cans alone is incredibly dangerous, since God Tier immortality doesn't protect you from being punched into next week and effectively removed from the fight.

[Zejety]

I wonder if Karkat and Kanaya will return to frog duty?

[Squark]

I am pretty sure Vriska is underestimating Spades Slick + the Felt. Slick is a lot sharper than he seems (he beat the Felt when they were on opposite sides without using any special powers of his own), and with all their time powers, the Felt is really nasty when under competent leadership. Cans alone is incredibly dangerous, since God Tier immortality doesn't protect you from being punched into next week and effectively removed from the fight.

Well, yeah. Like Dejurin said, I'd be surprised if anything goes according to plan. Vriska's dialogue is so laden with ironic foreshadowing, it's painful. There might be a few red herrings in there (Grandma English's ashes never took a tumble to my knowledge), but in general, characters saying something is never going to happen in this comic is a sure way to make that happen.

[Devils_Advocate]

I think that what Vriska may be heading off to do soon is to ensure Lord English's origin, much like what she did with Dog Jack.

But not because she's working for him, but because that's stuff that has to happen. E.g. Doc Scratch bamboozled Rose and co. into creating the Green Sun, which I think might be necessary for universes to exist or something? Basically, John's retconning could eliminate all life from existence if it leads to certain crucial events not happening, so it's pretty important for someone to ensure that that doesn't happen. Or doesn't not happen. Hopefully you get what I'm saying.

Hence Gamzee's "plot armor".

Shipping aside, Vriska made it clear from the start that she really likes Arquius (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009358).

VRISKA: Then, I made Arquiusprite happen 8ecause, first of all, he's a national ****ing treasure.
VRISKA: Literally everything he says is perfect and hilarious, and if I hear a single word to the contrary from the peanut gallery, the mother****er with a 8eef rockets to the top of my **** list. So please, I enthusiastically invite one of you no-taste mouth 8reathers to talk smack a8out the A-man. Make my day!

VRISKA: No8ody's allowed to interrupt me when I'm talking up Arquiusprite! That's the rule.
She could be kidding, but I honestly doubt it. I don't see any Homestuck character who isn't a Strider being that committed to a pointless joke, unless you count Andrew Hussie himself. (The Striders' sense of humor is pretty nearly exactly Hussie's sense of humor, I think.)


In looking through the archives, I also found a diagram of the individuals who presumably are "still" converging on the Medium post-retcon (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008121).
Confirmed! (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009420) Well, that clears that up. It's convenient how a bunch of stuff is the same as we already saw.


Cans alone is incredibly dangerous, since God Tier immortality doesn't protect you from being punched into next week and effectively removed from the fight.
Eh, just requires a time traveler to retrieve you. Possibly with guidance from a Seer to get to the right time? It's not completely irreversible in the short term, anyway, is my point. Just needs the attention of the right person, like how Jane is needed to reverse Heroic deaths. Less of a threat than those, really, if she can only resurrect each individual once.

[Great equalizer]

Why don't they get Tavros to "commune" Bec Noir? He already did it with Bec once.

[mythmonster2]

Why don't they get Tavros to "commune" Bec Noir? He already did it with Bec once.

It is Vriska making these assignments; she probably doesn't have enough confidence in his ability to do it.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Why don't they get Tavros to "commune" Bec Noir? He already did it with Bec once.

I also think that if it comes to it, the Condensce can "overpower" the other troll's mindwhammies.

[guttering flame]

Potato.

Jaspersprite is the best.
Vriska <3 Arquiusprite seems to be more and more a thing.
Also poor Jake. :C


Could this be the real reason Vriska won't spriterect Nepeta and Feferi? She wants to be Arquiusprite's matesprit / moirail and fears the competition?

[GorinichSerpant]

Could this be the real reason Vriska won't spriterect Nepeta and Feferi? She wants to be Arquiusprite's matesprit / moirail and fears the competition?

This idea amuses me.

[Calemyr]

The whole Vriska <3 Arquisprite makes a lot of sense, actually. The AutoResponder basically fills in all the gaps in Equius's personality: charm, self control, sense of humor... On his own, Equius is much like Tavros: someone Vriska finds noteworthy, but with personality "flaws" that really grate on her. She tried, several times, to "fix" Tavros into becoming what she desired, because I think she believed he could achieve it, but got increasingly hostile about it when Tavros would prefer to take the easy way rather than rise to the occasion. For the most part, she didn't have that kind of expectation of Equius, seeing him as dull and creepy and just using him whenever the need arose. ARquiusprite is everything Vriska liked about Equius, but also none of what she disliked. She finally was able to construct the ideal matesprit out of one of the two imperfect options she had on hand.

[Tectonic Robot]

The whole Vriska <3 Arquisprite makes a lot of sense, actually. The AutoResponder basically fills in all the gaps in Equius's personality: charm, self control, sense of humor... On his own, Equius is much like Tavros: someone Vriska finds noteworthy, but with personality "flaws" that really grate on her. She tried, several times, to "fix" Tavros into becoming what she desired, because I think she believed he could achieve it, but got increasingly hostile about it when Tavros would prefer to take the easy way rather than rise to the occasion. For the most part, she didn't have that kind of expectation of Equius, seeing him as dull and creepy and just using him whenever the need arose. ARquiusprite is everything Vriska liked about Equius, but also none of what she disliked. She finally was able to construct the ideal matesprit out of one of the two imperfect options she had on hand.

But Arquissprite is also kind of a snot.

[GalateasGallows]

But unfortunately, Arquiusprite has repeatedly signalled disinterest in Vriska, right? Like, "Thank you for the STRONG endhorsement, lowblood slash person I've never heard of and don't care about". So would she even want a matesprit that isn't interested?

[Calemyr]

But unfortunately, Arquiusprite has repeatedly signalled disinterest in Vriska, right? Like, "Thank you for the STRONG endhorsement, lowblood slash person I've never heard of and don't care about". So would she even want a matesprit that isn't interested?

She is effectively 16, isn't she? Isn't being attracted to someone who isn't attracted to you the general definition of being 16?

[Sigh]

At the very least we can presume that her OTP is NOT Ghost!Vriska/Ghost!Meenah.

[Derjuin]

Sick gun, Vriska. Crockercorp tech, though...

I love that John's dad's wallet was "just a regular wallet". Now they have the much superior option, the 8-ball-et!

:smalleek: I can only wonder what she's going to try to do to her ghost. It doesn't sound good either way.

[Shadow of the Sun]

See, I much prefer Vriska's ghost to the current Vriska because she's actually had some goddamn character development!

But hey, I'm an optimist. Maybe I'll get to see Caliborn curb-stomp her just a little.

Vriska really needs a crushing defeat from someone she underestimates so that she can mature a little.

[Squark]

Sick gun, Vriska. Crockercorp tech, though...

It's Jane's. She used it in the one-flash act (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007338).


EDIT: Whoops, no, it's Roxy's

[Draconi Redfir]

Honestly i think Karkat should have been assigned to Spade Slick due to their past relaitionship, it's POSSIBLE, not terribly likely, that SPades would reccognise him and calm down a bit since they were reasonably close. idk though.

[Calemyr]

Honestly i think Karkat should have been assigned to Spade Slick due to their past relaitionship, it's POSSIBLE, not terribly likely, that SPades would reccognise him and calm down a bit since they were reasonably close. idk though.

Didn't Spades comment that he never really liked the kid at the start of Hivebent? Of course, that event still gives me a headache: Boxcars and Droog both acted as exiles, but when Spades stepped into his role as exile the other three were dead.

I guess you could say that Karkat is likely the person he has the least compulsion to kill, other than a specific subset of carapicians.

[Draconi Redfir]

Didn't Spades comment that he never really liked the kid at the start of Hivebent? Of course, that event still gives me a headache: Boxcars and Droog both acted as exiles, but when Spades stepped into his role as exile the other three were dead.

I guess you could say that Karkat is likely the person he has the least compulsion to kill, other than a specific subset of carapicians.

I kinda got the impression that the end of the intermission wasn't the first time Spades had acted as exile towards Karkat. i could be wroung though. who knows?

[Draconi Redfir]

I am pretty sure Vriska is underestimating Spades Slick + the Felt. Slick is a lot sharper than he seems (he beat the Felt when they were on opposite sides without using any special powers of his own), and with all their time powers, the Felt is really nasty when under competent leadership. Cans alone is incredibly dangerous, since God Tier immortality doesn't protect you from being punched into next week and effectively removed from the fight.

Wait, Slick really DOES have the felt on his side? When did this happen? from what i recall he killed them all, then got cyborgified, then escaped english's wrath when hussie was gunned down... admittedly i have no idea how he got from that lake to the medium again. the whole felt think was kinda boring and uninteresting to me.




See, I much prefer Vriska's ghost to the current Vriska because she's actually had some goddamn character development!

But hey, I'm an optimist. Maybe I'll get to see Caliborn curb-stomp her just a little.

Vriska really needs a crushing defeat from someone she underestimates so that she can mature a little.


Now you see, this is something that always confused me. Why does a matter so much that a character change and develop? Vriska already has a pretty strong and interesting personality as it is, i honestly don't see any reason to change it. Hell, with a story going as long as Homestuck is i'd argue that too MUCH charactger development could be a BAD thing, like... the characters would be nothing like anything they were before, hell i can see this with Rose even now, i honest to god can not see any simmilarities between the Rose we have now, and the Rose we were first introduced too, it feels like one just spontainiously vanished and the other appeared, like they aren't even the same person!

If a character has a strong and interesting personality already, then i leginimately don't see the need for them to change at all. If you have a sniveling crybaby character then sure, make him a badass. but if a character is ALREADY a badass, i don't see why you'd want to make him a sniveling crybaby.

[Aquillion]

Wait, Slick really DOES have the felt on his side? When did this happen? from what i recall he killed them all, then got cyborgified, then escaped english's wrath when hussie was gunned down... admittedly i have no idea how he got from that lake to the medium again. the whole felt think was kinda boring and uninteresting to me.He brought them back to life by pulling all their pins from the juju doll (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008025) and then used Lord English's cuestaff to convince them that he was in charge (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008026).

[Derjuin]

He brought them back to life by pulling all their pins from the juju doll (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008025) and then used Lord English's cuestaff to convince them that he was in charge (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008026).

And then stuffed them in an oven, turned them into a nonsensical playing card, and took a spin in the idiot wagon through infinite oblivion with some giant octopus things. :smalltongue:

I love this story.

[Aquillion]

And then stuffed them in an oven, turned them into a nonsensical playing card, and took a spin in the idiot wagon through infinite oblivion with some giant octopus things. :smalltongue:

I love this story.

Alternatively:

ARGH. I HATE THE THINGS I'M FORCED TO SAY. AND ACKNOWLEDGE AS REAL. BECAUSE OF YOU.

[Shadow of the Sun]

If a character has a strong and interesting personality already, then i leginimately don't see the need for them to change at all. If you have a sniveling crybaby character then sure, make him a badass. but if a character is ALREADY a badass, i don't see why you'd want to make him a sniveling crybaby.

See, the difference between you and me is the follows: in my opinion, Vriska is not, and never has been, a badass. She's done awesome things (arguably), but her character is such that she has never been badass, in my view.

[Draconi Redfir]

i never said she was, that was merely an example. i was saying that she had a strong and well defined character. Egotistical, indipentant, in-your-face, "do it my way or you're doing it wrong", snarky, leadership qualities, etc. if you already have a strong character then there isn't a lot of need to change it unless the story demands it. and if the story demands it, well, then you get cases like Rose, where you're not really talking about the same character any more.

[Murk]

In general, I agree. This obsession with "character development" some people have is unnecessary. A good character doesn't necessarily have to change. Exploring how this character deals with new situations can be more than enough.

However, in Vriska's case I want character development because it would be so very satisfying to have her say "damn, I was a terrible person before". And then again. And then have her say it a few times more.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Vriska's personality isn't admirable.

She's a bully who is massively insecure and puts down anyone who challenges her, she overestimates her abilities time and time again, and continues to treat the world as if it was all about her.

Her ghost was the best she's ever been in the story because said ghost can actually see her flaws and has developed the ability to actually attune with people emotionally in a way that isn't just a means of heightening her massively fragile ego.

And the worst thing is that her insecurity ruins other people. Tavros was never weak. But since he did fit the mold that Vriska wanted him too, didn't fit how his ancestor was in her stupid journal, she proceeded to massively manipulate, abuse, and treat him like crap, and she continued to hate him for not fitting her ideal of how he should be.

I hate Vriska. I don't understand how anyone can like her. At all.

[Cavelcade]

My favorite Vriska moment is still her conversation with the absent John before she was planning to go fight Bec Noir. It was a moment of true introspection on her part and even though she made the wrong choice, she was trying to fix a mistake and make up for past wrongdoings and overcome the internal issues that had made her the way she was. Unfortunately by denying her this I think she failed to do so in an oddly crippling way. I expect John to be the one to help her move forward again, to set it right. He seems to be the only one with enough personal moxy to overcome hers.

Also I'm not really sure what you mean by Rose not being the same character she was at the start? To me, at least he core is largely unchanged - she's still analytically minded and deeply uncertain about her place in the grand scheme of things, only certain that she does want one. The main change I see in her is she has become more passive. I put that down to no longer really trusting her own judgement, which, given the numerous ways she was played before due to her cockiness, is not exactly surprising to me.

I take issue with your definition of character growth too. A 'badass' struggling to reconnect with their emotions/moral compass sounds pretty compelling to me, and that's without considering all the modes of growth completely independent of badassery measurements.

Edit: Vriska did make that admission, at the point I mentioned. It's one reason I like it so much.

[Calemyr]

Vriska's personality isn't admirable.

She's a bully who is massively insecure and puts down anyone who challenges her, she overestimates her abilities time and time again, and continues to treat the world as if it was all about her.

Her ghost was the best she's ever been in the story because said ghost can actually see her flaws and has developed the ability to actually attune with people emotionally in a way that isn't just a means of heightening her massively fragile ego.

And the worst thing is that her insecurity ruins other people. Tavros was never weak. But since he did fit the mold that Vriska wanted him too, didn't fit how his ancestor was in her stupid journal, she proceeded to massively manipulate, abuse, and treat him like crap, and she continued to hate him for not fitting her ideal of how he should be.

I hate Vriska. I don't understand how anyone can like her. At all.

By Alternian standards, and those are the only standards they knew for most of their lives, Tavros is absolutely weak. He lacks aggression, his growth rate is pathetic (at least at first), and he insists on getting others to do his work for him. He really is quite pathetic in a culture of "insane badasses" as Dave put it. I am quite sure that Vriska honestly expected him to be culled every time the drones came through because he was such a disappointment to the Alternian ideal. I also believe that her torment of him was because she truly wanted him to be strong enough to survive to maturity. Unfortunately, Tavros is worse than simply weak - he's rebellious in the wrong ways. He fights and resists whenever someone tries to make things anything but easier for him, whether or not it's well intended. This continually frustrates Vriska, inspiring her to do and say truly awful things.

[Shadow of the Sun]

By Alternian standards, and those are the only standards they knew for most of their lives, Tavros is absolutely weak. He lacks aggression, his growth rate is pathetic (at least at first), and he insists on getting others to do his work for him. He really is quite pathetic in a culture of "insane badasses" as Dave put it. I am quite sure that Vriska honestly expected him to be culled every time the drones came through because he was such a disappointment to the Alternian ideal. I also believe that her torment of him was because she truly wanted him to be strong enough to survive to maturity. Unfortunately, Tavros is worse than simply weak - he's rebellious in the wrong ways. He fights and resists whenever someone tries to make things anything but easier for him, whether or not it's well intended. This continually frustrates Vriska, inspiring her to do and say truly awful things.

I disagree, mostly. Yes, Tavros lacked aggression, but I don't think that's specifically something that makes him weak. I think his ability to commune with animals was amazingly powerful, and frankly more impressive than what Vriska had.

Also, I think "trying to make him stronger" doesn't hold any weight when she THREW HIM OFF A GODDAMN CLIFF.

I think that if Tavros had been allowed to mature at his own rate - because there are late bloomers in every culture - he would probably have succeeded more. In trying to 'make him grow', which also coincidentally included trying to shape him into her perfect boyfriend in an incredibly abused and messed up way, Vriska stifled his possible development.

I don't particularly like Tavros as a character, but I can't understand any attempts to justify how Vriska treated him.

[Derjuin]

I don't particularly like Tavros as a character, but I can't understand any attempts to justify how Vriska treated him.

There really aren't any. Remember, their relationship was in vacillating Red/Black, and Kanaya wasn't really doing a very good job at presiding over it as auspistice (no fault of Kanaya's, it just wasn't working out). The closest thing I can think of for 'reasons' for her to treat him that way is a huge pile of mixed up emotions that don't make sense. She feels redrom for him, which may or may not be natural, and may or may not be entirely due to Ancestor!Mindfang's journal. She also feels blackrom for him, possibly out of spite for herself (potentially: hate having flushed for a lowblood, hate for his apparent weakness, etc) or her ancestor (since she seems to really look up to her ancestor, she could feel a little vengeful - this part was later confirmed as part of a weird payback-destiny when almost all the ancestors' descendants killed the descendant of their ancestor's killer). It could also be real hatred, not blackrom, because troll romance sure is weird.

However, this huge pile of text shouldn't be taken as attempts to justify what she did. It all may come out good at the end, but it was still a really *&%^y thing to do. This is coming from someone who is an actual Vriska fan, too.

Regarding her conversation with absent-John, that still happened, since it happened before he appeared and changed the events of her death - the convo happened moments before Terezi appeared and challenged her with the coinflip. However, she didn't get to mull it over for however long she was a ghost, and instead the timeline seemed to pander to keeping her alive for the express purpose of being everyone's boss/replacement mother. Her thing about seeing her own flaws in the new updates? I don't think that's genuine, since ghost!vriska is a lot more wise to that. In fact, I don't really think I like this version as much as the one that turned into ghost!vriska, because she doesn't seem fallible, or connect-able. In the past, she had moments of self-doubt, and that made her more... uh, "human" (:smalltongue:). Those moments also made her vastly more likable to me.

[Draconi Redfir]

Vriska's personality isn't admirable.

She's a bully who is massively insecure and puts down anyone who challenges her, she overestimates her abilities time and time again, and continues to treat the world as if it was all about her.

Her ghost was the best she's ever been in the story because said ghost can actually see her flaws and has developed the ability to actually attune with people emotionally in a way that isn't just a means of heightening her massively fragile ego.

And the worst thing is that her insecurity ruins other people. Tavros was never weak. But since he did fit the mold that Vriska wanted him too, didn't fit how his ancestor was in her stupid journal, she proceeded to massively manipulate, abuse, and treat him like crap, and she continued to hate him for not fitting her ideal of how he should be.

I hate Vriska. I don't understand how anyone can like her. At all.

who said her personality was admirable?:smallconfused:

I said it was strong, well defined. she was a bully yes but we know WHY she's a bully, HOW she's a bully WHO she's a bully too. As a person she is terrible yes, but as a CHARACTER in a sorry she is a good character in a story.



Also I'm not really sure what you mean by Rose not being the same character she was at the start? To me, at least he core is largely unchanged - she's still analytically minded and deeply uncertain about her place in the grand scheme of things, only certain that she does want one. The main change I see in her is she has become more passive. I put that down to no longer really trusting her own judgement, which, given the numerous ways she was played before due to her cockiness, is not exactly surprising to me.

from what i saw at least she went from a snarky and fairly agressive character with the occaisional silly streak to an almost total elderich goth where before it was merely a light interest, to what i can only describe as a ball of sunshine and rainbows and literal light all through the span of the comic.

Kinda feel as if part of the probelm may be her appearance from then and now. granted three years have passed, but when i see the Rose in [S]WV: Acend i see a snarky, almost angry short character that looks nothing like any of the hero-mode images we've seen recently, indeed somehow even her sprites in the most recent updates look different asside from just the god teir pajamas.

all in all i can't quite explain it or what the differences truely are. i just know that if you showed me the Rose we have now, and the Rose we first met under the circumstance that i had never read nor heard anything about homestuck? I'd think they were two entirely sepperate people that just loooked simmiler.


I take issue with your definition of character growth too. A 'badass' struggling to reconnect with their emotions/moral compass sounds pretty compelling to me, and that's without considering all the modes of growth completely independent of badassery measurements.

again that post was an example, not a rule.

[Rakaydos]

With the comparisons people are giving between pre-retcon and post retcon vriska, with vriska's last line when she jumps into the window, I strongly suspect Vriska so going to be having a decent length adventure with ghost vriska, setting things up for a final battle between the black hole girls (Calliope, Jade and Nana) and the Cal Bros. (Caliborn, Arquis, and the clown)

[Randomguy]

Gee, I wonder who will be appearing on this yellow brick road? Maybe it'll be someone who just harvested a shiny pair of red slippers from a recently deceased wicked witch? :P

[Sigh]

New potato, and my response to it is as such:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sa8NREI_IPs

[Great equalizer]

That grinning Terezi :smallbiggrin:
I guess she completely predicted it.

[Devils_Advocate]

Some Homestuck characters have a weird tendency to smile even when I would guess that they aren't happy based not only on the situation but on their dialogue and behavior as well. It's particularly noticeable with Terezi and Tavros.

Someone asked about the possibility of combining two single-prototyped sprites earlier, I think. Well, this (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009491) isn't that, but it's definitely relevant data. Of note:

1. JASPROSESPRITE^2 DOESN'T HAVE A GHOST BUTT! Who ever would have anticipated that?! Why, just think about what that implies about what's going on here!

...

Yeah, I got nothing.

2. This one is less obvious, but it's clear on examination that the combined sprite's outfit is nearly identical to Dream Rose's, with only minor elements of Rosesprite's and Jaspersprite's clothing. WHAT THE HELL, WHAT IS GOING ON. :O


Okay, so. Let's think about this. Prototyping a sprite with something gives the sprite properties from that thing, and prototyping a sprite twice gives it properties from two things. Obviously. Prototyping a sprite with another already double-prototyped sprite lets you indirectly contribute two things to a sprite's overall mashup while using up only one prototyping "slot", thereby allowing you to make a mashup of three things total, or even of a theoretically unlimited number of things with enough sprites. That's the obvious application of sprite combining.

But the double-prototyped sprite doesn't just have properties from the objects that it was prototyped with, it also has the special properties that come from being a sprite! And I'd have thought that giving sprite properties to a sprite would be pretty redundant, but... apparently less so than I would have thought? Maybe some things stack rather than overlap. Like, if a regular sprite has half of a normal body, then a double sprite has two halves of a normal body; one half for being a player's sprite, and another half for also being a different player's sprite. Hey, looks like I do have something! Whoa. Similarly, one color for each constituent sprite.

And... maybe Dream Rose has been revived through doubling up on the whole "bringing back the dead" aspect of sprites? Maybe we'll get to see some cool dream powers or something. Dream selves seem to be able to... well, do the sorts of things that people can do in dreams, flying being just one example. (Remember Dream Jade dreaming up a bunch of extra arms?) That might be neat.

It seem like they've hit on some sort of special bonus combo thing here. And who knows what might happen if Jasprose merges with Tavros, for example. That might be too much. We're probably dealing with an entity with a dangerously high power level already.

[Draconi Redfir]

i kinda feel like the whole dreamself-powers thing has kinda been retconned out sort of? Back when Jade did her multi-arm thing the whole dreamself dear was a mysterious and unknown entity, and sort of acted like it took place more in an actual dream world then a real and physical one. sincei t was explored more however we've learned that in actuallity it's more like one mind being transfered from one body to another on the same material plane, you could go up to Derse or Prospit or what have you and physically touch your own dreamself if you actually wanted too. and idk, as a result of that it just sort of feels like they became less "magical" over time? Like they can fly yes, but i'm less sure about them being able to grow aditional arms now. Though Jasprosesprite^2 also has Jasper's tentacle arms, wich i suppose could potentually act like Jack/PM's tentacle arms, and merely appear on command when needed.

[GorinichSerpant]

Sburb, come for the convoluted rules, stay for the convoluted rules to stretched to the limits and then some.

[AgentPaper]

So uh, am I the only one confused as to where Rosesprite came from? Did I miss the update where she happened, or did she just kind of pop into existence off-screen?

[Great equalizer]

So uh, am I the only one confused as to where Rosesprite came from? Did I miss the update where she happened, or did she just kind of pop into existence off-screen?
During the "eight conversations" selection screen.

[AgentPaper]

During the "eight conversations" selection screen.

Which one? I thought I read all of them, but apparently I missed one.

[Great equalizer]

Rose/Roxy/Dave, here (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009405).

[Murk]

I find it interesting how homestuck is falling more and more into the old patterns of Problem Sleuth. It was of course always present, but now we have the habit of cloning/copying characters and having all kinds of mutilations and transformations happen to them too.
This makes me think the boss-fight will be as long as the entire previous part.

[AgentPaper]

Rose/Roxy/Dave, here (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009405).

Thanks. Somehow I missed that one.

[eschmenk]

This (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009499) must be the victorious alt-Calliope? I can't remember: Did we ever see Jade talking to her in a dream, or was it just Jade telling Calliope prime that she had talked with her?


In fact, I don't really think I like this version as much as the one that turned into ghost!vriska, because she doesn't seem fallible, or connect-able. In the past, she had moments of self-doubt, and that made her more... uh, "human" (:smalltongue:). Those moments also made her vastly more likable to me.
It may be a matter that in her new role she can't show any doubts. Everyone has to believe in her plan. But yes, I don't like her as well that way, either. Maybe she'll be more interesting when she interacts with her ghost.

[Oracle_Hunter]

I find it interesting how homestuck is falling more and more into the old patterns of Problem Sleuth. It was of course always present, but now we have the habit of cloning/copying characters and having all kinds of mutilations and transformations happen to them too.
This makes me think the boss-fight will be as long as the entire previous part.
It's more than that -- Problem Sleuth is very much the prototype of Homestuck.

In many ways, Problem Sleuth ("PS") was the "test-type" for the sort of comic Hussie wanted to make: a "choose your own adventure" that he wrote on the fly. As PS went on it became to develop its own mythos and you can see how Hussie started to try to weave a coherent meta-narrative to build out of the chaos later exemplified by Twitch Plays. The explicit references likely started as pure Plot Welding to keep things from meandering endlessly (seen extensively in Jailbreak) but later he was able to use the same tools he developed in PS to make Homestuck reach beyond it's CYOA roots.

Frankly, it's one of the things I appreciate most about Hussie as a Creator: being able to convert Garbage In into anything more than Garbage Out (let alone a cohesive creative work!) is a rare talent.

[Murk]

It's more than that -- Problem Sleuth is very much the prototype of Homestuck.

In many ways, Problem Sleuth ("PS") was the "test-type" for the sort of comic Hussie wanted to make: a "choose your own adventure" that he wrote on the fly. As PS went on it became to develop its own mythos and you can see how Hussie started to try to weave a coherent meta-narrative to build out of the chaos later exemplified by Twitch Plays. The explicit references likely started as pure Plot Welding to keep things from meandering endlessly (seen extensively in Jailbreak) but later he was able to use the same tools he developed in PS to make Homestuck reach beyond it's CYOA roots.

Frankly, it's one of the things I appreciate most about Hussie as a Creator: being able to convert Garbage In into anything more than Garbage Out (let alone a cohesive creative work!) is a rare talent.

Oh, very true. There's just moments it pops out more than others. I'm sure some of these are also just Hussie liking specific twists or ideas, and not explicit references.

[Devils_Advocate]

I love that John's dad's wallet was "just a regular wallet". Now they have the much superior option, the 8-ball-et!
Just a plain old regular wallet like you buy in a store, capable of captchaloguing the entire planet Earth from outer space.

You know, every once in a while I get the feeling that some of the things in Homestuck are ever so slightly ridiculous.


I find it interesting how homestuck is falling more and more into the old patterns of Problem Sleuth. It was of course always present, but now we have the habit of cloning/copying characters and having all kinds of mutilations and transformations happen to them too.
That's not a recent development. (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=003543)

Actually, I noticed several lessons being revisited over the course of Rosesprite-related happenings (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009407):

1. Don't turn your back on the body.
2. TT: I think the true purpose of this game is to see how many qualifiers we can get to precede the word "self" and still understand what we're talking about.
3. TG: skepticism is the crutch of cinematic troglodytes

Gotta say, kind of disappointed in Dave there. I do appreciate that we are dealing with forces that if handled recklessly will nullify the basic ability of intelligent beings in all real and hypothetical planes of existence to give a ****...

... but SBURB has always had this whole narrative, even mythological aspect to it. Dave was just talking about how cliche Rose's quest seemed on the surface! But he doesn't seem to quite grasp the idea that he and his friends exist to be players of this game and to fill the narrative / mythological roles provided for them. Or, alternately, the roles that he and his friends have been provided for.

Then again, maybe Dave is blocking out some of the more existentially horrifying implications of their origins.

Incidentally, why have they moved to talking about the quest stuff as optional? Like, okay, maybe some of it is, but I thought that getting the grist hoard from your planet's denizen was supposed to be necessary for the Ultimate Alchemy. But Vriska makes it sound like the hoards are already available (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009441) and even talks about Rose encountering her denizen in particular as simply a possibility (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009404). What's the deal with that, I ask! What even is the deal.

[Draconi Redfir]

the deal is that hussie decided to create this huge and convoluted plot involving horned aliens and green skull monsters over actually exploring the already grand epic and interesting plot he had about the game itself. and now he's trying to more or less write out the actually good plot in favor of the one where everyone obsesses over a green guy they've never met.

[Cavelcade]

Homestuck had always been about the internet and its myriad inhabitants, with the plot acting as a vehicle for Hussie's loving satire of it rather than being especially important in it's own right. Caliborn is about how 'The Internet' can destroy, Calliope represents how it can act as a muse in its own right.

[Lord Raziere]

the deal is that hussie decided to create this huge and convoluted plot involving horned aliens and green skull monsters over actually exploring the already grand epic and interesting plot he had about the game itself. and now he's trying to more or less write out the actually good plot in favor of the one where everyone obsesses over a green guy they've never met.

to be honest, I didn't get that impression. The Ultimate Riddle sure was mentioned, but it was never really that important and was only mentioned when the trolls got into things, which by then I think was pretty much the point where Lord English was going to be a thing. that and it was mentioned by trolls who didn't really have all the information at their disposal and were just as in the dark about everything.

that and I'm pretty sure trolls have always been in Homestuck, their introduction is too gradual and natural to be a shift in writing. that and what would the so-called original plot of the game itself be? its basically just light kingdom against dark kingdom and four people learning to become kings, generic wish-fulfillment "peasant-to-king" kind of stuff, with pretty much all the involved characters being literal archetypical cutouts aside from the players themselves, and we've shifted to what, actual characters with personalities, flaws, foibles, disagreements, problems that don't feel like they're set up and artificially structured?

I don't really see what Homestuck could've become if the trolls never came in aside from being a completely boring and trod out plot aside from the "create a new planet" thing which would just be "the end" to a generic kill the dark lord plot where the happy ending is them making a new society of Earth. I mean, the comic really started to get good when it started going off the rails from that plot, [S] Descend is probably the best thing that could've ever happened to Homestuck, providing a good way to shake everything up and start going in far more interesting directions.

[Murk]

Snippity.

While I agree that only following the game would have been a boring plot, I always felt it was skipped over too quickly. Maybe that's because I could do an archive binge through it all my first time, but really, the whole planets and their themes, the imps, even the house building weren't really relevant.

The involvement of the trolls felt like a veteran game player learning all the quick trics and cheats to a beginning player (which was what it was). While that may be understandable, everyone who had an older brother stand behind his back while playing a game first time knows it's not beneficial to your game enjoyment.
I personally would have liked it if the game, the way it's supposed to be played, it's quests and objectives, would be actually relevant to the eventual plot. Now it's only the exceptions that are relevant: only the broken sessions, the game glitches and the game cheats actually matter.

[Lord Raziere]

I personally would have liked it if the game, the way it's supposed to be played, it's quests and objectives, would be actually relevant to the eventual plot. Now it's only the exceptions that are relevant: only the broken sessions, the game glitches and the game cheats actually matter.

Homestuck is supposed to be a comic about growing up and and Sburb the game is supposed to be to. and while everyone obeys rules in society, a big part of growing up is learning that the rules of things and what is expected is not always how things turn out and that you have to figure out how to adapt to messes and problems you didn't prepare for or expect, because if they stuck to the actual game, what would change about them? how would it be any different from any other game but more immersive, if they actually stuck to the rules and everything went as expected? thats not really how life works.

I don't see why your so attached to the game as its "meant" to be played- its canonical that a vast majority of the games are null sessions and that successfully making a new world is actually pretty rare, its very possible that there is no right way to play it at all- life does not care about what is the right way, it cares about whether it works or not. its a common fan theory on the MSPA boards that the game is designed to go off the rails and force people into unplanned situations to grow up better, and I personally like that.

the fact that these derailings are often because of the players own screwups, only means that it reinforces the idea of growing up, apart of which is learning to recognize your own mistakes and how to fix them after the fact. what really be the point of a game where they did all this perfectly? they'd learn nothing.

[Lateral]

So... wait, where has Jade met Alt!Calliope before?

[Calemyr]

So... wait, where has Jade met Alt!Calliope before?

Probably while she was dead before the Cascade. During early Act 6 she says she had a very informative dream while she was dead that made all her time watching the clouds of Skaia seem trivial and inconsequential. Since this was before the Cascade, it wouldn't have altered due to John's canon hopping.

[Draconi Redfir]

idk, i just lok as [S]WV: Acend and think of how mysterious and epic everything was back then. We didn't need the condence or lord english to be antagonists, Bec Noir and the game itself were doing a fine job of that on their own. i could see a story still involving a scratch and the alpha kids, but if the trolls had bee left as voices on computer screens and maybe given their own side-story that explained their session and the whole lord english thing that didn't cross over into the kid's session(s) then personally i think it'd be a lot better, you'd have two stories with much more streamlined plots and naritives that would likely be shorter as a whole, rather then one messy and flayed story that's been compared to ulissies.

[Androgeus]

Don't know if I'm remembering rightly but the trolls originally weren't meant to be involved as they are, but Hussie did Act 5 Act 1 and they were ridiculously popular so he changed things so they would have more focus.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Don't know if I'm remembering rightly but the trolls originally weren't meant to be involved as they are, but Hussie did Act 5 Act 1 and they were ridiculously popular so he changed things so they would have more focus.
Part of Hussie's genius is that vast chunks of this story aren't "meant to be" anything in particular. Remember that, for at least the first third of Homestuck, the story was largely driven by The Internet. Certainly the things that drew people in originally are not the things that turned out to be central later but what has always been compelling to me is watching Hussie weave this story and make it feel like he always had some master plan that is slowly unfolding.

A lot like the BSG Reimagined, really. I just hope that, unlike Ronald Moore, Hussie sticks the landing :smalleek:

[Cavelcade]

Being compared to Ulysses is not a bad thing, although it's not quite as ludicrous with its word choice as Mr. Joyce. I more or less agree with Oracle_Hunter, with the one addendum being that I'm even less interested in any cohesiveness of plot - the satire works perfectly well as is, and I still like reading the characters talking **** to each other enough to forgive it even if there were almost no plot.


Poor Callies. :smallfrown:

[Murk]

I don't see why your so attached to the game as its "meant" to be played.

Because we spend pages and pages and pages on it.
It's not that I necessarily need those rules, or consistency, or coherence, I just don't want to spend hours reading something that will never be relevant again. The whole issue with building up houses? The grist? The imps? The planets, their quests, heck, even the sprites, the specibi and the medium - it never really became relevant.
That would be fine. I don't need everything to be relevant. Background information is cool. But I don't want those non-relevant systems to take up at least three books (the books illustrate this better than the website: except for the character development, almost nothing that happens in books one and two is ever relevant again).

I just find that a shame, because I think it could have been interesting.
To each its own, though.

[eschmenk]

I think Hussie has been upfront about what he's doing at MSPA amounts to a bunch of experimenting. He's said that he broke a bunch of storytelling rules, but to him it was worth it because he learned a lot. The experimenting has its good and bad points. The story wouldn't be as groundbreaking without it, but the downside is that you wind up with a much more rambling story. I kind of think that readers should consider themselves lucky just for the fact that he has apparently figured out some sort of way to end the story this time.

[Murk]

I think Hussie has been upfront about what he's doing at MSPA amounts to a bunch of experimenting. He's said that he broke a bunch of storytelling rules, but to him it was worth it because he learned a lot. The experimenting has its good and bad points. The story wouldn't be as groundbreaking without it, but the downside is that you wind up with a much more rambling story. I kind of think that readers should consider themselves lucky just for the fact that he has apparently figured out some sort of way to end the story this time.

Fully agreed. It's a journey :smallcool:

[Devils_Advocate]

Raise your hand if you didn't see that coming as soon as Kanaya said "That Would Be One Way Of Handling It".

Anyone? Anyone at all?

(Yeesh, Karkat. Get a clue!)

So... wait, where has Jade met Alt!Calliope before?
Jade told Calliope about meeting Calliope in a dream that Jade had on her journey across the Yellow Yard. (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008959) Um, that is to say, she met her in a dream that she had on her journey across the Yellow Yard, and then recounted that meeting in another dream that she had while K.O.'d by Vriska. Um, that is to say, Jade met god tier Calliope in a dream that Jade had on her journey across the Yellow Yard, and then Jade later recounted that meeting to the other Calliope in another dream that Jade had while K.O.'d by Vriska. (There, that should be sufficiently clear now.)

Jade and Calliope had that conversation about god tier Calliope just shortly prior to meeting her, around half a year ago (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WebcomicTime).

[zabbarot]

Raise your hand if you didn't see that coming as soon as Kanaya said "That Would Be One Way Of Handling It".

Anyone? Anyone at all?

(Yeesh, Karkat. Get a clue!)

Yeah, I got the same idea. Thought I want to mention this bit:
KANAYA: By Following Through With The Duties We Have Fundamentally Tasked Ourselves With By Our Natural Inclinations
KANAYA: I Mean Us Specifically
KANAYA: You And I
KARKAT: DUTIES?
KARKAT: NATURAL INCLINATIONS?

Did anybody else initially read that as Echidna telling them to 'go forth and multiply'? Reading further I realized that was not at all what it meant*


*probably

[Lord Raziere]

Kay, Karkat got knocked out after failing to understand Kanaya telling him they they need to reproduce.

Now I'm hoping that we will finally get a conversation between Calliope and Karkat. there seems to be very little point to him talking to the trolls again and I want to see Calliope's reaction to meeting him.

[eschmenk]

Kay, Karkat got knocked out after failing to understand Kanaya telling him they they need to reproduce.

Now I'm hoping that we will finally get a conversation between Calliope and Karkat. there seems to be very little point to him talking to the trolls again and I want to see Calliope's reaction to meeting him.


The only Calliope he would meet would be the dead alt-Calliope who beat her brother. She was on her way to her outer ring so she might not be there anymore. Roxy came and got the alpha (friendly) one and took her somewhere. She's also alive now thanks to the ring Roxy gave her. Dreaming Jade may still be around, though, if she's still sleeping.

And I think Karkat understood that they needed to reproduce just fine. I assume that Roxy will eventually create a matriorb, but not for Her Condescension, and it will involve that somehow. But your way of reading it would be the funny way. I can't tell if you were joking, though.

[Sigh]

Clearly it's just that Echidna is a Level 50 Shipper with more than a few ranks in Knowledge (Relationships) and Diplomacy, she can make any ship she desires come into fruition!

[Devils_Advocate]

So, while reading bladekindeyewear's blog, I happened upon a post of his explaining how doomed timelines appear to work (http://bladekindeyewear.tumblr.com/post/36256163829/on-ghost-causing-doomed-timelines), which covers a bunch of the evidence for it, so I thought that I'd revisit that subject and explain why I agree with that theory.


We are all entitled to our ridiculous headcanons
Quite so. Let us be careful not to proceed... well, as if a story is nothing but raw data to be deconstructed, and not actually a million different stories that come to life within a million different vehicles of consciousness (http://comicsalliance.com/homestuck-interview-andrew-hussie-bryan-lee-omalley-ms-paint-adventures/?a_dgi=aolshare_twitter).


but how does your interpretation explain the absurd numbers of ghosts (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007327) that we see.
We know that the A2 session had lots of doomed timelines that contributed to the alpha timeline, because that's where the army of Aradiabots who showed up to help fight the Black King came from. There's no reason to assume that the A1 session didn't as well; wasn't their Time player, like, actively wrecking stuff? A lot of the troll ghosts were probably killed by other trolls.

How does your interpretation explain how few human ghosts we see? I think that the only ones that we ever see are the John and the two Daves in [S] Caliborn: Enter (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TluSImcNwac), whose deaths are actually accounted for in the story, because (it is implied) the B1 session didn't have a bunch of doomed timelines. Note how half of the ghosts in that Flash are Aradiabots.

The Ministrife also features an Equius referring to "Aradiabot #100502", and god tier Aradia speaking of him "courting such a great plurality of [her] mechanical doubles", both of which imply an Aradiabot to Equius ratio of much higher than 1 to 1.

Given that showing us the trolls in a variety of different outfits was clearly a goal for the Ministrife, it's notably that the Aradiabots are nevertheless by far the most common, and that we only see one each of Vriska, Meenah, and Gamzee (and no ghost Gamzees), when each of the other trolls gets at least three sprites. (I'm not going to bother with an exact headcount.)


I mean, there's a literal flotilla of ghosts (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007856) and there don't seem to be many Time Ghosts (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=007857) amongst them.
I don't think that the group shown there was meant to be a representative sample, though, while the groups of ghosts in the two above-mentioned Flashes were (to differing degrees, because the Ministrife was clearly meant to do something else as well).

But if you want to maintain that those Flashes featured random groups that just so happened to look like they indicate that timelines just end along with everyone in them when they cease to be relevant to the alpha timeline...

0kay. 0_0


Lack of Damara ghosts is indeed strange.
It looks like they tend to hang out together (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=008460), probably because of a shared penchant for debauchery and/or the difficulty that most other ghosts have even understanding what they're saying. Horuss suggests that all of them would be "quite a lot of Damaras", although it does seem like there are more Aradiabots.

[Aquillion]

Upd8.

Jasprosesprite^2 is the most wonderful character in Homestuck.

[Sigh]

Upd8.

Jasprosesprite^2 is the most wonderful character in Homestuck.

Absolutely, she's by far the best thing in the history of ever and probably the only way she could get more peppy is if we threw Feferi into the mix.

[Yuki Akuma]

I can't help but notice Jasprosesprite^2 immediately complimented Caliope's appearance the moment she saw her - you know, that thing that Callie feels incredibly ashamed by.

I wonder if that was deliberate or just a coincidence.

[The Mormegil]

I find 2sprite (not gonna call the full name it's more bothersome than writing this whole complaint on the name itself) kinda obnoxious. Also sort of fun... in small doses.

[Derjuin]

I find 2sprite (not gonna call the full name it's more bothersome than writing this whole complaint on the name itself) kinda obnoxious. Also sort of fun... in small doses.

Well, it IS at least 1/4 housecat... :smalltongue:

I wonder what Jasprose's uh, juxtaformation, will result in. Since like 99% of the stuff that happens, ends up happening for a reason. Maybe 2xsprites get like, a double/quadruple scoop of spritepower? :smallconfused:

[Lord Raziere]

I can't help but notice Jasprosesprite^2 immediately complimented Caliope's appearance the moment she saw her - you know, that thing that Callie feels incredibly ashamed by.

I wonder if that was deliberate or just a coincidence.


Jasprose has Seer of Light powers remember? its either a deliberate coincidence, or not a coincidence at all.
she sees these kinds of things.

[Yuki Akuma]

Either way, it's kinda sweet.

"Hey, person with a huge complex about her appearance and how monstrous it is. Have a dozen compliments about how amazing you look."

[Draconi Redfir]

Main thing i don't like about jasperrosesprite^2 is her dang seizure-inducing thing >:P Both sprites were the same colour weren't they!?

[Hytheter]

Main thing i don't like about jasperrosesprite^2 is her dang seizure-inducing thing >:P Both sprites were the same colour weren't they!?

Nope. Jaspers was pink, Rose was purple. All the sprites are different colours, using the same set of colours as the kids' writing.

[Draconi Redfir]

ah. Still wish she'd stay a solid colour. Like, give her the two-colour scheme thing sure, just don't make her flash between the two colours in rapid sucsession >_>

[eschmenk]

Fortunately, it looks like she will stay away for all but one of the next nine batches of updates. Nepeta's sign wasn't shown on the selection screen at all, so hopefully Terezi was wrong about Jasprosesprite^2 prototyping her.

[Yuki Akuma]

P-potato?

I still love how everyone is just being so nice to Callie. It's so heartwarming to see a character who's never had many friends suddenly surrounded by people eager to make friends and be nice.

[Aquillion]

P-potato?

I still love how everyone is just being so nice to Callie. It's so heartwarming to see a character who's never had many friends suddenly surrounded by people eager to make friends and be nice.

And also Terezi!

[Derjuin]

::::o

Maybe gettin' back to adventurin' is exactly what Meenah needs.

Also did anyone notice that Jasprose's symbol is now a crescent moon (or an eclipse) with the sun icon's rays?

[Lateral]

AUGH why are all these potatoes so SHORT

Yeah, that's kind of weird, neither of them were wearing Derse PJs or anything. Heck, where'd Jaspers' pinstripes go?

[Hytheter]

Yeah, Jasprose's outfit has elements unique to Rose's dream outfit, for as of yet unexplained reasons. It might have something to do with the Dream Rose from Davesprites timeline.

JASPROSESPRITE^2: Squaring these sprites, it's a marvelous thing. It opens you up! The selves become curiously multidimensional; concentrated!!
JASPROSESPRITE^2: I recall the lives of many Roses lost. And many Jaspers! Maybe even more than nine. ;3

Or maybe it has some symbolic significance.

[Sigh]

New potato with good message IMO. Kind of reminds me of Ep100 of MLP's moral at the end actually, everyone has an important part to play in life simply by living, and even if you're not the main character in someone elses story that doesn't make yours any less important.

[Derjuin]

New potato with good message IMO. Kind of reminds me of Ep100 of MLP's moral at the end actually, everyone has an important part to play in life simply by living, and even if you're not the main character in someone elses story that doesn't make yours any less important.


Plus Roxy is still trying to make the matriorb, which is kinda surprising to me, but I guess she took it as a challenge from HIC/Grimbark/whoever else was involved with that.

[Shadow of the Sun]

Plus Roxy is still trying to make the matriorb, which is kinda surprising to me, but I guess she took it as a challenge from HIC/Grimbark/whoever else was involved with that.



I'm assuming that since she met the trolls and realized that they're actually pretty decent she's all like "man i should probably not let these guys go extinct.

[eschmenk]

There may be a number of factors. I think it could also be due to the fact that John, after he did his denisen's task, transported LOWAS (and Roxy) into a voidy area where Roxy was supposed to get better in touch with her voidiness or something. I didn't exactly understand that part, and am not sure we were supposed to, but anyway, that period apparently gave Roxy a better understanding of what she needed to know, so maybe now she feels like she better prepared to take another shot at the matriorb.

[Sigh]

I got Linkara to review Act 1 via Patreon donations. (http://channelawesome.com/at4w-homestuck-act-1/)

That is all.

[Lord Raziere]

I got Linkara to review Act 1 via Patreon donations. (http://channelawesome.com/at4w-homestuck-act-1/)

That is all.

.....I've got to see this. I don't care if Linkara writes it off as completely horrible and never reads it ever again, I want to see his reaction to it.

[Cavelcade]

That was the first Linkara review I've watched in a while. It was pleasant watching him read something that seemed to intrigue him.

[Murk]

After this, I'm so very very very sure John will somehow become prototyped in a sprite with Casey the viceroy. There's just no other option.

[eschmenk]

After this, I'm so very very very sure John will somehow become prototyped in a sprite with Casey the viceroy. There's just no other option.

There is exactly one unused kernel sprite left...

Rose still has some psychological issues, doesn't she! Yeah, that was kind of obvious from how passive she was earlier and not knowing her role, and she obviously was going to be embarrassed by the sprite^2 telling all her secrets, but I still wasn't prepared for her to decide that she isn't the primary Rose character anymore. I like how much improved John is, though. He's handled the last two situations he was in well (Rose's angst over her place and Caliope's attractiveness).

And Roxy is making Rose look even worse by comparison. I really enjoyed the new potato.
I'm new here. Would someone mind telling me why we say "potato"?

[Great equalizer]

I didn't notice this before, but panels on fake selection screens show some funny pictures when you mouse over them. And they are different for every screen so far.

[Oracle_Hunter]

I'm new here. Would someone mind telling me why we say "potato"?
Because saying "update" tended to result in a rush that broke poor Hussie's servers.

I couldn't tell you why we use "potato" for the life of me :smalltongue:

[eschmenk]

I didn't notice this before, but panels on fake selection screens show some funny pictures when you mouse over them. And they are different for every screen so far.
I didn't notice that before either, and I thought I had moused over the old panels before, but I'm not sure. In any case, they work now, even the ones on the previous potatoes.

The images seem to be continuing the story of the situation that corresponded to that panel. For example, Vriska is arguing with ghost Vriska, while Meenah daydreams. The pictures aren't just random funny stuff.

----

Thanks Oracle_Hunter.

[Sigh]

Because saying "update" tended to result in a rush that broke poor Hussie's servers.

I couldn't tell you why we use "potato" for the life of me :smalltongue:

Actually it's a holdover from the official MSPA forums where people got confused talking about the most recent update that had come out a few days ago, and it got other people excited over nothing. Thus it was mandated that if a new update came out you'd use the word potato so people knew you actually meant an update just happened. No idea why potato in particular.

[guttering flame]

I assumed Hussie used the term "Hot Potato" for exciting developments and the forums latched onto it

[Chromascope3D]

So, I dunno if this has been discussed before, because I'm relatively new to the whole Homestuck scene (started reading like a year ago), but thinking about Roxy's powers made me realize: Couldn't she "steal" the trolls' Quest Beds?

[Devils_Advocate]

KANAYA: By Following Through With The Duties We Have Fundamentally Tasked Ourselves With By Our Natural Inclinations
KANAYA: I Mean Us Specifically
KANAYA: You And I
KARKAT: DUTIES?
KARKAT: NATURAL INCLINATIONS?

Did anybody else initially read that as Echidna telling them to 'go forth and multiply'? Reading further I realized that was not at all what it meant*


*probably
Well, um, in Kanaya's case... like, pretty much exactly that?

Not in the sense of personally having a lot of offspring, specifically, but in the more general sense of facilitating the revival of her species; and even restoring trolls' natural means of reproduction (as opposed to the use of ectobiology or such). That's... kind of been her personal quest since before we first met her?

And that sort of goes hand in hand with the creation of a new universe. Do note that that process involves mixing together a bunch of genetic material in order to create new organisms (frogs, in this case), and the end result of that is a tadpole that's probably going to be erupted out of a volcano into a sphere which will then be fed with nutrients in order to mature into a different form. So there are some pretty clear allusions to both troll and human reproduction going on there, in addition to the whole tadpole to frog metamorphosis thingy.

Also, I'm pretty sure that SBURB has been pretty explicitly referred to as the means by which universes reproduce? So, y'know, there's that. The whole idea of it was originally conceived (to get a bit meta here) of by Hussie as a great big overly elaborate creation myth, as I recall. Like a story of the cosmos literally hatching out of an egg. The symbolism of it all is, like, extremely blatant.

And now we've had Kanaya and now Roxy actually come out and say that reproduction is part of Space's deal, as though that weren't pretty obviously inherent in the Space player being the designated frog breeder.

Just shortly after your quote, Kanaya goes on to say...

KANAYA: For Me It Is Procreation I Believe
KANAYA: And So Does She
KANAYA: Fighting For The Persistence Of Our People
KANAYA: I Guess You Could Say
KANAYA: Motherhood?
and then soon after

KANAYA: I Somehow Came To Understand Space Meant More Than Just Space
KANAYA: Like Not Just
KANAYA: Physical Room And Dimension For Stars To Occupy
KANAYA: Its
KANAYA: Deeper Than That
KANAYA: A Field Related To Propagation
KANAYA: The Ones Who Create It
KANAYA: They Are Passing A Torch As It Were
... But none of that is erotic in a conventional sense. Granted, if power is the ultimate aphrodisiac then making a universe is pretty sexy, I guess, but that's tangential to the matter at hand. Reproduction itself is distinct from the various shenanigans that facilitate it, and Echidna wasn't specifically telling them to copulate, if that's what you're thinking. My goodness. Get your mind out of the gutter. :P

[Sigh]

So, I dunno if this has been discussed before, because I'm relatively new to the whole Homestuck scene (started reading like a year ago), but thinking about Roxy's powers made me realize: Couldn't she "steal" the trolls' Quest Beds?

They'd still need dreamselves in one way or another, and voidey powers or no I'm pretty sure those are gonna be in short supply.

[Chromascope3D]

They'd still need dreamselves in one way or another, and voidey powers or no I'm pretty sure those are gonna be in short supply.
Oh right, I forgot about that caveat...

Unless...

Roxy conjured up their long lost dream bodies, and Jane revived them! :O

[Oracle_Hunter]

They'd still need dreamselves in one way or another, and voidey powers or no I'm pretty sure those are gonna be in short supply.
Not so -- she could just get their Sacrificial Slabs (http://mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/God_tier#Ascension).

We broke the Ascension rules like five Acts ago. Basically anyone can become God Tier at any time :smalltongue:

I suspect this particular bit is going to fall into the "nobody asked" form of excuse.

[Androgeus]

Oh right, I forgot about that caveat...

Unless...

Roxy conjured up their long lost dream bodies, and Jane revived them! :O

Sacrificial slabs would also be an option. You don't need a dream self for that method.

[Calemyr]

Not so -- she could just get their Sacrificial Slabs (http://mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/God_tier#Ascension).

We broke the Ascension rules like five Acts ago. Basically anyone can become God Tier at any time :smalltongue:

I suspect this particular bit is going to fall into the "nobody asked" form of excuse.

They're more like guidelines than actual rules. We've seen far more exceptions than we've seen straight examples. John and Vriska are the only straight examples of the rules as we were originally told them. Jade fused with a sprite to reach Dog Tier. Dave, Rose, Roxy, Dirk, and Jane died on slabs to reach God Tier while in dream form, while Jake did the same while in his original body despite his dream self being dead. Aradia's dreamself was simply dormant on her slab until her alpha bot blew up and she woke up a god.

I don't think it's clear that the beds behave differently from the slabs. We haven't seen a single-self character die on a quest bed, yet. It could simply be that ascension combines all existing copies of that self.

[Chromascope3D]

Sacrificial slabs would also be an option. You don't need a dream self for that method.

Ah. Yeah, I totally forgot about those, mainly because I was kinda skimming through the Beta Kids section, mainly because I was kinda archive-wearied at that point, compounded by the fact that I didn't really find them interesting. And I just totally forgot how Dave and Rose did it. :smalleek:

[Oracle_Hunter]

Potato!
Enter The Nana :smallcool:

[eschmenk]

I thought Hussie was going to make a joke out of Roxy and Calliope saying goodbye. And what was that, a hug? kiss? just trolling the readers?

At least now we know where Jade went even if we don't know how she got there. Or was that already mentioned somehow?

It looked like both John and Terezi are giving Rose a rough time if you mouse over the previous selection panel. I'm a bit surprised by John.

[Yuki Akuma]

Probably not a kiss. Callie does not appear to have lips.

...Also cherubs don't do 'romance'. Hugging is probably pretty hardcore to her already.

[Oracle_Hunter]

It looked like both John and Terezi are giving Rose a rough time if you mouse over the previous selection panel. I'm a bit surprised by John.
No no, they're talking poop to each other. Terezi totally just flashed her spades (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009599) at John. Someone update the Shipping Wall!

[GorinichSerpant]

I can't tell if the feelings between Roxy and Callie are 10 degree (on a ten degree scale) friendship or 10 degree friendship and romance.

[Friv]

It looked like both John and Terezi are giving Rose a rough time if you mouse over the previous selection panel. I'm a bit surprised by John.

John and Terezi, as mentioned above, are spades-talking each other. Rose is busy feeling intense spades towards her catsprite self, which makes a certain amount of sense for how self-frustration would manifest.

[eschmenk]

No no, they're talking poop to each other. Terezi totally just flashed her spades (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009599) at John. Someone update the Shipping Wall!

OK, then I think I understand what you get when you mouseover the second (also 4th) panel in the selection screen (http://www.mspaintadventures.com/?s=6&p=009625). Spades between John and Terezi (both ways) and also between Rose and Sprite^2 (one way). (Somehow I misread the spade as a club.)


John and Terezi, as mentioned above, are spades-talking each other. Rose is busy feeling intense spades towards her catsprite self, which makes a certain amount of sense for how self-frustration would manifest.

Got that, but now I don't get your last phrase. Manifest in action or as a sprite? I would say that Rose hates Sprite^2 simply for exposing all of Rose's flaws and embarrassing thoughts and desires. Sprite^2 is almost a satire of Rose and Rose can't deny any of it because of who is saying it. I think it would be interesting if Sprite^2 was embarrassing Rose because deep down Rose thought she deserved it, but I don't really think that's the case.

[Rater202]

Hi.

I don't read Homestuck or these other MSpaint adventures things(though, having read the OP of this thread, I'm considering it now)

But, while browsing the Wretched Hive of wasted time known as Tvtropes, I came across descriptions of the Class and Aspect system.

Later, I found myself finding one of those online quizzes that you see, telling you what you're Homestuck Class and Aspect are(this one claims to be the most accurate)

Taking the quiz, I was told that I was "The Page of Life"

I then looked up what those terms meant.

Page, according to the MS Paint adventures Wiki, is a class that either Equips others with the Aspect or creates and/or exploits the aspect, Possibly both, starts out weak, and is really powerful once you get to high "levels"

Life, according to the same source, has to do with literal life force, based on it's color and symbol probably has something to do with plant life, and the Quiz I took says that it's associated with "Evolution, Power, and Bloat"

So I have a question, for those who read the work and are thus far more knowledgeable about it than I could ever be: What, exactly, does the Page of Life do.

(And if any of you know me from other parts of the forum, would Homestuck or any other MS Paint Adventure be something you'd recommend to me?)

[Lord Raziere]

So I have a question, for those who read the work and are thus far more knowledgeable about it than I could ever be: What, exactly, does the Page of Life do.

(And if any of you know me from other parts of the forum, would Homestuck or any other MS Paint Adventure be something you'd recommend to me?)

Aside from "be completely useless for most of your early days as a player who keeps trudging on in the hope of your eventual late game power up that makes you near godly that never seems to come"? not much.

as for Homestuck itself well hm, its primarily a comedy thing. but its also complicated.

you know how in Dragon Ball Z you have aliens, time travel and super-cataclysmic events happening because of ridiculously high-powered people? its like that, except ten-thousand times more time travel, cataclysmic events off the scale, but less fighting in between those two things and instead lots and lots of talking that are hilarious and mostly satirical. but with one of the most complicated intricate plots in existence revolving around the time travel.

oh and all the main protagonists of the comic are teens from 13-16 years old, so lots of teen drama.

except to get to all that you have to first go through a first act which is mostly just playful shenanigans and two other acts which are sort of slow compared to everything else...as well as an intermission.

and you cannot skip any of it. read the entire thing, because every bit of it is vital to understand the backwards super story puzzle that is Homestuck.

not saying you have to read it. but if you do, thats my warning to you, because you have no idea what your getting into. there is a reason why Android 23 felt like she couldn't adequately explain Homestuck to people who haven't seen it- because it has to be seen to be believed.

[LoneStarNorth]

So I have a question, for those who read the work and are thus far more knowledgeable about it than I could ever be: What, exactly, does the Page of Life do.

A lot of class/aspect combinations end up working way different than fan theories predict when/if they actually show up in canon but here goes...

The most common life power we've seen is reviving the dead, so a potential-fully-unlocked Page of Life could almost surely do that. They might have other strong healing powers as well. Based on Page of Hope powers, that healing might be an aura effect that works on everything in a wide radius (possibly friend or foe). Maybe they could also grant life to things that weren't alive in the first place? As in actual god-like creation of life.

All of the above is speculation and guesswork since there hasn't been a Page of Life in the comic at all.

[eschmenk]

We can be pretty sure that any Page would have a pretty horrible god-tier outfit, though. :smalltongue: Not that he would be forced to wear it, I guess.

I'd say that Homestuck is an experience. If you have the time, you should check it out, just so you know what it is, if nothing else. It's just so different than anything else out there. You won't know what you missed unless you give it a try.

Be aware, though, that it's highly experimental. Hussie (the author) never managed to complete any of the other MSPaint Adventure stories. Hussie says that he has a plan to end Homestuck, though, and I'm confident that he does given what's currently going on in the story. Still, you can tell that earlier on he changed his mind several times over where the story was going and that the story blew up into a much bigger project than he had intended it to be. (He thought he was about one year away from completing it a few years ago.) In other words, it's a convoluted story, and expect that some stuff that seems like it will be important will turn out to not be so important. But you won't know what will be important, and it's part of he experience, so I agree with the earlier advice to not skip sections of the story.

Also be aware that we are rapidly approaching 10,000 pages. Some pages are trivial; some contain cool animations; some contain hundreds or thousands of words of dialog; a few are flash games even. Be aware that it's a major time sink if you decide to keep reading.

[Derjuin]

Hussie (the author) never managed to complete any of the other MSPaint Adventure stories.

While I agree with everything else, Problem Sleuth is complete :smallwink:

[eschmenk]

While I agree with everything else, Problem Sleuth is complete :smallwink:

:smalleek: Yeah, you are right! Somehow my memory took what I read on Wikipedia (or somewhere else) about the first two stories and applied it to Problem Sleuth. I had started to read PS a long time ago, I think, but stopped. Now that I know it has an ending (and one that actually wraps things up), I'll probably read it.

[Rater202]

Okay.

Two statements

1: I read more about the classes. Let's just say that if I find myself inexplicitly transported to a parallel dimension where this stuff is real, I'm hoping the quiz I took is wrong on class.(Aspect is okay, though). A hypothetical for pretending/done on a laugh, it's fine though.

2: I gave actually reading the thing a go. I am two acts in, one sitting.

...The hell did I just read?

[Great equalizer]

...The hell did I just read?

Welcome to the club :smallamused:

[Aquillion]

While I agree with everything else, Problem Sleuth is complete :smallwink:
Technically speaking Jailbreak is now complete, too (he went back and gave it an ending a while back.) I mean, its ending is silly and out of nowhere, but so is everything else in Jailbreak, so.

The only one that didn't end at all is Bard Quest, which was an obviously failed experiment.

[Rater202]

Welcome to the club :smallamused:

...I don't even know if I like it or not but I can't stop reading.

[Derjuin]

...I don't even know if I like it or not but I can't stop reading.

One of us! One of us! One of us!!

:smallbiggrin:

[eschmenk]

1: I read more about the classes. Let's just say that if I find myself inexplicitly transported to a parallel dimension where this stuff is real, I'm hoping the quiz I took is wrong on class.(Aspect is okay, though). A hypothetical for pretending/done on a laugh, it's fine though.

You will probably hope it's wrong even more once you encounter the characters who are the same class (unless you already read about them). They don't get much respect.

[Lord Raziere]

...I don't even know if I like it or not but I can't stop reading.

I warned you.

you may have not read it because it was the last post of the last page and thus may have missed it, but I did warn you.

now I can be your annoying time traveler who hints at things that will happen but won't elaborate! such as commenting on how ironic that you have a horse avatar on at the beginning of your trek through this comic, what don't get it? just think it over....just think it over....

oh and beware of clowns and puppets.

and lastly...remember that a lot of homestuck has internet culture in it.

[Rater202]

now I can be your annoying time traveler who hints at things that will happen but won't elaborate! such as commenting on how ironic that you have a horse avatar on at the beginning of your trek through this comic, what don't get it? just think it over....just think it over....
Pony.

oh and beware of clowns and puppets. I'm aware of this.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Rather than ask for a link to the test, I found one that seems pretty great. (https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/rvalle/hsquiz/hsquiz.html)

I got Slyph of Heart, followed by Page of Heart when I selected for gender. I'm kind of terrified at the concept of a Page of Heart :smalleek:

Also, I can't help but feel that a Page of Life would be unkillable while in "Over 9000" mode.

[Somensjev]

Rather than ask for a link to the test, I found one that seems pretty great. (https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/rvalle/hsquiz/hsquiz.html)

I got Slyph of Heart, followed by Page of Heart when I selected for gender. I'm kind of terrified at the concept of a Page of Heart :smalleek:

Also, I can't help but feel that a Page of Life would be unkillable while in "Over 9000" mode.

so, i've actually done that exact quiz twice before (bard of blood and prince of doom were my results). but i decided to do it again, and got heir of void :smallconfused: that's a pretty big change from the last two

i actually liked the idea of the prince of doom the most, it's my favourite combination

[Rater202]

So. After reading the third act, I have decided that aww hell yess I like this thing.

I was particularly amused by TG successfully counter trolling the troll that I strongly suspect is a literal troll.(since everybody on the net know about homestuck trolls)

I also noticed that Tg/Dave's hair looks kinda like a someone bleached a crow and then it fell asleep on his head.
Rather than ask for a link to the test, I found one that seems pretty great. (https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/rvalle/hsquiz/hsquiz.html)

Taking this one for comparison with the other I took, taking twice differing only in one (the third)question, because I honestly could not decide between two answers.

First: Page of Breath

Second: Muse of Breath.

Doing this a third time, since I think Muses are supposed to be Female Exclusive, changing just that one answer: Page of Breath Again.

So this quiz averages out to Page of Breath and the other was Page of Life.

So. Definitely the page of something.


I'm kind of terrified at the concept of a Page of Heart :smalleek: Okay, I'm not to that point yet and I only skimmed the aspects, so what exactly is frightening about one who "creates and/or exploits" hearts or "arms others with" hearts?

Assuming that the MSPA Wiki contains accurate information about the Class.


Also, I can't help but feel that a Page of Life would be unkillable while in "Over 9000" mode.

Newb question: is "Over 9000" mode referring to to the top rungs of the echeladder, some point in the god tiers, or a specific instance of the meme in question being referenced in relation to a character demonstrating significant power.

My spell check knows echeladder.

[Derjuin]

Newb question: is "Over 9000" mode referring to to the top rungs of the echeladder, some point in the god tiers, or a specific instance of the meme in question being referenced in relation to a character demonstrating significant power.

My spell check knows echeladder.

Specifically to the point in a Page's career when they come fully into their aspect/power; all classes can do it, but a Page is much more potent once they do.

From the test, I got Maid of Light! I like it.

[Hytheter]

Assuming that the MSPA Wiki contains accurate information about the Class.

See, that's the thing, we don't have much actual information about classes and aspects; it's mostly vague hints and speculation. Basically all we actually know about Pages is that they have great potential but usually take a long time to reach it.

I also wouldn't put much stock in a personality quiz that attempts to link the results to such a poorly understood system...

[Rater202]

I don't know, "starts weak but kicks ass later" sort of sounds like something that would fit me, or at least interest me, even if I'm not so sure about the rest of the package.

One of the most fun roleplays I'm in and have ever been in started with PCs literally being fifth grade school children.

They are now counted among the powerhouses of their region.

[LoneStarNorth]

Okay, I'm not to that point yet and I only skimmed the aspects, so what exactly is frightening about one who "creates and/or exploits" hearts or "arms others with" hearts?

In this case the word "Heart" is apparently interchangeable with "Soul." As in the kind you sell to the devil, not the kind that turns you into a brilliant jazz musician.

...My headcanon just changed DRASTICALLY.

[Rakaydos]

Rogue of Breath.
...I find your lack of faith... disturbing.

[Sigh]

I also noticed that Tg/Dave's hair looks kinda like a someone bleached a crow and then it fell asleep on his head.

It makes me unfairly upset when new people seem to see this on their first read-through when me and my posse that have been through this since the beginning didn't realize it until about a year ago. It's just like... how did we not see this sooner?!

[AgentPaper]

I've always really liked homestuck's class system. Took the quiz above, came out Rogue of Hope, which is interesting. Basically, I literally steal hope away from my enemies and share it with my friends. Which sounds a lot like snatching victory out of the jaws of defeat. Makes me think of the typical "heroic leader" type, who passively steals hope from his enemies and shares it with his friends with a "never give up" attitude.


I don't know, "starts weak but kicks ass later" sort of sounds like something that would fit me, or at least interest me, even if I'm not so sure about the rest of the package.

One of the most fun roleplays I'm in and have ever been in started with PCs literally being fifth grade school children.

They are now counted among the powerhouses of their region.

The basic idea of the Page, from what I've gathered, is that they're the ultimate untapped potential. That is, there's an absolutely massive amount of power stored away in them (supposedly), but for the vast majority of their lives, they're pretty pathetic, and not just in combat, but also socially and in other areas. And there's no guarantee that they'll ever reach that potential, they can very easily die before that happens, and in fact that seems to be the more likely of the two outcomes. If they do manage to unlock that potential, though...well, we've only heard of it happening once, from an unreliable source and possibly an alternate timeline, but from that account an unlocked page is potentially the single most powerful being in the entire homestuck universe. Which is saying a helluva lot.

Pages also tend to have a "defecit" in their aspect because of their class. As a Page of Life, you'd probably start the session out dead (literally, a lack of life), and spend most of the game wandering about as a useless ghost. Pairing in with the "useless until to go big" thing, you'd probably have little real ability to help anyone else out with your aspect, maybe at best you could heal some minor wounds or make people feel healthier or other little things like that. You might be powerful compared to a normal person, but you'll always be well behind any else of your "level". Once you unlock your true potential, you'd basically be the ultimate healer and life-giver. You would likely be able to heal any wounds, bring people back to life at will, be next to unkillable yourself, and very likely be able to even create new life, in any shape or form you wanted.

[Aquillion]

Another thing of note:

We have never seen or heard of a Page reaching their full potential in a "sustained" fashion. Every time a Page's power has been accessed, it was a sudden overwhelming eruption which then died down. It's possible that a Page's true power is meant to be something they tap in a Limit Break sort of manner, rather than a transcendent enlightenment they ascend to permanently.

[eschmenk]

One of the most fun roleplays I'm in and have ever been in started with PCs literally being fifth grade school children.

They are now counted among the powerhouses of their region.

I agree with AgentPaper's reply. It's not just that a Page starts incredibly weak, it's that they stay incredibly weak and don't get any respect and usually die that way. Unlocking their power is very much the exception. And it's not just their Aspect powers, it's really their entire personalities that are weak, typically.

I was thinking of saying earlier that you would especially not want to be a Page if you had encountered the Pages in the story, so I'll say it now. There were three: one died after working very hard all of the time, but never amounted to anything special according to a story we were told about him. The other two are fairly significant characters in the story currently, but both are pretty pathetic. (One of the characters is such a weenie that I find him extremely annoying.) When assignments were given out recently, the two Pages pointedly got the easiest and least important one. It's gotten to the point that Hussie (the author) will be pretty much required to make at least one of them unlock their potential later (it's been foreshadowed), actually, but meanwhile it's pretty bad.

(Hopefully that was vague enough to not be too spoilerish. I know you must be seeing spoilers on the MSPA wiki, anyway.)

[Lord Raziere]

I got Knight of Light on that test.

which basically means I fight to defend my friends using luck. I can critical hit anything I want. Give me a six-shooter and I will One-Hit Kill everything. Call me Robin Hood, cause I always hit my target.

[Rater202]

The basic idea of the Page, from what I've gathered, is that they're the ultimate untapped potential. That is, there's an absolutely massive amount of power stored away in them (supposedly), but for the vast majority of their lives, they're pretty pathetic, and not just in combat, but also socially and in other areas. And there's no guarantee that they'll ever reach that potential, they can very easily die before that happens, and in fact that seems to be the more likely of the two outcomes. If they do manage to unlock that potential, though...well, we've only heard of it happening once, from an unreliable source and possibly an alternate timeline, but from that account an unlocked page is potentially the single most powerful being in the entire homestuck universe. Which is saying a helluva lot....That sounds more like me and what I fear about the future than I care to admit.

I'm thinking that first quiz was on the money when it said it was "The most accurate."


Another thing of note:

We have never seen or heard of a Page reaching their full potential in a "sustained" fashion. Every time a Page's power has been accessed, it was a sudden overwhelming eruption which then died down. It's possible that a Page's true power is meant to be something they tap in a Limit Break sort of manner, rather than a transcendent enlightenment they ascend to permanently.
And that sounds like Gohan from Dragonball... Up until the end of the Cell Saga.

I agree with AgentPaper's reply. It's not just that a Page starts incredibly weak, it's that they stay incredibly weak and don't get any respect and usually die that way. Unlocking their power is very much the exception. And it's not just their Aspect powers, it's really their entire personalities that are weak, typically.

I was thinking of saying earlier that you would especially not want to be a Page if you had encountered the Pages in the story, so I'll say it now. There were three: one died after working very hard all of the time, but never amounted to anything special according to a story we were told about him. The other two are fairly significant characters in the story currently, but both are pretty pathetic. (One of the characters is such a weenie that I find him extremely annoying.) When assignments were given out recently, the two Pages pointedly got the easiest and least important one. It's gotten to the point that Hussie (the author) will be pretty much required to make at least one of them unlock their potential later (it's been foreshadowed), actually, but meanwhile it's pretty bad.

(Hopefully that was vague enough to not be too spoilerish. I know you must be seeing spoilers on the MSPA wiki, anyway.)
Don't worry, I'm not too big on Spoilers(Though I am trying to go itno this one elativly blind, since I'm sort of wishing I hadn't been spoiler on a big plot twist in the last thing I got into.

I got Knight of Light on that test.

which basically means I fight to defend my friends using luck. I can critical hit anything I want. Give me a six-shooter and I will One-Hit Kill everything. Call me Robin Hood, cause I always hit my target.

This is good fit for you, you think?

[Lord Raziere]

This is good fit for you, you think?

well here is the thing, Homestuck classes are a lot about the person themselves than just their abilities.

you said that it describes you in a way that fears for your future than you care to admit- thats half the point, according to the webcomic, because the title is about how your supposed to grow, sort of- like, its not just your abilities, but your problems. Homestuck is a webcomic about teenagers growing up, and the titles are sort of like, HOW they grow up.

Knights? they tend to have great talent, but lack the confidence in their talents and their journey is about discovering that confidence. Light is about significance/luck/seeing the way forward/ and such. so I can interpret it to mean that while I have talents in such an area, I may lack the confidence for them, which I think does describe me- I am in college, and I do have talents which I'm good at, but I'm uncertain about whether my talents would be good enough, y'see? so technically I am a Knight of Light, in that I not confident about my future, despite my talents being good, y'know?

thing is though, the whole thing is designed for people younger than me. I might've already grown past my thing. when I was 13-14 I was dealing with major anger management issues- perhaps my title then would be like.....Prince of Rage or something since I needed to learn to calm down and deal with my stress- to "Destroy" my Rage. who knows, but I can interpret it to mean that I am a Knight of Light now, but I'm more complex than that- who knows, maybe your not really a Page of Life after all? online tests like that are just astrological signs 2.0. I just readings like that because while I don't actually believe them as accurate, I like the descriptions because they associate me with things I like. so whatevs.

[JadedDM]

Took a test years ago that said I was the Heir of Blood and my girlfriend was the Mage of Void. Still no idea what either of those things could mean, though.

[Oracle_Hunter]

thing is though, the whole thing is designed for people younger than me. I might've already grown past my thing.
A fascinating point!

I decided to retake the test and answer it as I would have when I was 13-14 years old. While most of the answers did change (which is good!) I was surprised to find a few did not. In any case, my result was Mage of Light. Fancy! :smallcool:

Despite what the quiz says, I feel that Mages are more than "dudes with magic" -- and not just because magic is totally fake :smalltongue:

Both of the Mages we've seen are talented tinkerers in their Aspect: one (http://mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/Sollux_Captor) is a master of a death-based programming language; the other (http://mspaintadventures.wikia.com/wiki/Meulin_Leijon) is a shipper without peer. Indeed, this tinkering may seem more "magical" because it deals with immaterial concerns (e.g. programs, relationships) than concrete ones.

In this sense, a Mage of Light might manipulate Destiny at a further remove than a Rogue (who steals fortune for herself!) or a Seer (who merely sees and advices, as opposed to pulling on the threads of Fate).
And, of course, Internet Quizes are for Entertainment Purposes Only and should not be taken at all seriously :smallsmile:

[AgentPaper]

Took a test years ago that said I was the Heir of Blood and my girlfriend was the Mage of Void. Still no idea what either of those things could mean, though.

An Heir of Blood would essentially be "someone protected by their relationships". I'd imagine it as someone who has a large network of friends/family/loved ones who are willing to and often do go out of their way to help you out. We don't know too much about heirs other than that, it seems to be one of the simpler classes, you just kinda get your aspect handed to you early on, even if it isn't always obvious that you have it.

A Mage of Void would be "someone who helps themselves using knowledge of nothingness". Basically, someone who knows everything there is to know about nothingness, and uses that knowledge to set an example for an guide their friends. This is a bit of a strange combination (most Void pairings are though), so it's hard to say exactly what it means, but Void players seem to often be powerful in unexpected ways.

[Rater202]

So, with the "Made for 13 year olds" thing in mind, gonna do both tests again.

The first (http://zules.com/titletest/index.php) one I took, that started this whole mess, when answered as I would have at 13, makes me the Page of Mind.

The second one, answered as I would have at 13,made me Seer of Light(and spoiled Roses Class for me, but it was kinda obvious so I don't mind)

On the topic of Homestuck proper, I continue to be amused by the fact that the kids seem to be better ant trolling the trolls are than the trolls are at trolling the kids.

[eschmenk]

On the topic of Homestuck proper, I continue to be amused by the fact that the kids seem to be better ant trolling the trolls are than the trolls are at trolling the kids.

Heh. Just wait. :smallbiggrin:

[Rater202]

Having seen Alternate future Dave secondarily prototype sepucrowsprite by combining with it, I am now convinced that Dave's crow hair was on purpose.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Having seen Alternate future Dave secondarily prototype sepucrowsprite by combining with it, I am now convinced that Dave's crow hair was on purpose.
ProTip: Everything in Homestuck is on purpose. Even that stuff that wasn't originally on purpose is retroactively made purposeful by Shenanigans :smallbiggrin:

[Sigh]

Holy updates Batman, I think all of us missed the one posted last night with Dave and Dirk, because that is one long update with a bunch of characterization going on there.

[Rater202]

ProTip: Everything in Homestuck is on purpose. Even that stuff that wasn't originally on purpose is retroactively made purposeful by Shenanigans :smallbiggrin:

Just pointing something out.

I mean, between that and Dave's many, many, many crows, the crow hair should have pretty obvious.

I mean, he's kinda got a crow animal motif, is what I'm saying.

[Oracle_Hunter]

Holy updates Batman, I think all of us missed the one posted last night with Dave and Dirk, because that is one long update with a bunch of characterization going on there.
Dirk is now my Favorite Kid.

Dave is pretty good too, but man, that was some serious Character Development :smalleek:

[Rater202]

So.

Just saw the "end" of act four.

The hell I just watch?

[Lord Raziere]

So.

Just saw the "end" of act four.

The hell I just watch?

you mean [S] Descend?

you watched the beginning of Homestuck's true awesome.

[Great equalizer]

you mean [S] Descend?

you watched the beginning of Homestuck's true awesome.

I think he means the Con Air "tribute".