Is TDO an unreliable source?

[Riftwolf]

Forgive me if I don't recall what happened in SoD exactly, but the Dark One gave Redcloak a vision of his origin, and the 'Goblins as XP' story. From memory, this is the *only* source for the GaXP story. Thor didn't mention it to Durkon, even though it'd be kind of important to know for a diplomat going into a negotiation. Now, it's possible Thor didn't think of it, or was ashamed to admit it, or wasn't involved in the GaXP plot (the Northern Gods have their own infighting to level their clerics without the need for a dedicated mook race). But its also possible the Dark One is manipulating Redcloak with the GaXP story, as Redcloak is a speciesist who would buy into a story of not just societal or earthly injustice, but divine.
Thoughts?

[Fyraltari]

Yes it’s possible that the Dark One is lying to Redcloak on a great number of things such as his motives or his plans with the power the Plan is to grant him or even just hiding knowledge of things we aren’t privy to. I would even say that it is likely as the story seems to have take greater pain to ensure that Redcloak and TDO had no direct contact than for any other important Cleric.

However the idea that goblins exist as walking bags of XP for adventurers is so clearly commentary on game design that it would be baffling for it to turn out to be untrue.

[understatement]

Yes and no.

Yes in that there's a very high chance The Dark One has an ulterior motive. Redcloak has led a lot of goblins to his death, but there has been no sort of reprimand or dissuasion from his god. Heck, at the whole Gobbotopia speech the Dark One's message is very clear to his high priest: don't mess up the gate-stealing possibly-world-ending Plan.

No in that I don't think the whole "goblins as XP" was a complete lie, because the message this would send would be
welp, it looks like goblins were actually perfectly fine the whole time and brought their abysmal conditions on themselves!" I don't think the physical XP part matters as much as the racial stigma, anyway. Redcloak doesn't want just better land and ores (which would directly address the XP part), he wants goblins to be recognized as equals among demihuman races.

[dancrilis]

We don't know.

But The Dark One might not know either - he might believe the story and it could still be wrong.

Maybe Goblins thought it before he died and he still does or maybe one of the evil gods lied to him for some reason i.e and maybe didn't want him trusting to many other gods so they could maintain power over him and use him as a bargining chip with there panteons etc.

I am half leaning towards it is a story that The Dark One made up to isolate his worshippers from others and thereby secure himself as well as possible.

[C-Dude]

Maybe the Dark One was actually a PC race (Orc or Half-Orc)? Perhaps he used the goblins as cheap followers to get what he wanted (an army), and his appearance as a purple goblinoid came after his deification (much as how Thor's hair changed color).

That'd be the kind of betrayal to shake Redcloak to his core: the goblins were fodder, even to his god.

EDIT: It might actually even be a betrayal of dimensional flux. In the 2nd dimension, Orcs WERE goblinoid.

[arverst_aegnar]

I think it's unlikely that TDO's take on the situation is either 100% right or 100% wrong, for a number of reasons. What sticks in my craw is the generic use of "the gods" when talking about the source of the problem.

The gods agree on next to nothing. Even all the Goos/Neutral/Evil gods within a single pantheon don't agree on whether or not to destroy the world. If the goblins really were created solely as a source of XP for clerics, i sincerely doubt every single god supported it. I'm not even sure if they all know about it, since Thor said nothing about it to Durkon when prepping him for talking to Redcloak, but i'm also not sure how such a thing would be kept secret so who knows.

[The MunchKING]

I thought the idea might be they agreed they were doing a fantasy D&D theme world this time, and one of the Gods just threw in some demihumans to round out the Monster Manual and no-one else thought about it to hard. They all just kind of agreed it was part of the setting, or at least no more disparate than a bunch of East Asian cultures running around their pseudo-European fantasy world.

[KorvinStarmast]

Is TDO an unreliable source?

I would not buy a used car from him.

[Emanick]

I would not buy a used car from him.

I would. You'd likely have the only car in the multiverse!

At best, you could sell it to Tinkertown for a pretty penny; the gnome engineers there would go nuts over it, however poorly it ran. At worst, hey, it'd be a talking point.

[bravelove]

I think its worth mentioning that the dark one was assassinated at peace talks, as this was such a huge event in goblin history it really would surprise me if that detail is fake, and if that detail is true that does imply that the dark one was fighting for something and if that holds true the thought that he was fighting for better living conditions makes sense, for which he was assassinated for. The Dark One has no reason to be lying about whats wanting best for goblin kind at least, I could see him fudging details yes, but the very core of 'martyr who fought and died to give his people a better life' I feel is important and really can't be a fabrication due to just how it'd be impossible to really fake that. Which means he is telling the truth on at least some fronts, even if what he thinks is true may not be correct.
So I'd say he's not unreliable, just bitter and biased most likely which is clouding his judgement somewhat. For instance the insistence that every person at the peace talk hired the assassin sounds like a bitter biased response, but even though thats probably not completely true even if he thinks it is, there was still an assassin, and that still matters a lot. It''s not unreliable, it just needs to be thought through, like you should with information from any source.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

"Is TDO an unreliable source?"

I don't know. I'll form an opinion once we hear from TDO. But so far in the comic, we have hear-say at best. Heck, the closest thing to a direct line from TDO was still conveyed via both crayon and the mouth of someone with an agenda. Crayons in particular have so far conveyed "this is what the person telling the story believes to be true, but it is not reliable", and I don't see why goblin religion foundational mythology would be any different from Azurite secret order foundational mythology.

Grey Wolf

[tomandtish]

I think it's unlikely that TDO's take on the situation is either 100% right or 100% wrong, for a number of reasons. What sticks in my craw is the generic use of "the gods" when talking about the source of the problem.

The gods agree on next to nothing. Even all the Goos/Neutral/Evil gods within a single pantheon don't agree on whether or not to destroy the world. If the goblins really were created solely as a source of XP for clerics, i sincerely doubt every single god supported it. I'm not even sure if they all know about it, since Thor said nothing about it to Durkon when prepping him for talking to Redcloak, but i'm also not sure how such a thing would be kept secret so who knows.

Actually, it's not that they don't agree on destroying the world to stop the threat. Even those gods voting NO seem pretty clear that it's more about giving the mortals one more chance to clean up the mess first, since they think they'll still have time to deal with it if the mortals fail.

It's really only a debate on how much of a time cushion they want to leave. Like me and my wife...

"It takes an hour to get there normally so we should leave an hour 15 or an hour 20 before we have to be there".

"It takes an hour to get there so we leave 5 minutes early".

[Morty]

"Is TDO an unreliable source?"

I don't know. I'll form an opinion once we hear from TDO. But so far in the comic, we have hear-say at best. Heck, the closest thing to a direct line from TDO was still conveyed via both crayon and the mouth of someone with an agenda. Crayons in particular have so far conveyed "this is what the person telling the story believes to be true, but it is not reliable", and I don't see why goblin religion foundational mythology would be any different from Azurite secret order foundational mythology.

Grey Wolf

Yes, everything we know about TDO comes from either Redcloak or Thor. Neither of which is impartial or entirely trustworthy on the topic.

That being said, I agree it's unlikely for this plot to be resolved with "this was all a lie, goblins are just evil and it's all their fault", due to the Giant's strongly-worded opinions on the subject.

[Metastachydium]

Yes, everything we know about TDO comes from either Redcloak or Thor. Neither of which is impartial or entirely trustworthy on the topic.

That being said, I agree it's unlikely for this plot to be resolved with "this was all a lie, goblins are just evil and it's all their fault", due to the Giant's strongly-worded opinions on the subject.

Also, I can't quite see how the cosmic-level problems could be solved without the Dark One with his purple quiddity and Redcloak with his 9th level purple spells if the Giant is not to resort on some massively lame, well, deus ex machina (however unfortunate the term might be with all the gods already involved).

[Mastikator]

To be honest I've yet to see any reason to believe The Dark One is any more or less trustworthy than any other deity. Do we have any reason to believe Thor is pulling the wool over Durkon's eyes? I don't see why we should apply a different standard.

Edit- I don't really see a big conflict here. Redcloak claims he wants equality, he wants goblins to be more than just monsters, he wants decent conditions to thrive without relying on stealing and without other races genociding goblins constantly.
Thor claims that The Dark One's cooperation is the only thing that can actually save the world, like actually save it. If they undo the world then they're doomed to keep doing it forever, that's a bad outcome. To get The Dark One to cooperate they have to come to some mutually beneficial compromise: The Dark One gets to be the goblin deity who has their back, the goblins has a dignified existence finally. The other gods get to finally solve the problem of the Snarl.

[dancrilis]

I don't see why we should apply a different standard.

Generally trusting good people to be good and evil people to be evil is reasonable.

In this case good can be displayed via honesty and evil can be displayed via deception.

Having said that I am dubious about Thor.
Panel 4 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1089.html) here refers to him as deceitful and untrustworthy (from the prespective of someone who is better at Knowledge Religion checks then Durkon), but I am willing to give Thor a pass on that (for now).

But the one that kindof stood out to me was panel 9 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html) he just looks so bored about the eternal reward of his worshippers and apathetic about the fact that they exist to power his house.

[Metastachydium]

Having said that I am dubious about Thor.
Panel 4 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1089.html) here refers to him as deceitful and untrustworthy (from the prespective of someone who is better at Knowledge Religion checks then Durkon), but I am willing to give Thor a pass on that (for now).


Well, it came from the high priest (in all but name) of a goddess who has a grudge against Thor because of her wager with Loki (which Thor seems not to have understood all that well (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1083.html) when it was made), so I think you made the right call there with giving him a pass.
The weird thing about Thor, as I see it, would be that although by the time the Order set sail towards the Western Continent he should have realized Durkon is the most important cleric in existence that he has, he never really tried to contact or help him in any way before his death (despite the fact that he was free to explain to him any stuff about the Gates he saw fit because Durkon already knew that they exist, as well as their purpose). Heck, he let let the Linears threaten the very life of this key asset of his, because soaking his feet seemed to be a higher priority (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0806.html) – and that wasn't some early strip, we are talking about a scene from BRitF.

[factotum]

He's an Evil god (so he has no particular reason to tell the truth), plus he wasn't even there when the current world was created and thus any information he has about what the Gods were doing back then is second-hand at best...how could he be anything *other* than an unreliable source?

[Fyraltari]

Generally trusting good people to be good and evil people to be evil is reasonable.

In this case good can be displayed via honesty and evil can be displayed via deception.

Having said that I am dubious about Thor.
Panel 4 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1089.html) here refers to him as deceitful and untrustworthy (from the prespective of someone who is better at Knowledge Religion checks then Durkon), but I am willing to give Thor a pass on that (for now).

But the one that kindof stood out to me was panel 9 (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html) he just looks so bored about the eternal reward of his worshippers and apathetic about the fact that they exist to power his house.

The low priest of Hel thinks that because his first memory ever is Durkon being kicked out. Every time he heard about Thor being good and kind he’d have been thinking of that particular memory and conclude that the church of Thor and Thor itself are deceitful.

The afterlife panel is a joke contrasting the dwarf’s intense devotion to Thor all of her life and her casual attitude to him once they live together playing cards. His expression is annoyance at asking him for chips she can reach herself. Also, I’m curious what reaction would you want him to have to something that’s as natural to him as breathing? Eternal wonder?

As to why Thor seems more trustworthy than the Dark One there are (in my opinion) three reasons: real world parallels, narrative function and characterization.

The Dark One plans to take control of a fantastical version of a nuke to make demands,to this end he uses a middle-man that he recruited wen he was a teenager after a traumatic event. He is the leader of a terrorist movement. These are rarely open and honest.

Thor’s narrative role is that of an adjuvant, an ally to the protagonists : he gave them important information, gave Durkon his upgraded weapon and helped them against Hel. In tv-tropes lingo he is a Big Good.
The Dark One is an antagonist, more precisely he is the one who enables and motivates one of the primary antagonists (Redcloak) and got the Evil Plan (tm) rolling. In Tv-tropes lingo he is the Greater Scope Villain.
The readership is naturally more inclined to trust one of these characters.

The last book gave a lot of characterization to Thor and it all pointed towards being benevolent, selfless and respectful. He didn’t need Durkon to want to go back to the Prime yet he felt it’d be wrong to order him out of Valhalla, likewise he didn’t need to inform Minrah or answer most of their questions.

Meanwhile the Dark One has received very little characterization but the one he has point towards him being uncaring: his message to Redcloak didn’t include any acknowledgment of all he’d done so far, a couple strips back the lack of communication between him and Red is compared to a negligent parent or spouse and Right-Eye called him angry and uncaring. Unlike the Durkon* case, we have nothing to contrast that to, and Right-Eye is framed as being in the right in that conversation so it seems like the Giant wants us to at least consider that TDO isn’t being completely genuine.

[dancrilis]

The afterlife panel is a joke contrasting the dwarf’s intense devotion to Thor all of her life and her casual attitude to him once they live together playing cards. His expression is annoyance at asking him for chips she can reach herself. Also, I’m curious what reaction would you want him to have to something that’s as natural to him as breathing? Eternal wonder?
There was just something about it that felt off - it was the most bored I think we have seen him (not even annoyed I don't think).

Fixed here but:


Right-Eye called him angry and uncaring. Unlike the Durkon* case, we have nothing to contrast that to, and Right-Eye is framed as being in the right in that conversation so it seems like the Giant wants us to at least consider that TDO isn’t being completely genuine.
You may want to fix your spoiler tags.

[uncool]

Yes, everything we know about TDO comes from either Redcloak or Thor. Neither of which is impartial or entirely trustworthy on the topic.

There's a little we know from Jirix, from strip 704. Nothing specific, but a little about his demeanor (as told by a biased source).

[Fyraltari]

Well, it came from the high priest (in all but name) of a goddess who has a grudge against Thor because of her wager with Loki (which Thor seems not to have understood all that well (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1083.html) when it was made), so I think you made the right call there with giving him a pass.
The weird thing about Thor, as I see it, would be that although by the time the Order set sail towards the Western Continent he should have realized Durkon is the most important cleric in existence that he has, he never really tried to contact or help him in any way before his death (despite the fact that he was free to explain to him any stuff about the Gates he saw fit because Durkon already knew that they exist, as well as their purpose). Heck, he let let the Linears threaten the very life of this key asset of his, because soaking his feet seemed to be a higher priority (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0806.html) – and that wasn't some early strip, we are talking about a scene from BRitF.
It generally seems that while Clerics can contact gods (who can then decide wether to answer) the reverse isn’t true (probably some dumb Law with a provision for calling a moot) and so Thor couldn’t tell Durkon until he either called him or died. Indeed, Thor believed Odin had engineered Durkon’s death so that Thor could do so.

There was just something about it that felt off - it was the most bored I think we have seen him (not even annoyed I don't think).

Fixed here but:

You may want to fix your spoiler tags.
Thanks.

[Metastachydium]

As to why Thor seems more trustworthy than the Dark One there are (in my opinion) three reasons: real world parallels, narrative function and characterization.

The Dark One (…) uses a middle-man that he recruited wen he was a teenager after a traumatic event.

Disagreed. He did not recruit Recloak, specifically. He just did not dump him once he picked up the Mantle.


He is the leader of a terrorist movement. These are rarely open and honest.

1. Interesting take, and technically true.
2. They can be pretty straightforward if they so choose. Also, Recloak is obviously not necessarily ”open and honest”, since, first of all, he doesn't go around explaining the Plan to anyone who cares to listen. How many levels of obfuscation do you expect to be there?


Thor’s narrative role is that of an adjuvant, an ally to the protagonists : he gave them important information, gave Durkon his upgraded weapon and helped them against Hel. In tv-tropes lingo he is a Big Good. (…)
The last book gave a lot of characterization to Thor and it all pointed towards being benevolent, selfless and respectful. He didn’t need Durkon to want to go back to the Prime yet he felt it’d be wrong to order him out of Valhalla, likewise he didn’t need to inform Minrah or answer most of their questions.


In Utterly Dwarfed, yes, but whatever we've seen up to that point clashes with that image, big time. That's what I've brought an example for from Blood Runs. Is Thor this carefree, irresponsible, apathetic guy, who seems to be somewhat benevolent at times (if childish and fairly dumb) that keeps popping up as late as in Blood Runs, or the knowledgeable Reasonable Authority Figure from Dwarfed? Is he both, with creepy mood swings (and why would we trust such an unstable character)? Is he one of these, and just putting on an act whenever he acts contrary to what he really is, and would this be a good sign? Is he neither, manipulating everyone? What's the deal here, really?


The Dark One is an antagonist, more precisely he is the one who enables and motivates one of the primary antagonists (Redcloak) and got the Evil Plan (tm) rolling. In Tv-tropes lingo he is the Greater Scope Villain.
The readership is naturally more inclined to trust one of these characters.

Good for the readership. As if authors never played with expectations.



Meanwhile the Dark One has received very little characterization but the one he has point towards him being uncaring: his message to Redcloak didn’t include any acknowledgment of all heÂ’d done so far, a couple strips back the lack of communication between him and Red is compared to a negligent parent or spouse and Right-Eye called him angry and uncaring. Unlike the Durkon* case, we have nothing to contrast that to, and Right-Eye is framed as being in the right in that conversation so it seems like the Giant wants us to at least consider that TDO isn’t being completely genuine.


It generally seems that while Clerics can contact gods (who can then decide wether to answer) the reverse isnÂ’t true (probably some dumb Law with a provision for calling a moot) and so Thor couldnÂ’t tell Durkon until he either called him or died. Indeed, Thor believed Odin had engineered DurkonÂ’s death so that Thor could do so.


Mhm. So Big Purple, the only god who basically went the extra mile to tell all his high priests much everything he could possibly know at the point when he created the Mantle is negligent for not calling Redcloak every other night to chat (what's he supposed to tell him, really, besides ”carry on, you're doing fine” which Redcloak could infer anyway from being granted spells?), while we should pity poor Thor, whose hands are tied, so he absolutely has to sabotage Durkon's attempt at defending Elan and himself (mind you, he's Thor's single most important cleric at this point). I see.
Further, Redcloak and Jirix are biased and probably wrong, while Right-Eye, who works from even less than those two certainly figured it out much better. Right-Eye is right about the Plan, inasmuch as he foretells accurately that it will get messy if Redcloak stays on board, but we have no reason to believe he's also right about the Dark One's motivations, because he simply does not have the means to verify his claims.
(As for divine-to-mortal communication, even if such laws exist (and I don't remember any clear on-panel confirmation of that), they can certainly be bypassed. At least two gods have demonsrated an ability to kinda-sorta speak to/through their clerics/followers (I'm talking about Odin's prophecy about Durkon and the dynamic between Tiamat and her Oracle).)

[Grey_Wolf_c]

That being said, I agree it's unlikely for this plot to be resolved with "this was all a lie, goblins are just evil and it's all their fault", due to the Giant's strongly-worded opinions on the subject.

OK, but TDO being the most honest god, the most deceitful ever, or somewhere in the middle has no impact on that. The question is not "how will the story resolve", it is "can we trust what TDO says". And, like I said, it's a strange question to ask when we've never seen TDO say anything.

If the question is instead "were the goblins created to be XP bags for good clerics?", then TDO is definitionally an unreliable source, since he wasn't there when the gods created the goblins.

Grey Wolf

[KorvinStarmast]

What sticks in my craw is the generic use of "the gods" when talking about the source of the problem. The gods agree on next to nothing. The godsmoot illustrated that nicely.


I would. You'd likely have the only car in the multiverse! And no gas. :smallbiggrin:

the gnome engineers there would go nuts over it, however poorly it ran. And they might be able to make some gas, for a suitable fee ... where's Haley when I need her to negotiate a price?
I don't see why goblin religion foundational mythology would be any different from Azurite secret order foundational mythology. That's a good take on the whole thing, IMO. But the Azurite thing was partly right (the Redcloak is threatening them eventually) and the TDO might be at least partly right, particularly given the gags in the early strips about 'why are we even doing this' ...

Generally trusting good people to be good and evil people to be evil is reasonable. In this case good can be displayed via honesty and evil can be displayed via deception.
I'd like to let this stand as is, but wasn't Shojo CG and deceptive (for whatever reasons ...) and isn't Haley all about deception as a rogue? She's not evil.

He's an Evil god (so he has no particular reason to tell the truth), plus he wasn't even there when the current world was created and thus any information he has about what the Gods were doing back then is second-hand at best...how could he be anything *other* than an unreliable source? Once again, not buying a used car from TDO.

He did not recruit Recloak, specifically. He just did not dump him once he picked up the Mantle. I raised this point in another thread: Redcloak had the mantle passed to him in an act of desperation (by the previous red cloak). Not quite "I need the best goblin out there to be the leader of my people, here's the red cloak to make it all work better" or whatever.

As to Thor, he has sufficient empathy that he'd like to see the cycle of creation and destruction ended. See panels 1 and two of this strip. (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1140.html)

[dancrilis]

I'd like to let this stand as is, but wasn't Shojo CG and deceptive (for whatever reasons ...) and isn't Haley all about deception as a rogue? She's not evil.

True.

But:


In this case good can be displayed via honesty and evil can be displayed via deception.

The key words are 'this case' - Shojo and Haley have no relevance to that.

To take a different case lying* to Durkon about rebel trees is not evil.
*assuming he was lying.

[Metastachydium]

True.

But:

In this case good can be displayed via honesty and evil can be displayed via deception.
The key words are 'this case' - Shojo and Haley have no relevance to that.

To take a different case lying* to Durkon about rebel trees is not evil.
*assuming he was lying.

I'd be more inclined to treat can as the operative word here, in which case the two examples are very much relevant. Shojo and Haley are neither honest, nor evil; likewise, Redcloak could be as honest as it gets, but if he had never to deliberately uttered a flase statement in his life (which is not the case (which is not the point)), he would still be, for all intents and purposes, a cosmic-level terrorist. In other words, his methods would make him evil regardless.

[KorvinStarmast]

The key words are 'this case' - Cool, makes sense.

[Dragonus45]

TDO is clearly an Evil god, if he really died in life an innocent martyr assassinated on the verge of creating true peace between races I will EAT A HAT and post the video in this thread. Also worth noting is some inconsistency between his situation and the current situation in Gobotopia beginning to build up diplomatic credibility and get at least one nation to acknowledge it after the brutal sacking of the Azurites and the current enslavement and slaughter of its people. When the backstory of TDO is that even when he tried to be peaceful they instead killed him and caused a goblinoid rampage so severe every other race decided they could never allow goblins and their kin to ever build society again. So from GO right there we have some serious aspersions on his honesty and the real situation involving his death.

The goblins as EXP fodder thing becomes a second problem with his honesty. I think it was probably true back when they squabbled a metaphor for dissolving game groups into existence and then couldn't get a world to last more then a few years before it fell apart, and I would bet that for the most part everything was similarly one dimensional and rushed as well. From there I think that the gods likely left that idea behind long ago when they started being more out there with their ideas, LASER SNAIL!, only to creep back in when they went for their self aware stick figure parody in the form of sheer neglect. Less that the gods put them in for the sake of being slaughtered then that they put them in as an afterthought because D&D worlds need goblins and orcs and whatnot as a general rule but then didn't really think to do much with them. Things get most fuzzy between and TDO's ascension because we know almost nothing about where their souls went, who they worshiped, what level of civilization they were at? There are a lot of blanks, and a lot of potential for them to be even greater victims of TDO then they are to the negligence of the gods.

[Psyren]

"GaXP origin/reason for goblin creation is true" and "The Dark One's cause is unjust" don't have to be mutually exclusive. The goblins got a raw deal, but they demonstrably have souls (see Jirix) and the Dark One's plan is endangering theirs as much as everyone else's. Given that only he and Redcloak know the full details of it (and Tsukiko I guess, wherever she ended up), all the other goblins were essentially signed up for it without understanding it, and even the two of them are missing critical pieces of the puzzle.

[ti'esar]

Heck, TDO's supposed "martyrdom" and his present status as an evil god are hardly mutually exclusive either.

(Although for the record I do think the account presented to modern goblins of his life and death is at least a little... idealized).

[Fyraltari]

Disagreed. He did not recruit Recloak, specifically. He just did not dump him once he picked up the Mantle.

A distinction without a difference.



1. Interesting take, and technically true.
2. They can be pretty straightforward if they so choose. Also, Recloak is obviously not necessarily ”open and honest”, since, first of all, he doesn't go around explaining the Plan to anyone who cares to listen. How many levels of obfuscation do you expect to be there?
At the very maximum? Three. Redcloak < TDO < Loki & Consorts but the last one is among my farthest « out there » guesses.




In Utterly Dwarfed, yes, but whatever we've seen up to that point clashes with that image, big time. That's what I've brought an example for from Blood Runs. Is Thor this carefree, irresponsible, apathetic guy, who seems to be somewhat benevolent at times (if childish and fairly dumb) that keeps popping up as late as in Blood Runs, or the knowledgeable Reasonable Authority Figure from Dwarfed? Is he both, with creepy mood swings (and why would we trust such an unstable character)? Is he one of these, and just putting on an act whenever he acts contrary to what he really is, and would this be a good sign? Is he neither, manipulating everyone? What's the deal here, really?
Thor is a fun-loving benevolent guy. When he can help, he does so (even playing dumb when that helps such as when arguing over souls with his niece) and‘ when he can’t help he doesn’t dwell on it and goes to do something else.
Those segments are hardly incompatible.




Good for the readership. As if authors never played with expectations.
« The story points towards something being true therefore it’s not » is not a convincing argument. What would [/spoiler]Right-Eye was wrong![/spoiler] bring to the table? Why not have put in the story a scene of Redcloak and the Dark One talking about their plans like Hel and Durkon* did if they are completely on the level with one another?







Mhm. So Big Purple, the only god who basically went the extra mile to tell all his high priests much everything he could possibly know at the point when he created the Mantle
Neither of those things are established facts. First, you can’t say that the Mantle contains the sum total of the Dark One’s knowledge on the Snarl because the Crimson Mantle is our only source on what he knows about the Snarl, that’s circular.
Second, Hel was more communicative with Durkon* than he was with Redcloak.

is negligent for not calling Redcloak every other night to chat (what's he supposed to tell him, really, besides ”carry on, you're doing fine” which Redcloak could infer anyway from being granted spells?)
Nice strawman you’ve got going on there.
Things The Dark One could have told Redclaok:
That the Order of the Stick is actively working against them and coordinated with the Sapphire Guard in Azure City. Later on, that they were en route to Girard’s Gate.

And much more importantly, where to find an arcane Caster willing to work with goblins and powerful enough to carry out the Ritual. That would have saved Redclaok a world of trouble.

But also, Redcloak hasn’t talked once to the Dark One in his entire life. Don’t you think he called his god for help when he was alone with his baby brother having left the ruins of their village when he was just a teenager?
I’m not the one calling the Dark One negligent, that’s what the gag is saying.

When the Dark One had a chance to send a message to Redclaok he didn’t congratulate him on the job he’d done so far, he didn’t offer any advice going forward like a good leader would have done. He told him to get back to work. What it comes down to is that Thor is portrayed as someone who values his subordinates as people and the Dark One as someone who sees his as a mean to an end.


Further, Redcloak and Jirix are biased and probably wrong, while Right-Eye, who works from even less than those two certainly figured it out much better. Right-Eye is right about the Plan, inasmuch as he foretells accurately that it will get messy if Redcloak stays on board, but we have no reason to believe he's also right about the Dark One's motivations, because he simply does not have the means to verify his claims.
Right-Eye has the perspective of an entire life of service to the Dark One for no reward but the death of his entire family and the Dark One being fine with that. The Dark One could have stripped Redcloak of his power to tell him that allying with Xykon was not acceptable. But he didn’t, therefore to the Dark One the needless death of all those goblins is acceptable. That’s not a loving god, that’s a god who sees his flock as expendable.

But that’s Watsonian reasoning, the Doylist reasonning is simpler and more powerful: Right-Eye is framed as being right. Therefore he most likely is.

(As for divine-to-mortal communication, even if such laws exist (and I don't remember any clear on-panel confirmation of that), they can certainly be bypassed. At least two gods have demonsrated an ability to kinda-sorta speak to/through their clerics/followers (I'm talking about Odin's prophecy about Durkon and the dynamic between Tiamat and her Oracle).)
Tiamat does not speak to the Oracle, she gave him the power of prophecy. As for the priest of Odin we don’t know who contacted whom in the first place so it does seems (although that isn’t stated) that gods can’t initiate contact with their Clerics.

[Dragonus45]

"GaXP origin/reason for goblin creation is true" and "The Dark One's cause is unjust" don't have to be mutually exclusive. The goblins got a raw deal, but they demonstrably have souls (see Jirix) and the Dark One's plan is endangering theirs as much as everyone else's. Given that only he and Redcloak know the full details of it (and Tsukiko I guess, wherever she ended up), all the other goblins were essentially signed up for it without understanding it, and even the two of them are missing critical pieces of the puzzle.

On the GaXP thing, I'm not sure if it's just the story has gone on for a long time and stuff shifted a little or what but the revelation with the gods makes it feel more out of place, the kind of thing that certainly happened the first few cycles the same way your first few games when you run tend to be more basic while you learn how to RP and tell a story. What I find a bit more interesting, awful, and compelling is the idea that at this point people did it all on their own anyways. The gods made Goblins and the like as an afterthought, set the world in motion, and people found their way to writing off goblin lives and and creating the state of perpetual war they are all in all on their own without any divine mandate.

[Riftwolf]

Tiamat does not speak to the Oracle, she gave him the power of prophecy. As for the priest of Odin we don’t know who contacted whom in the first place so it does seems (although that isn’t stated) that gods can’t initiate contact with their Clerics.

This being a self-aware fantasy parody, it's likely the Gods have a rule they can give their High Priests prophecies outside the domain agreement, but only if the prophecy is vague and worded in such a way to give multiple readings.



(Although for the record I do think the account presented to modern goblins of his life and death is at least a little... idealized).

I've thought about that too, but it's hardly like he'd be the first folk hero to be posthumously lionized.

[dancrilis]

Right-Eye was wrong!

As a heads up the tags are wrong here.

Also I agree I will be a bit surprised if that spoiler turns out to be correct.

[Metastachydium]

A distinction without a difference.

Not quite. The dying bearer handed the Mantle to the only other cleric around him. Redcloak hired himself by putting it on, and although the way I remember it, he could have passed it on to any other goblin cleric with more experience and less traumas, he chose to keep it.




At the very maximum? Three. Redcloak < TDO < Loki & Consorts but the last one is among my farthest « out there » guesses.

You guess so, and I guess your guess is a guess, no more, no less (silly rhyme not intended).



Thor is a fun-loving benevolent guy. When he can help, he does so (even playing dumb when that helps such as when arguing over souls with his niece) and‘ when he can’t help he doesn’t dwell on it and goes to do something else.
Those segments are hardly incompatible.

That example with the arguing business is, again, from UD. Before Book 6, he was consistently portrayed as irresponsible, lazy and not as helpful as he could be. The thing with the Mass Death Ward is not a god trying hard and failing, so not pressing an issue he cannot press. It's a god not even trying, and throwing his most important cleric to the metaphorical lions and going to literally soak his feet instead of hanging around to see what he can do.

Also, unless Durkon is a bloody liar, Thor is not really keen on answering calls from his followers, Durkon (the most important of them) included. He only implies he'll do it in the future after he has burdened the dwarf with a nigh-impossible task. What a guy!




« The story points towards something being true therefore it’s not » is not a convincing argument. What would Right-Eye was wrong! bring to the table? Why not have put in the story a scene of Redcloak and the Dark One talking about their plans like Hel and Durkon* did if they are completely on the level with one another?
(…)
Second, Hel was more communicative with Durkon* than he was with Redcloak.


Well, it would apparently surprise next to everyone in the readership, since ”the story points towards the Dark One's quiddity being the best solution to end the cycle, therefore he's a malevolent, double-crossing piece of excrement who'll probably end up as a red herring” sems to be a great fan-favourite as far as theories go, although pretty much everyone I've seen arguing for it thus far failed to present conclusive evidence that this is truly the case.
As for Greg, I find that comparison wanting: Greg's „dark spirit was birthed in [Hel's] hall” (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0946.html) – quite literally.






Neither of those things are established facts. First, you can’t say that the Mantle contains the sum total of the Dark OneÂ’s knowledge on the Snarl because the Crimson Mantle is our only source on what he knows about the Snarl, that’s circular.

Thor confirms (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1143.html) that Big Purple realized the Gates exist on his own, and severed all connections with Loki immediately afterwards, which is consistent with the story the Mantle implanted in Redcloak's head (a cleric of his found Lirian's Gate and he doesn't know where the other Gates are). Which is close enough for me to treat it as plausible.
Also, „not an established fact” does not mean „it's all a bloody lie”.



Nice strawman you’ve got going on there.
Things The Dark One could have told Redclaok:
That the Order of the Stick is actively working against them and coordinated with the Sapphire Guard in Azure City. Later on, that they were en route to GirardÂ’s Gate.

And much more importantly, where to find an arcane Caster willing to work with goblins and powerful enough to carry out the Ritual. That would have saved Redclaok a world of trouble.

But also, Redcloak hasn’t talked once to the Dark One in his entire life. Don’t you think he called his god for help when he was alone with his baby brother having left the ruins of their village when he was just a teenager?
I’m not the one calling the Dark One negligent, that’s what the gag is saying.

Yeah, sure. You're making a big fat assumption here: the gods know everything, and much unlike the others, Big Purple could have told Redcloak everything. If that's the case, why didn't Thor (who should know more about the Gates than Big Purple) tell Durkon where exactly he can find Kraagor's Gate, while handing him a complete version of Xykon and Redcloak's spell list and revealing the identities of the Mystery Voices?
Gods don't seem to be omniscient. It would seem to me that they know what their clerics know (this is how Big Purple apparently found his first Gate), and they can probably (this one is guesswork, mind you) scry for stuff super-efficiently if they know well enough what they are looking for. No goblin cleric followed the Order around, and Big Purple had no reason to believe they are importa
nt until they showed up in Azure City. As for the Arcane casters, given the status and perhaps life choices of the goblins arcane casters willing to work with them are apparently hard to find, while goblinoid arcane casters (about whom the Dark One would know) powerful enough to do the job just don't really exist.


When the Dark One had a chance to send a message to Redclaok he didn’t congratulate him on the job he’d done so far, he didnÂ’t offer any advice going forward like a good leader would have done. He told him to get back to work. What it comes down to is that Thor is portrayed as someone who values his subordinates as people and the Dark One as someone who sees his as a mean to an end.

1. Redcloak knew exactly what he was going to do, so no advice was needed.
2. He also said ”no pressure, though”, which we can safely read as ”don't angst over it too much, it's going fine”. As per Jirix, he calls Redclaok his true prophet as well, which is also a form of recognition.
3. Why exactly would a newly ascended former warlord have better people skills?



Right-Eye has the perspective of an entire life of service to the Dark One for no reward but the death of his entire family and the Dark One being fine with that. The Dark One could have stripped Redcloak of his power to tell him that allying with Xykon was not acceptable. But he didn’t, therefore to the Dark One the needless death of all those goblins is acceptable. ThatÂ’s not a loving god, thatÂ’s a god who sees his flock as expendable.

But thatÂ’s Watsonian reasoning, the Doylist reasonning is simpler and more powerful: Right-Eye is framed as being right. Therefore he most likely is.

As does Redcloak and probably Jirix, who are both clerics to boot. As for the alliance with Xykon, it furthered the Plan just fine thus far (and it also helped create Gobbotopia (which, if Jirix is to be trusted, is something Big Purple absolutely approves of) – Redcloak wouldn't have hired the hobos if it hadn't been for Xykon, the lich as a bad example was crucial for his realization that he mistreats them, and Xykon also did his share in the battle).
Moreover, I never said he's a nice guy, let alone a Good guy. He's (most feasibly Lawful) Evil, and a hypothetical cost-benefit analysis resulting in the conclusion that the death of a couple thousand followers can change the future of entire generations doesn't sound unlike some twisted, Lawful Evil version of a „the needs of the many sort of reasoning”. No sane general expects to win a hard-fought battle withput casualties.
As for how Right-Eye is framed, I outlined a possible way in which he can be right (results will come at a terrible cost, especially for Redcloak) which does not exclude the possibility that the Dark One honestly thinks this is the best way they can achieve their goal.


Tiamat does not speak to the Oracle, she gave him the power of prophecy. As for the priest of Odin we don’t know who contacted whom in the first place so it does seems (although that isn’t stated) that gods can’t initiate contact with their Clerics.

He gives him knowledge (I'd bet money that a share of her knowledge, in fact, but at any rate, it is hardly likely that the knowledge doesn't get to him through Tiamat) about everything there is and everything there will be, giving him, for instance, the ability to foresee his deaths and make arrangements for that.
As for the other half, „we don’t know who contacted whom in the first place so it does seems (although that isn’t stated) that gods can’t initiate contact with their Clerics” (we don't know if it's possible, so potential evidence for the position that it is has to be ignored) is a ludicrously weak argument. I have no reason to accept any conclusion you reached working with this as a premise.

[Psyren]

On the GaXP thing, I'm not sure if it's just the story has gone on for a long time and stuff shifted a little or what but the revelation with the gods makes it feel more out of place, the kind of thing that certainly happened the first few cycles the same way your first few games when you run tend to be more basic while you learn how to RP and tell a story. What I find a bit more interesting, awful, and compelling is the idea that at this point people did it all on their own anyways. The gods made Goblins and the like as an afterthought, set the world in motion, and people found their way to writing off goblin lives and and creating the state of perpetual war they are all in all on their own without any divine mandate.

You're right, it's entirely possible that OotSlanders chose to treat goblins that way independent of or perhaps even contrary to the gods' wishes. Though one could argue that the gods have the opportunity (through their clerics) to steer people in a different direction if that's the case, and therefore that even if they didn't create this paradigm they're doing nothing to stop it.

I expect that there's more to the Dark One's tale than he told Redcloak to get him so dedicate to The Plan, but I also expect that the story will end with Redcloak having at least played a part in accomplishing a better status quo for goblins everywhere (whether or not he lives to see it.)

[The MunchKING]

This being a self-aware fantasy parody, it's likely the Gods have a rule they can give their High Priests prophecies outside the domain agreement, but only if the prophecy is vague and worded in such a way to give multiple readings.

I was thinking it was more that Odin, Rooster, and Tiamat are prophecy Gods. Apollo could probably do the same thing if he wasn't super dead. :smalltongue: