TDO, souls and a parallel to Hel's problem.

[halfeye]

TDO has a huge Goblinoid army in the after-life, but is allegedly on track to fade away before a new world is created. Perhaps TDO is keeping the goblinoid souls as an army, when he ought to be rendering them down into godstuff. Of note in this context he doesn't talk directly to RC, maybe because he's low on power.

[Murk]

I assume "being a soldier in the goblin army" is part of the soul-processing done in the goblinoid afterlife.

From what we've heard (in the comic and from the Giant), the souls aren't ready-made to be eaten by the gods. They need to be processed through stages of... enlightenment? Spirituality? - slowly turning into pure forms of their own alignment.

In Roy's lawful good afterlife that was done through climbing the mountain (which probably symbolizes all kinds of lawful good values? Perseverance, determination, etc.), then getting to enjoy all (bodily) rewards for a good life before spiritually "rising above" basic pleasures, literally climbing further up the mountain. Roy's granddad did and only came down again to say hi to Roy. Roy never went up that high, so we don't know what the further stages are, but presumably it further processes the soul into pure lawful-goodness. That's how souls become the godstuff that the gods need to survive.

What is the Dark One's alignment? Lawful Evil? Or just the alignment "goblinkind"? Either way, serving in his goblin army to conquer the afterlives seems like a good symbolic fit to the alignment, just like climbing the mountain towards the heavens is a symbolic fit to lawful good.
Presumably, once a soul has served in the army for some time they also rise above that, going to a next level or next task, slowly turning into the pure godstuff that the Dark One needs to survive.

[Tzardok]

The Dark One's alignment is pretty likely to be Lawful Evil. Redcloak has cast spells exclusive to the Law and Evil domains (Unholy Blight (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1212.html) and Hold Monster in Start of Darkness), and most deities in 3.5 only grant alignment domains that fit their own alignments (there are a few exceptions like Io, Shekinester or in OOTS the Twelve Gods, but all of those have in common that they have multiple aspects, encompass multiple alignments or are otherwise "beyond" alignment).

His afterlife is propably located in Acheron, the Outer Plane between lawful neutral and lawful evil ("I was just following orders" in this strip (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1138.html)). Acheron is after all called "the Infernal Battlefield".

Edit: It should be noted that Roy, as someone who didn't worship the deities in life, goes to directly power the plane he lives on. Gods only get power from those who worshipped them in life (or, as in Hel's case, were accordet them).

[halfeye]

I assume "being a soldier in the goblin army" is part of the soul-processing done in the goblinoid afterlife.

Why should we assume that? It may be the case, xor it may not. What I'm suggesting is that that has to be set up by the god in question, and The Dark One doesn't yet know, he's new to the god business.

[Tzardok]

Sounds unlikely. Even assuming that building an afterlife (or even drawing in and processing souls) isn't instinctual for a deity, the Dark One isn't that new. Specifically, there was a timespan between his ascension and his discovery of the rifts where he at least communicated with deities like Tiamat, Rat and Loki who recognized what his quiddity could mean for the Snarl problem and therefore were invested in his survival. They propably taught him.

[Ruck]

As some supporting evidence (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html), Thor doesn't suggest TDO doesn't know how to convert souls, just that TDO hasn't had the time and doesn't have a large enough following to have built up the "god energy" to survive the time before the next world is created. (And I guess you could also include that his mention of the importance of Souls just has one he's drinking and playing cards with, not one that's being merged into the plane.)

[Fyraltari]

Presumably, once a soul has served in the army for some time they also rise above that, going to a next level or next task, slowly turning into the pure godstuff that the Dark One needs to survive.

I'm guessing they simply go up in rank, you start a grunt and end up a general.

[Bacon Elemental]

I always assumed that the dark ones realm / Acheron makes people slowly fade into a generic obedient soldier, the perfect ideal of following the orders given, indistinguishable from all others

[ZhonLord]

As some supporting evidence (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html), Thor doesn't suggest TDO doesn't know how to convert souls, just that TDO hasn't had the time and doesn't have a large enough following to have built up the "god energy" to survive the time before the next world is created. (And I guess you could also include that his mention of the importance of Souls just has one he's drinking and playing cards with, not one that's being merged into the plane.)

Indeed. Keep in mind, the dark one is a couple centuries old. This world has existed for a few thousand years at this point. For simplicity let's say 2000 total vs 200 TDO, if the consumption of worship is linear then the other pantheons will quite literally live 10x longer after a world's destruction than TDO will. (obviously there's some grey area with spending power on their clerics, worshippers and other divine acts, but I can't see it having enough of an impact to allow TDO to match their post-world longevity).

As minrah put it, TDO simply doesn't have enough fuel in the tank.

[Murk]

I spent way too long reading the Index of the Giant's Comments, as I always do when I visit the thread.

But the two relevant quotes to the working of the afterlife would be:

"The afterlife processes [the] soul so that it has less personality and the power is more available to the gods/other beings who rule that plane. (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?434019-After-vs-Life/page2&p=19683640#post19683640)"

"[The afterlife] (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?434019-After-vs-Life/page2&p=19683417#post19683417) makes you into a cookie-cutter clone of everyone of the same alignment. It may take centuries to do so, but all the people at the top of the mountain? Completely indistinguishable from one another. Arguably, that is the purpose of the D&D afterlife—to turn flawed mortal souls into perfect alignment-batteries, through various methodologies.
In the Nine Hells, they torture you until you forget everything else. In Celestia, you meditate until you renounce all worldly concerns. In Valhalla, you party until you can't remember your own name. In Limbo, the chaos drives you mad. In Mechanus, you sit in grey cubicle stamping paperwork until you are bored into oblivion. And so on and so forth."

So, I guess it could be possible that the Dark One made an afterlife that works differently, but it seems more likely to me that his afterlife works the same way as all the other afterlives, and that this:


I always assumed that the dark ones realm / Acheron makes people slowly fade into a generic obedient soldier, the perfect ideal of following the orders given, indistinguishable from all others
is true.



(And I guess you could also include that his mention of the importance of Souls just has one he's drinking and playing cards with, not one that's being merged into the plane.)

This is also true, which I find interesting! Maybe Thor's idea of "In Valhalla, you party until you can't remember your own name" is playing card games.

Or alternatively, The Giant does not have afterlives set in stone, thought this was a funny gag, and didn't care about some forum post he wrote ten years ago. That's the explanation I would bet on.

[Peelee]

Maybe Thor's idea of "In Valhalla, you party until you can't remember your own name" is playing card games.

In much the same way that the entirety of Celestia is the tavern of one-night stands. Id imagine card games with your patron deity are one of many activities offered up there.

[Ruck]

Or alternatively, The Giant does not have afterlives set in stone, thought this was a funny gag, and didn't care about some forum post he wrote ten years ago. That's the explanation I would bet on.

The Giant's own comments on the subject would certainly suggest he does not have the OOTS afterlife set in stone.

[Kish]

Tangentially, here's an interesting question to ponder: would it be possible for a Good god like Thor to benefit from dominion over souls that he only has due to a bet? Hel, as the personification of death, sickness, and gloom, can presumably fortify her existence by torturing souls until their thoughts are dominated by those things, but a coward in Valhalla or a selfish jerk in Celestia might not contribute much thought/idea power towards strengthening those places.
Looking at Thor's description here (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html), I would guess that if Thor got, for example, Hilgya's soul due to a bet, she'd send Belief and Worship to Loki throughout her life regardless. (Probably also send Belief to all the other Northern gods.) When she died her Dedication, whether she liked it or not, would go to Thor (Thor is explicit that Hel has been getting Dedication from the dwarves who die and go to her), and then Thor would get the "Soul" benefit from her ongoing presence.

Similarly, I think Hel could* make her captured dwarven souls comfortable, or even create a fake version of Valhalla in her plane and encourage them to believe that they're spending eternity with Thor, not with her, without it costing her any of the Dedication and Soul energy she's getting as it is. She just doesn't choose to.

*Though "could" for the gods is, as Odin illustrates, dubious: is she known to be a monstrous sadist because of the way she behaves, or does she behave the way she does because half a billion** people down there know she's a monstrous sadist?

**NOT FOR CITATION AS A SPECIFIC NUMBER.

[KorvinStarmast]

Or alternatively, The Giant does not have afterlives set in stone, thought this was a funny gag, and didn't care about some forum post he wrote ten years ago. That's the explanation I would bet on. Shaving with Occam's Razor this morning. +1

[hamishspence]

Or alternatively, The Giant does not have afterlives set in stone, thought this was a funny gag, and didn't care about some forum post he wrote ten years ago. That's the explanation I would bet on.

Considering those quotes are from less than 8 years ago, and The Giant hasn't posted much since then, I think those posts aren't likely to be contradicted any time soon.

[Ruck]

Considering those quotes are from less than 8 years ago, and The Giant hasn't posted much since then, I think those posts aren't likely to be contradicted any time soon.

The thing is, even in that thread, he says he doesn't really care about the afterlife, he just took his version straight from D&D, and if he hadn't already established Eugene as dead, he wouldn't have used it at all. The afterlife basically serves two purposes in the story: One, to have a way to keep Roy still in the story while he was dead; two, that the characters prefer life to the afterlife.

[Psyren]

Why should we assume that?

Because so far, every Outer Plane we've been shown or referenced in OotS (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1138.html) appears to map pretty closely to a standard D&D one, down to sharing the same names (e.g. Arborea (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0943.html) and Limbo. (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1147.html)) So it's reasonable to conclude that they work similarly in the broad strokes until we have evidence to the contrary. Based on Jirix's description ("iron plateau, endless battlefield"), TDO's looks almost certain to be Acheron (https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0704.html), which would fit with both TDO's alignment (and Redcloak's too) as well as his disposition (he became a god literally by warlording so hard he ascended.)

Combine that with the Giant's explicit statement (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?434019-After-vs-Life&p=19683417&viewfull=1#post19683417) that the thing you do repetitively in the Afterlife IS the thing that eventually converts you into a perfect soul battery, and thus we have enough evidence to suggest that TDO putting you into his planar army is exactly the activity needed for you to count as Souls for him, just like you being put into a cubicle stamping paperwork would power Mechanus, or raucously partying would power Ysgard/Valhalla.


TL;DR you shouldn't be thinking "goblin afterlife makes them soldiers instead of soul batteries" - you should be thinking "goblin afterlife makes them soul batteries by making them soldiers."