The Sticks Awards: BotH 401-500

[Nazzo, the 102nd]

Hi, and welcome to The Sticks Awards - The Best of the Hundred!

The Sticks Awards are given to the best strips of all times, chosen by the polls here in the Playground. Read the The Sticks Awards Results Compilation (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34791) thread for more details and previous results.

To vote, simply post your favorite strip of the current 4 on the thread. You have 3 days to do it.

The poll will close on August 18th, 3:00 PM forum default time.


The Best of the Hundred 401-500

406 A Moment of Truth (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0406.html)
449 Land of the Rising... (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0449.html)
464 Not For Everyone (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0464.html)
484 At the End of the Day (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0484.html)

[Sir_Norbert]

Of course 406 wins it, and deservedly; I'm very pleased that the four strips that really are the best of the hundred have all survived to fight against each other.

[Warren Dew]

406 and 464 are both primarily about Miko. Okay, I'm a Miko fan, but OOTS is not primarily about her; she's still an antagonist, not a protagonist. Even if it were, the strip which probably depicts her most important action - destruction of the gate - isn't a choice.

449, while interesting, can hardly be considered significant. Soon's ghost only plays a bit part in the greater story, at best delaying things until Miko, not present in this strip, ends up resolving them.

There are two other issues with these three strips. First, they feature player characters in bit parts or not at all. Second, they have little or no humor. They're good strips, but they're not typical of the story as a whole.

484, on the other hand, does an excellent job of summing up the battle for Azure City - the arc that covers most of this 100 strips - as well as setting up for the action in the next hundred strips. It features speaking parts for all six of the player characters. It's also the only choice with some humor in it ("Shut up dad"). I think it's the clear winner.

[Lira]

I'll vote for 464.

[Fitzclowningham]

449 for my money. It's not all that impressive now, but when I first read it, I got chills. I did too for Miko-kills-Shojo and Miko-dies, but not nearly as much.

[David Argall]

Well, we end with 4 deserving candidates this time. In fact the winner here will likely win the best of 500, which should be next.

Anyway, I'll go with 464.

[Morty]

Hm. All are great, especially 449 and 484. In the end, I choose 484. It's masterfully done sum-up of the whole battle and has got this "Empire Strikes Back ending" feel to it- everything sucks for the good guys and it'll likely get worse.

[Sylian]

406 or 449... It's tough. 449 is really dramatic and awesome... Yet I feel that 406 is more important to the plot.

406.

[CasESenSITItiVE]

between 406 and 449, but i'l go with 406

[DBear]

449. Anything that can scare the Big Bad gets my vote. 484 is a close second. Miko--meh.

[Tricia]

I just have to go with 464.

[d'Bwobsling]

406 has my vote

[Chronos]

Were I voting for which one best represents OotS overall, I would vote for 484. However, I am not voting in that manner: I consider the strips as they stand in the context of the entire strip. And Miko has in fact been very significant over the course of the entire strip. Therefore, I vote for 464.

[blackspeeker]

406 1000 times over, or perhaps just the one vote I'm allowed.

[Inhuman Bot]

hmmmm..... I guess I would have to say 443 just because roy dies, and that's a very importent moment.

[Deepkicker]

Very, very tough choice. It's hard to choose between the three (449 doesn't cut it for me).
But I have to choose...so I'll to go with 464. But they are three of the best ever in my opinion.

[AlisdairM]

This hundred had some awesome strips that would easily stand up in my 'best of 500'. Unfortunately, it seems my tastes don't match the majority as none of them made the final 4. In fact I think this is a moderately weak set, especially the final one which is nothing but a summary built on all the previous 483 strips, and not a great strip in its own right. Figures this will probably win the poll - 2 of the previous 100s have been won by strips I would probably place in my bottom 10 for that century!

Nevertheless, the two Miko strips bring a certain epic feel. Indeed, "redemption isn't for everyone" is a line that has stuck with me, so 464 gets the vote.

Oh, and just to prove how out of touch with the voting I am, a strong contender for my personal 'best of 500' would be the very first strip. Not only did this not even maker it past its best-of-10, it is regularly quoted as a bad strip...

[Chronos]

Quoth Slaanesh:
hmmmm..... I guess I would have to say 443 just because roy dies, and that's a very importent moment.That's not an option. It didn't even get past the first round. You have to pick one of the four finalists listed in the first post.

[Zvendels]

484. "Shut up dad".

[Lupy]

464

I cried, I had never cried over Oots before, but I bawled when I read this the first time. I still tear up a little about it.

[Bubbles]

Of these four...I vote for four hundred sixty-four.

[funkyhomosapien]

454 is better than four choices given here. I'm voting for it. If that is unnacceptable then I abstain from voting.

[ZFR]

All strong ones here.

I vote for 464. Too touching. 484 close second for being an extremely well done summing up strip.

[Kurald Galain]

464 ftw...

[T-O-E]

449. Most awesome comic ever.

[dps]

484. I guess.

[Reigheena]

My vote's for 406

[Virgo]

I have to go with 464. I didn't have a particularly strong feeling of like or dislike re: Miko either way, but it's really a powerful moment in the strip.

[Lissou]

I don't think I'd have voted for any of these as the best of the hundred (or that they'd even make the top ten) but between the four of them it's definitely 484 for me.

[Kato]

Uh, that's a really hard one...
All ofthem are pretty epic one way or the other... But... I think I'll give it to 406, for Miko's down fall and poor Shojo's death. (Must... resist... temptation... to start argument...)

[Morgan Wick]

Well, we end with 4 deserving candidates this time. In fact the winner here will likely win the best of 500, which should be next.

Er...


As for the Best of Five Hundred and such awards, I really don't know how to do it. Say Morgan's prediction of 1200 comics to become true: we'll end up with 12 superb comics, to decide for one. And since we don't know in advance how many strips there will be, I think it's not fair to set up a 500 hundred poll and then know that there will be 1100 comics only. That last hundred would be out of the "500" contests.

But I can say that we WILL have that kind of voting in the future. Just don't know how.

And here's the post he was referring to, in case you were saying "it should be next, regardless of whether it is":


(B)asically, Best of All Time is an even better idea, and any preparation for it needs to wait until the strip finishes so we can do it in the fairest way for all the BotH winners. I've started thinking the strip may end at 1200, not 1000, in which case 4 Best of the Three Hundred, or 3 Best of the Four Hundred, rounds would be more appropriate than any number of Best of the Five Hundreds. Even if Rich is on record saying the strip will end at 1000, which I don't know. But even if you don't think there's a chance later developments may push that back and you believe Burlew would have a Dave Sim-esque fixation on that goal, you haven't met this (http://www.adventurers-comic.com/). And you also haven't factored in that at the rate the plot is going, to end at 1000 means a rather accelerated timetable for the last two Gates; David Argall has posted that he thinks we're set for only two more books after the current one, one for each Gate, which I've countered with the aforementioned 1200 prediction, since only two more books means a disturbingly quick turnaround from the penultimate gate to the gate we think will be climactic. Unless we somehow jump to Girard's Gate before the current book ends.

[Child Conscript]

449 For the last panel of Xykon's facial expression.

[Trizap]

484, End of the Day

[Graymayre]

As much as it pains me to not vote for 484 (I had chills when Xykon said "Ladies and Gentlemen, Azure City is officially off the grid.")

I believe that I have to vote for 406. it epitomizes Shojo's dedication to his people while subsequently finalizing all those wrong turns that Miko has take. These two examples show that it takes more than a mantle to make a good person.

[Lupy]

I think personally that we should save all the best of the hundreds for the end, then vote.

[Number316]

484, the others are no match for this one.

[warmachine]

464. Wonderful ending.

[Morgan Wick]

Bump in hopes of a last-minute flurry.

[Ramien]

I'm going to have to go with 406on this one. The asides and comments on this one are generally funnier than the ones in the other options, and I do prefer a dash of humor to go with the serious bits in the comic.

[Kaytara]

Tough to decide between 406 and 484 here.... The former has excellent dialogue that realistically shows an overzealous person going completely nuts like that, and the latter does a brilliant job of wrapping up the story arc.

I'm going to have to go with 484, At the End of the Day, for its storytelling value and using the medium so well. It didn't have too much or too little text, did a complete overview of how things ended up, hinted at future troubles to come (Xykon's Cloister) and had a bitterly hilarious punchline. :)

[Yendor]

Going with 484.

[Red XIV]

I'm going with 464. It's pretty impressive to convey such a moving death scene with stick figure art (but then, OotS in general is impressive in how much it can accomplish with such art), especially when doing so with a character many (if not most) readers probably expected to be cheering the death of.

But like I said in its BotQ thread, I wish 407 were an option instead of 406. I found the consequences of Miko's act to make for an even more powerful strip than the act itself.

[TerrickTerran]

464 because in the end while Miko wasn't perfect, she perhaps learned a little humility and that while she wasn't going to be what she was, she wasn't totally a lost cause either.

[Salty]

406. It was a surprising twist, and crucial to the plot.

[McMurphy]

Oooo, I have to push the 484 a little...

[funkyhomosapien]

How where these four strips picked, again? It seems like someone intentionally picked the least relavent strips possible for this.

[Logalmier]

464, it was a very sad moment that I shed some tears on-which no other comic has made me do.

[SlightlyEvil]

Aw man, hard choice. I'll go with 449, because of the epicness of the paladins' revenge.

[Chronos]

How where these four strips picked, again? It seems like someone intentionally picked the least relavent strips possible for this.The same way we're doing it now, by vote. If you don't like any of these, why didn't you vote in any (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87427) of the (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87115) previous (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86763) round (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86180)?

[kabbor]

Miko's actions: Pivotal plot moment, and lots of "wow!!"s.
Ghost matyrs: Another pivotal plot moment. One that almost saved the day.

But for me, it's 464, Miko's death. The way that was handled was extraordinary. This one has me singing Rich's praises like no other.

[aapje]

The comic I want the least to win seems to have a 6 vote lead atm. Which pretty much sucks. And since only 406 and 484 have a chance to overtake it at this point I'll vote for 484 and hope some others will do the same.

[Ikialev]

484. What else to say?

[funkyhomosapien]

The same way we're doing it now, by vote. If you don't like any of these, why didn't you vote in any (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87427) of the (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=87115) previous (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86763) round (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86180)?


Because I wasn't here.

[recluso]

I vote 406

[Sedgewood]

Of these four, 449 was my favorite.

[Mordae]

406 for the drama, since I can't have humor.

[Spiryt]

Very hard choice.

Guess i will go with 464. I never liked Miko, but let's salute her in the hour of hear death. Or something like that.

[MyrddinDerwydd]

All of them are so good...
To me, 406 had only one really good unexpectedly cool thing, Miko killing Shojo, which required far too many speech bubbles.

464 was cool, but way to expected and focused on Miko and Soon. Anti-climatic.

484 is a great ending for that arc, but it is what it is. Fairly predictible, mundane, and covering everything.

449 however, ROCKS. Unexpected, right in the middle of everything, nice mix of dialogue and action. And it is one hell of an awesome event. My vote goes to 449.

[Morgan Wick]

Ahh, the sweet smell of a heavy voting round!

I owe David Argall... um... nothing, since we never bet on whether 464 would end up making out with the BotH win. 406 and 484 were neck-in-neck for second and might have challenged 464 were it not for each other. 449 is the runt to a somewhat shocking extent.

I'm operating under the assumption that we're not doing a Bot500, so even though that means the smart move is to take a break, I'm going to take a look at the Sixth Hundred. I considered composing four limericks, one to a quarter, with each line containing a basic analysis of a group of five. Instead, I'll give a more basic analysis.

After the epic Fifth Hundred, it's back to the sort of "normal" group that characterized the past of OOTS for the next hundred, with the added twist that it looks like we're going to whip around between various groups for the duration. Strips are going to win quarters here that might not have gotten out of the group of five in the last hundred. The very first two rounds will greatly affect how I analyze the rest, because if it turns out Therkla is Miko's replacement (Miko representing the figure responsible for three of the first five BotH winners), a distinct possibility, that could affect the order of every strip in every group of five where Therkla even appears.

There are, of course, plenty of stars in this hundred, including 404 errors on scrys (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0504.html) (well, I liked it), clumsy connection attempts (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0506.html), Therkla's attempt to defend herself to Kubota (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0509.html), "Monty Python's Life of Haley" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0511.html), terror alerts for PCs (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0513.html), Tsukiko blasting Haley out of the panel (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0518.html), the arrival of Mr. Scruffy (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0520.html)(which will make the Belkar vote all the stronger), Belkar's attempt to switch sides (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0521.html), making fun of secret doors (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0522.html), Haley tells off Belkar Part 1 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0524.html), the +5 Air Freshener of Pineness (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0526.html), heartbreak (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0527.html), laughing at us all (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0528.html), Celia's arrival (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0529.html), weepy melodrama (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0530.html), "The Exposition Fairy" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0532.html) (not likely to even win the group of five), "the cat... is also near that paladin back there (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0533.html)", "A Brief Tribute (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0536.html)" (which will probably smash the Haley-Celia-Belkar arguing in the rest of the group of five, but this strip (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0538.html)will receive some votes as will the one after), two entire groups of five from 541-550 because of O-Chul (with a bonus to lampshade hanging (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0546.html) and a timeout for plot exposition and Reanimated Gladiators (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0548.html)), "let's finish today's grammar lesson (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0552.html)", the return of Banjo the Clown (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0553.html), "that imply very ugly backstory" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0555.html), "fight, fight, fight, fight the urge to say I told you so" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0556.html), Therkla the superhero (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0560.html), Giggles the clown (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0561.html), V's plan is epic fail (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0563.html), making fun of the forums for fun and profit (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0567.html), Mark of Justice Powers... Activate! (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0568.html), vomit, vomit everywhere (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0569.html), Haley tells off Belkar Part II (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0570.html)(too bad she forgets it), Roy remembers everything (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0572.html), Haley and Celia become bestest friends (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0573.html), "third time's the charm" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0577.html), "important sexy context" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0580.html), Old Blind Pete (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0581.html), Elan tells off Therkla (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0582.html), "a one in a million chance is a sure thing" (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0584.html), and whatever comes out of the three remaining groups of five.

As for the first group of five, it starts with a wedding and "good plot exposition (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0501.html)", and moves on to Elan's eyepatch (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0502.html), the first hint of Therkla's crush (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0503.html), the aforementioned 404 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0504.html), and the runt (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0505.html). As I wasn't around for the first two groups of five in this hundred, I will say only that 501, 503, and 504 are the strongest strips, and the latter two are probably the favorites. Whether that voting round occurs now, in a month, or in a year, or two years, or even more for all I know.

[Zed the Sharp]

As strong as I've been campaigning for 484 in earlier rounds, my vote this time goes to 464. Good plot, good dialogue, and a good reveal at the end.

[Nazzo, the 102nd]

... the poll is closed, and we have a winner! The Sticks Award goes to... 464! Official results below.

Okay, I'm very tempted to start the 6th season already. By my calculations, we use 5 days in average for each poll, meaning 100 days to the regular season, 20 days for the quarters and 5 days for the big final: 125 days. That's 4 months. I don't think that The Giant will take this long to reach #600, so we're in good situation.

BUT! As I explained later, I fear that the voting could be affected by the proximity to the current timeline of the strip. As others have suggested, I think I'm going to take a break for now. My plan is to resume the polls once the sixth hundred is complete. Do you guys have any other ideas?

That was an spectacular season, thanks to all for voting!



406 - 12 (24.48%)
Sir_Norbert; Sylian; CasESenSITItiVE; d'Bwobsling; blackspeeker; Reigheena; Kato; Graymayre; Ramien; Salty; recluso; Mordae

449 - 7 (14.28%)
Fitzclowningham; DBear; Troll; Child Conscript; SlightlyEvil; Sedgewood; MyrddinDerwydd

464 - 18 (36.73%)
Lira; David Argall; Tricia; Chronos; Deepkicker; AlisdairM; Lupy; Bubbles; ZFR; Kurald Galain; Virgo; warmachine; Red XIV; TerrickTerran; Logalmier; kabbor; Spiryt; Zed the Sharp

484 - 12 (24.48%)
Warren Dew; M0rt; Zvendels; dps; Lissou; Trizap; Number316; Kaytara; Yendor; McMurphy; aapje; Luena

[Graymayre]

Those thrice damned Miko fans seemed to have ruined yet another poll...

P.S. (A CHALLENGER APPROACHES): Shojo is a better character than Miko by far.

[Lira]

Those thrice damned Miko fans seemed to have ruined yet another poll...Guess what? I'm not a Miko fan. At all. Yet I still voted for 464. Why? It was the best. I'm glad to see it won. :smallwink:

[Dacia Brabant]

... The Sticks Award goes to... [B]464!

Alas poor Miko! (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AlasPoorScrappy) We knew her well, Hinjo: a lady
Of infinite scorn, of most excellent beauty:
She hath born our insults a thousand times,
and now, how abhorred in our imagination it is! my gorge rims at
it. Here hung those lips that mouthed curses I know
not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your
judgments? your gods? your slashes of katana,
that were wont to set the forum on a roar? No one
now, to mock your own sinning? quite crest-fallen?


...still, I would've voted for 464 too.

[Chronos]

Those thrice damned Miko fans seemed to have ruined yet another poll...That depends on what you mean by "Miko fans". A lot of readers consider her a terrible person, but yet a great character. We wouldn't want to hang out with her, but we do like to read about her, even or especially when things don't go her way.

[Red XIV]

How where these four strips picked, again? It seems like someone intentionally picked the least relavent strips possible for this.
Are you kidding? This included some of the most plot-relevant strips of OotS's most important story arc to date.

[Spiryt]

Those thrice damned Miko fans seemed to have ruined yet another poll...

P.S. (A CHALLENGER APPROACHES): Shojo is a better character than Miko by far.

Miko is terrible person, but great character. Your post is simple proof. If character is making people write stuff like that, she must be good charcter :smalltongue:


Anyway, I think that waiting max to the 590 should be sufficent.

Unless you are planning to delay the moment when voting catches the comic - but this moment is anyway inevitable, so there's no point IMO.

[Morgan Wick]

I'm concerned even the publication of #600 may be too soon to start back up. By the time we finished the groups of five, we'd probably only be in the 620s, meaning we'd still have to contend with votes based on relevancy to current events. By the time we finished the postseason, we might be in the 630s. If I had any of the books I could start a "midsummer replacement" project I've been thinking about, writing annotations for OOTS strips, which would take two years or more to complete if I did one a day and that would be plenty of time to get a buffer for the Sticks Awards! I mean, we'd be pushing #800 by the time I reached the strips out now, #900 by the time I ran out of space! :) (Too bad we might forget about the Sticks Awards entirely with all that time...)

Perhaps the end of the current book would be a good stopping (rather, starting) place? If Books 2 and 3 are any indication, that should be somewhere in the 660s, which means already plenty of time has passed to provide an objective assessment of strips approaching #600. Allot one strip published for one voting round completed and we'd hit the late 680s or early 690s by the time we held Bot6H, a bit later than we are now. Even that, though, wouldn't really solve the problem of a potential need to take another break before launching into Bot7H and each successive hundred. Especially since the next book after that wouldn't end until the 840s - in the ninth hundred.

I'm just concerned that to even come close to solving the problem long-term, you don't need a "break", you need a full-on sabbatical. I'm even tempted to say "hold revotes on the first book and hold BotQ's on 121-200 to bring them in line with the current method of predicting winners" but that would produce mass chaos, we might need to hold revotes on 121-200 as well, there would be unnecessary disagreements over the "true" winners, the far slower pace of voting caused by the lack of real polls might cause accusations of breaching the will of the people, and if - heaven forbid - it produced a different BotH winner than the original voting the boards might break into smithereens. And it wouldn't have much more (and maybe even less) of an effect than waiting until the end of the current book. Perhaps I could hold regular backdated analyses of voting rounds dating from the beginning and continuing to the present, as a "countdown" to the return of the Awards? I'm reaching for ideas here!

[Warren Dew]

Those thrice damned Miko fans seemed to have ruined yet another poll...

Indeed, for a broad definition of "Miko fan".

I didn't explain my voting tactics with my vote this time. That's because I thought 484 was a favorite - but that its winning depended on the Miko contingent splitting between the two Miko strips, 406 and 464. If the Miko contingent consolidated on just one of those strips, it would win, and I didn't want to point that out.

Well, the Miko contingent - broadly defined as the folks just as happy seeing stuff about Miko as seeing stuff about the Order - did indeed split between 406 and 464. What I failed to consider was that the contingent would be so strong they could take both first and second place, making it basically impossible for one of the other strips to win.

Now, 464 would have been my second choice, so I don't feel like my vote was wasted. However, Miko's very strong showing forces me to reevaluate my perception of the strip. Previously, I figured the comic was about the Order of the Stick, with Miko as just one of the antagonists, and not the most important one. The results of this voting round make think that the Miko contingent may be right - that this comic, at least between 200 and 464, or maybe 484, may better be viewed as Miko's story, with the Order merely the primary antagonists. Perhaps I'll reread it with that outlook in mind.

[Morgan Wick]

Indeed, for a broad definition of "Miko fan".

I didn't explain my voting tactics with my vote this time. That's because I thought 484 was a favorite - but that its winning depended on the Miko contingent splitting between the two Miko strips, 406 and 464. If the Miko contingent consolidated on just one of those strips, it would win, and I didn't want to point that out.

Well, the Miko contingent - broadly defined as the folks just as happy seeing stuff about Miko as seeing stuff about the Order - did indeed split between 406 and 464. What I failed to consider was that the contingent would be so strong they could take both first and second place, making it basically impossible for one of the other strips to win.

Now, 464 would have been my second choice, so I don't feel like my vote was wasted. However, Miko's very strong showing forces me to reevaluate my perception of the strip. Previously, I figured the comic was about the Order of the Stick, with Miko as just one of the antagonists, and not the most important one. The results of this voting round make think that the Miko contingent may be right - that this comic, at least between 200 and 464, or maybe 484, may better be viewed as Miko's story, with the Order merely the primary antagonists. Perhaps I'll reread it with that outlook in mind.

Bumping because this is at least as interesting a topic of conversation as what happens with the Sticks Awards now. And knowing that we'll get a bunch of useless after-the-bell votes as a result.

[Nazzo, the 102nd]

I'm really tempted to open up the 6th hundred already. :smallbiggrin:

One good thing I can point out is that, after 484, the comic follows another story arc. Warren has a point, there: this hundred will be Miko-free. That can spice things up a little.

I don't know, honestly. The whole point of the Sticks Awards was not to elect the best strip at all, that's a bonus. The cool thing is to read the old comics again, and then vote for them. But with voted strips being so fresh (as it's an inevitable thing), I think people will no re-read them to vote.

... maybe we could do the first two hundreds again... Just kiddin'. :smallbiggrin:

[Warren Dew]

One possibility might be to allow a more extended time for voting, so we don't catch up as quickly. Allowing, say, a week would also prevent voting skew from whether the period falls mainly on a weekday or mainly on a weekend, though as you point out, the real fun is looking at old comics again and perhaps seeing what others think of them.

I know you have reasons not to do a five hundred vote, but I'd be really interested to see how those five do against each other, too.

[AlisdairM]

Personally I would like to see those 5 run off against each other, but don't want to see that poll unless it is run by Nazzo - this is his 'game' and he has given us too much fun playing along to take it elsewhere now!

I would also be interested in re-running the first 500 again. Some of us joined late so missed the early rounds. The format has evolved since the early days too, and revisitting from the beginning would be fun.

Unlike Nazzo though, I am quite interested in seeing the 'best of the best' as voted by the boards. I suggest an extra twist if we do re-run the 500. Rather than taking 5-in-a-row, lets take the same 'number' from each hundred. This would reduce the issue of split votes when a favourite character or ark gives two or three strong strips, and a weaker strip steals the vote.

So my suggestion is a new series of votes, starting with 1, 101, 201, 301 and 401; followed by 2, 102, 202, 302, 402 etc. and finishing with 100, 200, 300, 400, 500. I expect we will get a very different 'top 5' this way, and plenty of time before we pick up with the next few hundred 'the official way'.

[McMurphy]

So my suggestion is a new series of votes, starting with 1, 101, 201, 301 and 401; followed by 2, 102, 202, 302, 402 etc. and finishing with 100, 200, 300, 400, 500. I expect we will get a very different 'top 5' this way, and plenty of time before we pick up with the next few hundred 'the official way'.Where to sign?

[Chronos]

So my suggestion is a new series of votes, starting with 1, 101, 201, 301 and 401; followed by 2, 102, 202, 302, 402 etc. and finishing with 100, 200, 300, 400, 500. I expect we will get a very different 'top 5' this way, and plenty of time before we pick up with the next few hundred 'the official way'.Interesting concept... In a set of five, there are closely-related events, so, for instance, Miko killing Shojo and Miko falling ended up splitting votes, but there'd be almost no correlation between strips a century apart. And even if there is, it'd at least be a mixing, giving us a different perspective.

The only problem I can see is that if we got a different winner from the five-in-a-row method, there'd be a dispute over which one is "official". I suppose we could have a Grand Championship Superb Owl (or Superb Owlbear, even) showdown between the two, in that case.

[T-O-E]

Aw... I can't believe my vote lost.

[Deepkicker]

The best strip won! And that stems from my love of good storytelling, not a particular fondness of Miko.

[AlisdairM]

If we run the '1 per hundred' polls I don't think there is much danger of confusion with the 5-in-a-row format. For one thing, we can't run a second 500 until the giant hits strip #1000! And as Nazzo has pointed out, there is no guarantee the story will end on a nice round number. So I think the original polls stand.

I would be happy to run this second series, but I think that is Nazzo's call. This is still his game.

I'm also thinking of another series in the 'strip idol' format. Take the top 12 characters or so by number of appearances (found in another thread...) and appoint a champion for each. Each round, the 'champion' nominates a strip to represent their character, and we have a round of voting. Each round, the character with fewest votes drops out. Obviously we need some kind of tie-breaking mechanism, and 'champions' would be required to vote, and not for their own characters. This would run significanly quicker than revoting the first 500, and might give Nazzo the distance from current strips to run the next hundred.

There's probably a couple more poll formats out there folks are dreaming up, we might run a poll-of-polls to figure which to play next ;¬)

[shadowpriest]

449 For the last panel of Xykon's facial expression.

totally agree :smallbiggrin:

[Morgan Wick]

Bumping to announce that we have a late-breaking highlight (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0593.html)from this hundred that is likely to be at least a strong candidate for the quarter.

[Vargtass]

So my suggestion is a new series of votes, starting with 1, 101, 201, 301 and 401; followed by 2, 102, 202, 302, 402 etc. and finishing with 100, 200, 300, 400, 500. I expect we will get a very different 'top 5' this way, and plenty of time before we pick up with the next few hundred 'the official way'.

I fully endorse this! Excellent idea!

[Mc. Lovin']

484, I remember being really pleased when we finally saw Roy again. The wait was worth it :smallsmile:

Whoops, I think I was a bit late ...