Murphy's Law 5: To Comic 100...And Beyond!

[Lix Lorn]

Hmm... I think the song Hero of War kinda fits.

[Marnath]

Damnit, I missed the new thread for like two weeks!

I knew something had to be up.

Oh well. Caught up again. Keep it up Coffee!

It's been on top of page 1 this whole time, how'd you miss it? O.o

[CoffeeIncluded]

Ha, thanks everyone! And yeah, I wanted to show Lloyd utterly freaking out (A reasonable response). Notice how his hair, always impeccably groomed, even now, suddenly becomes frazzled when he freaks out?

[Worlok]

Notice how his hair, always impeccably groomed, even now, suddenly becomes frazzled when he freaks out?

I had noticed something was different, but until you pointed it out, I didn't realise what it was.

By my count, that is the... third time that revelation has come up. xP

Alright. Moping in my corner now.

[Lord Raziere]

wow.

also,I noticed something..... "General Murphy".....

Murphy's Law.....

General Murphy.....

this ain't about any law stating the worst will eventually happen. Its about the law of General Murphy in the story......now why do I have bad feeling about this?

[Worlok]

So I stopped moping momentarily in order to ask: Does that constitute the fourth time?

[HalfTangible]

wow.

also,I noticed something..... "General Murphy".....

Murphy's Law.....

General Murphy.....

this ain't about any law stating the worst will eventually happen. Its about the law of General Murphy in the story......now why do I have bad feeling about this?

Four....

[Eleanor_Rigby]

Hi again

I've been working on the 'cover version' of one of the strips and I'd say I'm probably at least half way through it but it will probably still be a while yet before I can post the finished thing because I kind of went a bit overboard with it. I've got a coloured version of the first panel-sans lettering though if anyone wants to see a preview?

Spoiler

Show

Can you tell what it is yet?

[John Cribati]

@Eleanor: No. The pic didn't show up on my browser.

@Comic: More revelation for Lloyd. It's oddly fun to watch him break down like this.

[Lix Lorn]

Not showing for me either.

[Worlok]

Can you tell what it is yet?

I am sorry, but I doubt anyone can. The picture doesn't show. At least to me.

Edit: Swordsages all around...

[Eleanor_Rigby]

Sorry, haven't posted images online. I think the file might be too large. Will resize.
Also, as Varsuvius knows, stressful situations will wreak havoc with your hair...

EDIT: Or, I may have copied the URL of the photobucket webpage instead of the image code...
EDIT EDIT: Or I may have done what you said, Half Tangible. Hopefully it works now, it shows on my computer anyhow...

[HalfTangible]

Sorry, haven't posted images online. I think the file might be too large. Will resize.
Also, as Varsuvius knows, stressful situations will wreak havoc with your hair...

You gave it the album url, you need the image url.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Ditto here; I can't see it either.

@Comic: More revelation for Lloyd. It's oddly fun to watch him break down like this.

Ooh, really? Why?

[John Cribati]

It's just a thing with me. I just find it fun to toss one of my characters into a metaphorical meat grinder to see how they respond. It helps build them up for me, mostly because I'm the kind of guy whose characters complain and threaten violence against me when they're written OOC.

[Lix Lorn]

Ooh! I see it!
Matt seems a little short, IMO.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Cool! And is the shortness/pointy nose your drawing style? (Matt's about average height, but slim and wiry with a sprinter's build.).

Also, I can't believe I forgot to mention this, but Matt's blue hair is actually his bangs, dyed and tied up with a lockpick.

Dammit, I really need a new scanner.

[Eleanor_Rigby]

Ooh! I see it!
Matt seems a little short, IMO.

Cool! And is the shortness/pointy nose your drawing style? (Matt's about average height, but slim and wiry with a sprinter's build.).

Also, I can't believe I forgot to mention this, but Matt's blue hair is actually his bangs, dyed and tied up with a lockpick.

Dammit, I really need a new scanner.

He does look rather small, doesn't he? Which is odd because I think of him as a tall person too. I think it's probably a combination of things that causes it; my art style (such as it is) and the fact that I was trying to make him look small next to the intimidating Tinder in dragon form (who I've drawn quite tiny) are probably the main reasons. As far as his nose goes I just made one up that suited my visualisation of him since none of the pictures of him in the comic have a nose, for obvious reasons. I preferred the noses on my pencil sketches of Matt but the family scanner is evil so this fanart is going to be 100% unfortunately.

I'm struggling to get my head around Matt's hair style though: what sort of lockpick are we talking here? Is it like a bent up piece of wire?

EDIT: Ooh! Is it difficult to tell that he's both slouching slightly and leaning back a little (to put some distance between himself and the dragon)? In retrospect all the weird angles in there might make that a little unclear...

[CoffeeIncluded]

He does look rather small, doesn't he? Which is odd because I think of him as a tall person too. I think it's probably a combination of things that causes it; my art style (such as it is) and the fact that I was trying to make him look small next to the intimidating Tinder in dragon form (who I've drawn quite tiny) are probably the main reasons. As far as his nose goes I just made one up that suited my visualisation of him since none of the pictures of him in the comic have a nose, for obvious reasons. I preferred the noses on my pencil sketches of Matt but the family scanner is evil so this fanart is going to be 100% unfortunately.

I'm struggling to get my head around Matt's hair style though: what sort of lockpick are we talking here? Is it like a bent up piece of wire?

It's long but not really pointy like that. And the lockpick's like a cross between a loop and a clip.

Now I want to see what you'd do with Human!Tinder and Serrin, since they're not in this scene.

[Eleanor_Rigby]

It's long but not really pointy like that. And the lockpick's like a cross between a loop and a clip.

Now I want to see what you'd do with Human!Tinder and Serrin, since they're not in this scene.

Actually, Human!Tinder is at the very end of this strip. It's strip no.24# so you get to see his face in the last panel. It'll be interesting to see how you react to it as I sort of went with something a little different for that design. I'm just not sure if I can replicate that on the computer or not...

[MoleMage]

It's been on top of page 1 this whole time, how'd you miss it? O.o

Easy; I subscribe to these threads then just go in my subscriptions to check. I almost never check the forum itself; even to find the new one (once I realized what was up) I just went to my subscription for the old one and followed Coffee's sig.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Actually, Human!Tinder is at the very end of this strip. It's strip no.24# so you get to see his face in the last panel. It'll be interesting to see how you react to it as I sort of went with something a little different for that design. I'm just not sure if I can replicate that on the computer or not...

Ooh, I can't wait! (And don't forget Serrin!)

Easy; I subscribe to these threads then just go in my subscriptions to check. I almost never check the forum itself; even to find the new one (once I realized what was up) I just went to my subscription for the old one and followed Coffee's sig.

Ah, okay. Well, you like what's going on so far?

[Dusk Eclipse]

I have to agree with the general sentiment of amusement at Loyd's Freak out... it makes him more human. to see the normally composed sane Loyd at the brink of insanity. I also really enjoyed the hair detail... very fitting and funny.

And now I want to know what happened to Miles and Lexington...

[mucat]

Wow. I go away from the Net for a couple days, and there are two new Murphy's Law strips. Intense ones too...

I'll have to read them more thoroughly later -- I'm posting this from an airport bar, and have a plane to catch in a minute -- but they look great (if sad), Coffee, and thanks as always for the hard work.

[RdMarquis]

Thanksgiving vacation threw me off a bit. I forgot today was Friday. Anyway, Lloyd's imagined execution was kind of funny, in a morbid way. Overall, this is shaping up to be a good story. I'm looking forward to seeing how Lloyd gets out of Kago.

[Draconi Redfir]

so i just realized that as far as i can tell we havent seen the girl Lloid made all that "noise" in his tent with the preivious night. we ever gunna see her? or is she just gunna be one of those people who are always there, just hidden offscrean?

[mucat]

so i just realized that as far as i can tell we havent seen the girl Lloid made all that "noise" in his tent with the preivious night.

Presumably we have seen Lloyd's lover, but we still don't know who he/she is. Lloyd's squadmates jokes about "Lexi," which could mean either Alexis the wizard trainee, or Lexington, the guy with the tusk. They never used a gender-specific pronoun, so it's up in the air...but unless there's a third "Lexi", it's someone we've seen.

And I assume the ambiguity is intentional on Coffee's part, to mess with everyone's mind.

[Alagaesian]

The more I read this, the more I see of how Kago is like a classic fascist country. They use nationalism as an excuse to go to war, and they make people feel better about it by dehumanizing the people they happen to be fighting. All one needs is a couple strong leaders of a structured military and a little propaganda to get the people behind the cause.

The average soldier would not commit atrocious war crimes, like slaughtering an entire village or killing without too much provocation. They do it anyways because they are simply following orders and the military system has trained them to do so without question. I mean, it's not my fault I'm doing all these immoral things if I'm just doing what the authority tells them to do, right? Plus, the authority knows more than I do. They must have a good reason for making me kill all these people for a little slice of land. And it's not as if those people I'm killing are 'real' people anyways.

Usually, in a comic deconstructing DnD racism, the characters perform these crimes by sincerely not knowing that what they are doing is wrong. Killing goblins, orcs, and drow seriously doesn't bother anyone at all until someone thinks about the situation a little and realizes, 'wait, not all of these guys are evil enough to be killed'. This comic shows how people can follow racism by doing the reverse: performing genocide, feeling guilty from the start, and then ignoring the guilt by consciously refusing to think about it too hard. At least, that's what I'm assuming Lloyd was doing until he realized he was falling down a slippery slope.

On another note, I'm not too surprised at Lloyd freaking out. He's caught in a five-way battle of fears here - horrified at what kinds of atrocities his fellow paladins are doing, terrified at how easy it was for him to get caught up in it, scared that he might be hanged for resisting the system, dreading what things he might be forced to do in the future, and helpless that he can't do anything to fix the situation.

[Lycan 01]

This wasn't Lloyd's first kill either, was it? I'm under the impression he's killed many Plavian before - he's just never seen them in a human light until just now.

[CoffeeIncluded]

The Kagoans never really liked the Plavaan much because of the whole "Their gods killed Salblaze" thing, but things really went downhill once the Red Fever happened, combined with the fact that the Alavaan plains have a lot more arable land than Kago was. Also, Kago's always been a very militaristic society.

So basically we've got a highly militaristic society that needs both land and a target, and oh look! There's the Plavaan, ready for us to target. And it's not like we think they're as "human" as we are, so it won't take much for us to tip the scales, hell, quite a few of us would happily kill them all and let Astrid sort them out. Justice? They don't deserve our higher human justice. They never gave it to Salblaze, why should we give it to them?

Kago has gone off its rocker.