Goblins XVII: The shocking end of the story arc

[Agi Hammerthief]

*Faceplam* No. I'm talking the difference between this:

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in

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Which is literally just a dude who is in the process of playing a video game, you don't even get to see the game, and he's not even talking. he's just kind of sitting there playing.

This is what you guys seem to think the Goblinverse is and oh my god that's boring as hell.

¿que?
you can read the comic, read my comments and are still able to think that „dude holding controller“ is what we think the Goblinverse is like?
seriously Draconi Redfir?

edit: deleted ‚stuff‘

[Draconi Redfir]

i read the comic and i see a world in which gaming rules apply, in which the goblins, kore, minmax, everyone are alive and living in the world. i get immersed in that world and i care about what happens in that world.

You see "Oh the short archer dude remembered being a drow, it's all just a bunch of nerds sitting at a table, everything can be explained as a bunch of nerds sitting at a table, nothing matters because it's all just a bunch of nerds sitting at a table."

How is that fun? how is that a "better" thought then mine?

[Morgaln]

What I don't understand about this complaint is that it's true of all fiction. All fiction is made up by someone, all fiction is not real. The tension comes from my investment in the characters and the quality of the writing. We know that goblins has a DM. OK - we also know that ASOIAF has an author. We know that Avatar is a Nickelodeon show that's going to have a happy ending. What is it about Goblins DM that changes things? MMs player would roll up a new character but MM would be dead. Maybe they'll fail to stop Kore and the world will end but it's just a game a bunch of people are playing so why does it matter? Because I'm invested in that world and those characters.

Do you believe in tension in D&D? Or do you dismiss all story telling and 'danger' because you can just roll up a new character?

I'm not trying to harass you or tell you you're wrong - I'm legitimately confused as to why this is a problem?

The difference is that the author of ASOIAf is not part of the story of ASOIAF. Within the reality of the story, G.R.R.Martin does not exist; and no one is breaking the fourth wall to point out that it is all a story written by someone in a different universe.
In goblins, however, the players are a part of the universe. They exists, and the characters in the story are aware that they exist. And if Minmax is dead, he's not lost. We know (by evidence of the drow characters) that all of his knowledge and experience will keep existing and be transferred to the next character, because Minmax is not real; only his player is and they are not in any danger. And if the world ends, the players can just shrug and say "well, that could have gone better; time to get new characters."
In addition, the DM is part of the universe; that means that any character that doesn't have a player behind them has no agency. It's just Herbert doing whatever Herbert wants to do with them. That includes any and all of the villains that have shown up, everyone in Dies' Horribly's story, every alt version in the Maze of Many, all the goblins in the warcamp, Hawl and his group of monsters, all Kliks and so on. So far, it is uncertain whether the GAP, Kin, Idle and Bowst have actual players or not, so this might even include them. They're all just drones controlled by one person. And this is different from knowing a story has an author because that person is part of the in-universe lore.

Consider it like this: assume that in the Matrix, if Neo gets killed inside the Matrix, he is just ejected out of the Matrix and all he needs to do is to log in again. Suddenly, everything that happens to him in the Matrix is far less dramatic and exciting. Not because there's no action going on, but because we know that nothing that happens will change things permanently, and his outside self will be perfectly fine. That's exactly what's happening in Goblins.

[GloatingSwine]

In goblins, however, the players are a part of the universe. They exists, and the characters in the story are aware that they exist. And if Minmax is dead, he's not lost. We know (by evidence of the drow characters) that all of his knowledge and experience will keep existing and be transferred to the next character, because Minmax is not real; only his player is and they are not in any danger. And if the world ends, the players can just shrug and say "well, that could have gone better; time to get new characters.

Yeah, but the actual protagonists, after whom the comic is named, can't.

Remember that the comic is about viewing RPG characters and players, and the worlds created for them to play in. through the eyes of things they slaughter for XP.

[Kish]

Yeah, but the actual protagonists, after whom the comic is named, can't.

Yes, this. That's a very good reason not to be invested in characters I was never invested in anyway, and never would be because I find all of them (the "PCs," that is, not the goblins) repulsive on every level, except Forgath, for whom it's merely 95% of levels. Elli has pissed me off pretty regularly, but never more than when she wrote "we're stuck here with this guy who attacked our camp to murder and rob all of us and killed most of our friends and still doesn't actually see anything wrong with this, so I'm going to kill him out of hand" as not only an evil attitude for a goblin to have, but an insane one that Complains had only because of his own feelings of guilt.

[Steven]

just take all the same logic in Order of the Stick, and apply it to goblins. All discussion of class, skill points, players, PC's, NPC's, everything else, it's all just part of the physics of the world.

if you can do one, you can do the other.

IIRC the thing that started off this entire discussion was someone saying that the switch from MinMax wailing about how everyone he cares about dies, and this page where he flippently reminds us that he'd just roll up another character.

OotS handles this entirely differently. Even though death is reversible under the right circumstances in OotS, there has never been any suggestion that there is an external player as part of the equation. If Roy or Belkar get skewered by Snarl they are gone. They don't get to come back, they don't get to be raised from the dead, there is a real impact from this for someone like myself who has formed an attachment to the Order.

Contrast this with Goblins where there is, what feels like to me, constant reminders that MinMax is a character with a player who could just roll up a new character.

For me and others this undermines the emotional impact of almost everything in the comic. The fact that you can still form an attachment that means something to characters in the comic means you probably enjoy it more and that's great for you. I think you are completely wrong in saying that the same logic which OotS runs by can also be applied to Goblins however.

[Draconi Redfir]

honestly, using my "It's like oots" method of thinking, i just interpreted "get ready to roll up a new character kinda weird" as a turn of phrase or saying. Like how we would say "another roll of the dice" , "kick it into high gear", "All hands on deck", or "Another day another dollar".

We're not literally doing any of those things, they just have subtle meanings that we've adapted too over the years. Maybe "Roll a new character" in this context means "This is someone else's problem" or a "If i die, i'm going to be forcibly reincarnated as someone else who has to deal with this until it finally gets done"

They live in a world where initiative, class levels, skill points, and saving throws. A world where curse words are just bastardized versions of Demon-language. Who knows how their sayings or language would develop with all that under it?

[Vinyadan]

i read the comic and i see a world in which gaming rules apply, in which the goblins, kore, minmax, everyone are alive and living in the world. i get immersed in that world and i care about what happens in that world.

You see "Oh the short archer dude remembered being a drow, it's all just a bunch of nerds sitting at a table, everything can be explained as a bunch of nerds sitting at a table, nothing matters because it's all just a bunch of nerds sitting at a table."

How is that fun? how is that a "better" thought then mine?

Just to make my position clear: to me it seems as if there are two universes in Goblins. One is the Realm. The other one is a fictional world similar to ours. They have equal dignity. They both are real. However, the people who are in the world like ours can affect the Realm with essential impunity through player characters. Some players are good and can effectively forget about themselves and identify with the PC. Other players are not as good and forget how the game works, which creates a disconnect between what they think they know and what is actually happening in the world (the gloves joke I linked above: Yodette was wearing gloves, it was clear within the Realm, but she couldn't visualise it because her player wasn't aware of it.). The DM also comes from the world like ours, and he has disproportionate power on the Realm.

However, there clearly have been changes during the run of the comic. The way in which the PCs were killed by Junior suggests that they will not come back. Somehow, they stopped being characters (or even players) in a campaign and turned into characters in a horror movie, as Yodette had foreseen (she is apparently something of a trope evoker). To be honest, it sounded like the players died, too. I think it can be said that that was the end of narration about people around the table, and especially of the parody of RPG groups.
The DM also has stopped intervening directly (summoning demons, changing the scenery). From this point of view, it's really as if MM and Forgath were characters like the others; Forgath even belongs to a Dwarf clan.
But I think that it has more to do with a change in style (gaming parody is gone) and in themes (no interest for player antics, only for the themes of the story within the game), than with a consistent reflection on the problem within the comic.

[BaronOfHell]

Wasn't there once a theory that the characters in Goblinverse kept on "playing" while the players and DM controlling them did not?

E.g. let's say the DM controls the goblins and used them for the war camp quest, then suddenly uses them again when Minmax and Forgath appears at the bridge, or another example could be that the actual players who played Minmax, Forgath and co. haven't been regularly at the table (perhaps not even since the attack on the war camp?), and the characters have just continued their existence in the goblinverse, not knowing any better, so when the players one day may return, they will find their characters have become much more powerful.

Another thing to ponder, how long ago did Forgath pray directly to the DM? I remember he said the DM's name, when he cast some spell, but that wasn't comical as when he prayed for a tougher challenge. All in all, I think it is correct that the comic has changed over time, and while I don't know if this change was always intended, I do understand if people who perhaps followed a very different comic originally have come to realize that they dislike the change. Personally I think it is still a good comic.

[Draconi Redfir]

To be honest, it sounded like the players died, too.

i can't confirm, but i think there have been some theories that Idle, Bowst, and Ward might be those same three "Players" in new forms, but more stable / better forms that don't do stupid things like remember lives they never had.

[Morgaln]

i can't confirm, but i think there have been some theories that Idle, Bowst, and Ward might be those same three "Players" in new forms, but more stable / better forms that don't do stupid things like remember lives they never had.

Ellipsis herself has said that this theory is false, but that those three will return at a later point.

[Draconi Redfir]

ah, my mistake then.

[Lizard Lord]

just take all the same logic in Order of the Stick, and apply it to goblins. All discussion of class, skill points, players, PC's, NPC's, everything else, it's all just part of the physics of the world.

if you can do one, you can do the other.

The problem is that no one in OotS has ever mentioned a dungeon master of their world or mentioned being controlled by people just playing a game.

With that said characters in OotS DO mention being in a webcomic. I am honestly unsure why one would consider that level of fourth wall breaking ok, but not what Goblins has going on.

[Vinyadan]

Uh, OK. Thanks for the info on the 3 PCs.

The problem is that no one in OotS has ever mentioned a dungeon master of their world or mentioned being controlled by people just playing a game.

With that said characters in OotS DO mention being in a webcomic. I am honestly unsure why one would consider that level of fourth wall breaking ok, but not what Goblins has going on.

Different genres, I think. They both started out as parodies, but OotS stayed a parody, while Goblins became something else. This gives OotS more leeway, while Goblins is expected to be more coherent.
And I am not sure that Goblins is breaking the fourth wall. If I make a comic about a stage play and the actors break character once in a while, it's still within the scope of the comic, and not fourth-wall breaking.

[deuterio12]

But it would also be an isekai, which is a fate worse than unreality....

Although there's been a lot of trash Isekai lately, it can and has be done right. Case in point Magic Knight Rayearth was CLAMP's big debut in the entertainment industry and still remains a classic. Bonus points for the story starting with the classic "let's go save the princess from the evil priest that has taken over!" and then

Spoiler: big spoilers if you haven't read/watched it yet

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turns out that the heroine's mission was to kill the princess, and the evil priest was just trying to protect her.

Also there's giant robots. Everything's better with giant robots.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Different genres, I think. They both started out as parodies, but OotS stayed a parody, while Goblins became something else. This gives OotS more leeway, while Goblins is expected to be more coherent.
And I am not sure that Goblins is breaking the fourth wall. If I make a comic about a stage play and the actors break character once in a while, it's still within the scope of the comic, and not fourth-wall breaking.

You could argue that it's breaking the fourth wall, they just add a fifth.

Alternatively, they break the 3.5th wall, which is oddly appropriate in this case.

I think you're right, it might bug some people more because of the tone of the stories. Oots has the world at stake, but it's still a pretty lighthearted swashbuckling adventure compared to Goblins, which is all "everyone will suffer forever, and it will seem even longer, and I am now going to draw the bloodiest thing I can think of, which is a mere preview compared to what's awaiting everyone!" It might clash a bit more with "but at least my player is having fun, wink wink."

I do not count myself among those people. I like the world just fine even if it's not technically real. It feels more like a story set in the real world except some characters are controlled by energy beings from a higher dimension, and as a bonus they add a little humor I can relate to.

And that last bit is important. Horror movies have "it's just the cat" moments because a story benefits from changing moods. If you're just doing tense and scary all the time it becomes boring, or stressful. Goblins is already heavy on the suffering for my taste (and most of my favorite movies are R-rated flicks like Pan's Labyrinth, Cube and The Beast, so go figure), I love the more lighthearted moments. But I can accept that for some people they're too far from the regular tone and break the investment in what's going on. That's just not the case for me.

[Traab]

You could argue that it's breaking the fourth wall, they just add a fifth.

Alternatively, they break the 3.5th wall, which is oddly appropriate in this case.

I think you're right, it might bug some people more because of the tone of the stories. Oots has the world at stake, but it's still a pretty lighthearted swashbuckling adventure compared to Goblins, which is all "everyone will suffer forever, and it will seem even longer, and I am now going to draw the bloodiest thing I can think of, which is a mere preview compared to what's awaiting everyone!" It might clash a bit more with "but at least my player is having fun, wink wink."

I do not count myself among those people. I like the world just fine even if it's not technically real. It feels more like a story set in the real world except some characters are controlled by energy beings from a higher dimension, and as a bonus they add a little humor I can relate to.

And that last bit is important. Horror movies have "it's just the cat" moments because a story benefits from changing moods. If you're just doing tense and scary all the time it becomes boring, or stressful. Goblins is already heavy on the suffering for my taste (and most of my favorite movies are R-rated flicks like Pan's Labyrinth, Cube and The Beast, so go figure), I love the more lighthearted moments. But I can accept that for some people they're too far from the regular tone and break the investment in what's going on. That's just not the case for me.

Nah, to break the 4th wall is to acknowledge the world of the readers or watchers, ie us. In a book about a play, if one of the actors goes, "Wait wait, whats my motivation here?" It isnt the 4th wall, its the actor in universe talking to the director in universe about his job. Same for if he randomly grabs a pie in a scene of high drama and slams it into his fellow actors face. In Goblins, Minmax and Forgath, in comic, are controlled by players, so when they acknowledge that fact, they arent breaking the 4th wall. Because thats an in universe reality that doesnt connect to us.

The world they are playing in is either real or just a well fleshed out D&D campaign, it honestly doesnt matter which as the end result is the same. Making it a real world does seriously complicate the comic however, as it brings to mind questions like how is this even possible? The simplest solution is, this is a D&D campaign run by a DM who is both really good at his job, and enjoys creating comprehensive plots that grow and change depending on what the players do. This no more removes drama than any other book, tv show, or movie. "Oh but if he dies he just rerolls and thus there is no real tension!" Well first off, we have seen plenty people die, some in dramatic ways. Secondly, how many times have you read stories where the main characters seem to die only to come back all the freaking time? (Oddly enough this is worst in the drizzt series, d&d novels lol) Third, there will always be the tension of IF and WHEN it will happen. And fourth, even if minmax dies and comes back as Maxmin, the secret king of everything, or whatever silly idea he creates, the npcs at the very least would treat him differently, even if he acts the same as before because thats not minmax to them. Kin wont be in love with him, complains likely wont care about him as anything more than another human, and vorpal will miss his buddy minmax. So there will still be consequences in the story.

[Vinyadan]

About the DM, there is an interesting fact: the 3 bad players were talking about the while terror when they were reintroduced to the game. Since they had not read the parchment and they had not met MM, I think that they simply got filled in by the DM or the other players and they received the same quest as MM. That probably is why they ended up close to the Viper camp.

[Typewriter]

The difference is that the author of ASOIAf is not part of the story of ASOIAF. Within the reality of the story, G.R.R.Martin does not exist; and no one is breaking the fourth wall to point out that it is all a story written by someone in a different universe.
In goblins, however, the players are a part of the universe. They exists, and the characters in the story are aware that they exist. And if Minmax is dead, he's not lost. We know (by evidence of the drow characters) that all of his knowledge and experience will keep existing and be transferred to the next character, because Minmax is not real; only his player is and they are not in any danger. And if the world ends, the players can just shrug and say "well, that could have gone better; time to get new characters."
In addition, the DM is part of the universe; that means that any character that doesn't have a player behind them has no agency. It's just Herbert doing whatever Herbert wants to do with them. That includes any and all of the villains that have shown up, everyone in Dies' Horribly's story, every alt version in the Maze of Many, all the goblins in the warcamp, Hawl and his group of monsters, all Kliks and so on. So far, it is uncertain whether the GAP, Kin, Idle and Bowst have actual players or not, so this might even include them. They're all just drones controlled by one person. And this is different from knowing a story has an author because that person is part of the in-universe lore.

Consider it like this: assume that in the Matrix, if Neo gets killed inside the Matrix, he is just ejected out of the Matrix and all he needs to do is to log in again. Suddenly, everything that happens to him in the Matrix is far less dramatic and exciting. Not because there's no action going on, but because we know that nothing that happens will change things permanently, and his outside self will be perfectly fine. That's exactly what's happening in Goblins.

I don't know - it still doesn't completely make sense to me to disregard the world and the setting because of some bleed from the real world equivalent of their game group. The drow coming back and retaining all their memories was done as a gag and are essentially a mockery of terrible players who do things like that - project themselves completely onto their characters and don't allow the characters to grow or be themselves. MM was a character like that at first with a player who only cared about one thing - min maxing. Now he's grown and changed and that represents a willingness of the player to change. The character growth of MM is the development of two characters - MM himself and the unseen player. If/when MM dies I think it'll have more impact on the story than just 'and then MM 2.0 shows up' because I think the importance of the character goes beyond the fact that he has a player.

I think it's got some interesting story telling potential - imagine if Forgath actually died and a new character showed up and tried to be chummy with MM because it's Forgaths new character. How would MM react to this? Would he simply accept it and move on as if nothing had changed? Would he be upset or distraught that Forgath was replaced? Would he think this 'stranger' odd for trying to fill that old role? I think that reducing all of the potential of the story/setting to being invalid because the DM/players exists is a bit dismissive of that potential.

As far as the Matrix comparison - I don't think it's a great one because in the Matrix there is no distinction between Neo in the matrix and Neo outside. He's not going into the Matrix and assuming the identity of a character who becomes dead and gone if he dies and comes back just fine. I feel a slightly better (but still imperfect) comparison would be Altered Carbon - a story/setting in which the body/sleeve has a distinct form that is independent of the soul/stack. Takeshi can move from body to body but whichever body he winds up being in takes on a significance to him and to the people around him. They recognize his sleeve as the one they know and their reactions to him in that sleeve change his perceptions and alter who he is. When someone threatens his sleeve it is a danger to him because it has significance to him and to others - even if he himself would be fine. Again - this is not a perfect comparison but I feel like it's slightly better than the Matrix.

[Agi Hammerthief]

how is that a "better" thought then mine?

care to quote where „better“ came into play?

[Vinyadan]

It's also possible that MM always represented the Stormwind Fallacy. After all, the character was simply boisterous and stupid, which isn't bad roleplaying per se.

[Willie the Duck]

honestly, using my "It's like oots" method of thinking, i just interpreted "get ready to roll up a new character kinda weird" as a turn of phrase or saying. Like how we would say "another roll of the dice" , "kick it into high gear", "All hands on deck", or "Another day another dollar".

My take is that it was a no-other-peoples'-IP-mentioning equivalent to "This looks weird, Tomb of Horrors deathtrap weird." So yes a D&D-ism allusion, but I also do not see a 'nothing matters because if I die I roll up a new character' message behind it. I honestly don't remember seeing anything like that in years. I think the comic has moved on from that. Yes, it existed in the past, and someone looking for consistency in tone from this comic is going to be disappointed, but the comic as it stands today does not seem to be going to that well.

However, there clearly have been changes during the run of the comic. The way in which the PCs were killed by Junior suggests that they will not come back. Somehow, they stopped being characters (or even players) in a campaign and turned into characters in a horror movie, as Yodette had foreseen (she is apparently something of a trope evoker). To be honest, it sounded like the players died, too. I think it can be said that that was the end of narration about people around the table, and especially of the parody of RPG groups.
The DM also has stopped intervening directly (summoning demons, changing the scenery). From this point of view, it's really as if MM and Forgath were characters like the others; Forgath even belongs to a Dwarf clan.
But I think that it has more to do with a change in style (gaming parody is gone) and in themes (no interest for player antics, only for the themes of the story within the game), than with a consistent reflection on the problem within the comic.

Also my take.

*Faceplam* No.

I just ran out of patience and crayons to try and explain things to you.

care to quote where „better“ came into play?

Can we please not do this?

[Radar]

Although there's been a lot of trash Isekai lately, it can and has be done right. Case in point Magic Knight Rayearth was CLAMP's big debut in the entertainment industry and still remains a classic. Bonus points for the story starting with the classic "let's go save the princess from the evil priest that has taken over!" and then

Also Grimgar from newer stuff. To be fair though, the characters have no memory of their previous life whatsoever, so the "out of this world" theme is only used for the "we have to learn, how to survive fast" and most importantly forming of bonds between the characters. It is a great short series by the way.

[Ibrinar]

With japanese isekai it is less the topic and more that it is a very derivative trend among amateur writers. Portal fantasy still exists here, the most recently written I have read is probably Summer in Orcus from 2016 but I am sure there is plenty newer stuff.

But I think mostly not coming up is the best option for Goblins. I think it makes the most sense from some earlier parts of the story that there are real players but I mostly just don't think about it at all. And making it more about that would probably be a bit weird at this point. I mostly treat it as early installment weirdness (to use the tv tropes name) though it isn't entirely gone.

[Anteros]

I think it's probably possible to write a good Isekai...but I've tried a ton and I've never seen one maintain any kind of quality. I think it's just an inherently flawed concept. A good enough writer can overcome those, but it doesn't make the concept itself any better.

[Draconi Redfir]

a lot of media have such "early installment" / "season one" weirdness. Zombies in "The Walking Dead" were able to use weapons and climb ladders for example. Season one Star-trek TNG had Riker without a beard, and everything sucked because of that. Steven Universe season one had Steven more as an annoyance then an actual character, and Gem-technology was explicitly stated to be "Magic" rather then alien technology. Oots had squiggly panel boarders and little to no plot relevance.

In almost all instances, we just say that the media was still finding it's footing and that those events were only partly or semi-canon at best. I don't see why we can't say the same for Goblins.

[Ibrinar]

I think it's probably possible to write a good Isekai...but I've tried a ton and I've never seen one maintain any kind of quality. I think it's just an inherently flawed concept. A good enough writer can overcome those, but it doesn't make the concept itself any better.

Never? There are some pretty famous ones. The neverending story, Alice in wonderland, Wizard of Oz, Narnia, Peter Pan arguably. For the big older ones. I could name more current books less famous books but the chance you know them would probably be lower.

[mucat]

Never? There are some pretty famous ones. The neverending story, Alice in wonderland, Wizard of Oz, Narnia, Peter Pan arguably. For the big older ones. I could name more current books less famous books but the chance you know them would probably be lower.

A fairly well-known and well-received recent one, by an even more well-known writer, would be Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.

[tomaO2]

Yes, it existed in the past, and someone looking for consistency in tone from this comic is going to be disappointed, but the comic as it stands today does not seem to be going to that well.

"Because the story is more in line with my personal tastes, it's good that the author changed a major plot point."

<rolls eyes>

Author wrote out a summary of the story very early on. The death of Chief, for example, was always planned to happen. Likewise, the fact that Minmax and Forgath are always meant to be player characters. That IS the story she wanted to tell, it always has been. What it is NOT is some minor detail, to be changed at a whim.

It's not a simple change of tone, or the decision to stop making certain types of jokes. Forget all the modern isekai stuff, this sort of world building was common. Heroes of a Lesser Earth https://www.heroesoflesserearth.com/2005/12/pilot/ is one example. I'm sure other readers could list off a few, plus there were all the RPG based comics, where a lot of the minor characters were, well, basically just NPCs, such as ADVENTURERS! http://www.giantrobot.club/adventurers

The main difference here is that the story didn't focus on the player characters, it focused on the NPC. That said, a significant amount of time and reader excitement was all about who was and wasn't a player. The idea of this world being inherently less important is not a topic that came up. I question how serious complainers are about D&D to begin with if they wanna just dismiss a campaign world as not measuring up because it was created by a DM. It sounds really dismissive to those of us that enjoy this sort of thing, ya know?

Author has talked about how she liked creating worlds and making a party of goblins is something she would have added. She was very detail oriented and put a lot of worldbuilding onto her campaigns. Her love of the genre is why the comic was created in the first place. If she had just wanted to write a fantasy world, she could have done that, if she had wanted to write a fantasy world that operated on D&D logic, she could have done that too but she deliberately included the PCs.

If this is no longer the case, then it's a real slap in the face for all long time fans. Maybe the newer fans will like it but I would consider it an insult, given the way the author has sold the story for all these years. Assuming this is an actual change, I would really like to know what on Earth possessed her to make it.

[DataNinja]

If this is no longer the case, then it's a real slap in the face for all long time fans. Maybe the newer fans will like it but I would consider it an insult, given the way the author has sold the story for all these years. Assuming this is an actual change, I would really like to know what on Earth possessed her to make it.

I feel like you're overreacting a little bit here, since I don't really feel like it's one way or the other here. It's mostly just that... it's not something that's in focus. It's not the thing driving the story. That doesn't mean that it is or isn't there, just that it's not something really being addressed.