Ultimate OOTS Book Tournament 2: The penultimate match!

[137beth]

Greetings to all people of the Playground, and welcome to
The Ultimate Order of the Stick Book Tournament II!


Back in 2014, I ran a series of polls to determine the forum's favorite OOTS book. Start of Darkness won that tournament, defeating Blood Runs in the Family by one vote. Since that time, the number of available books has increased, and the readership has had more time to reflect on earlier stories in light of more recent events. Hence, I felt it was time for another tournament. Without further ado, I present

The Contestants

Start of Darkness
Don't Split the Party
Blood Runs in the Family


Dungeon Crawling Fools
On the Origins of the PCs
No Cure for the Paladin Blues
Snips, Snails and Dragon Tails
Haleo & Julelan + Uncivil Servant
Good Deeds Gone Unpunished
War and XP
Utterly Dwarfed


I have grouped together the two stories which are currently digital-only. The 11 contestants will compete in a double elimination tournament, with your votes deciding who wins each match. The winner of the entire tournament will be crowned Grand Champion of the Stick!

Due to the fact that there are more than 8 but fewer than 16 contestants, five books will get a free pass on the first round. The contestants were seeded randomly. You can see the entire tournament bracket on Challonge.

Vote once in each match by posting your vote in this thread. For the semifinals, we will have an extended two week voting period. Voting for this match will close Saturday, May 9, at which time I will post the final match. I will vote only in the case where a tie-breaking vote is needed. Please put your votes in bold, since it makes it easier for me when tallying them.


The Current Match

Match 19: Start of Darkness vs Don't Split the Party

Both books in this match have lost to Blood Runs in the Family. The winner gets a rematch for the Grand Championship!

[rgrekejin]

My head tells me to vote for Start of Darkness, as it seems like the only book capable of taking down Blood Runs in the Family in the finals, a book that I view as an unworthy champion. But my heart tells me to vote for the book with Darth V, Belkar coming into his own as a real character, and Roy's afterlife hijinks. So, Don't Split the Party gets my vote, although I fully expect it to get curb-stomped in the final tally.

[Schroeswald]

Start of Darkness

[Bedinsis]

I have not read Start of Darkness. I don't know if this disqualifies me from voting. If not, I vote for Don't split the party, the book that in my mind is the best of the books, regardless of how the tally has turned out.

[CriticalFailure]

[Bold] Start of Darkness [/Bold]

[understatement]

EDIT: I keep forgetting to read the whole post.

Don't Split the Party. Gives the characters a moment to shine. Darth V's arc was high-tier. And Roy meeting his little brother is among my top ten scenes of the comic.

[LadyEowyn]

Don’t Split the Party. It’s my favourite of the main books. Vaarsuvius’ arc is exceptionally good. So is the arc with O-Chul and MITD, and the way that combines with Vaarsuvius’ story at the end is excellent. Redcloak gets additional character development. The arc with Roy in the afterlife is good in both characterization and worldbuilding terms.

[Vulkos]

Start of darkness

[trtl]

Start of Darkness

[Ruck]

Start of Darkness

[knag]

Start of Darkness

The Redcloack/Right-Eye betrayal is deep man.

[Mariele]

Start of Darkness.

I'm honestly not the biggest fan of the first three books, and DStP was when it was just starting to get good. Blood Runs in the Family kind of kicked everything else to the curbside, IMO. A shame it didn't win--I considered it far better than SoD!

[Schroeswald]

Start of Darkness.

I'm honestly not the biggest fan of the first three books, and DStP was when it was just starting to get good. Blood Runs in the Family kind of kicked everything else to the curbside, IMO. A shame it didn't win--I considered it far better than SoD!

BRITF is still in, its the only one that hasn't lost yet, and both of these have lost to BRITF (though SOD also beaten BRITF in the last tournament, when it was missing the whole "being in book form" thing).

[Mariele]

Ah, gotcha, I was going by the post alone and not the links to the previous rounds. Thanks for clearing that up. :) Hurray! My opinion on which snippet of an overall story was best is shared by the majority! I feel validated!

[Jaxzan Proditor]

Again, going to have to go with Start of Darkness.

[PopeLinus1]

It isn't over yet! Start of darkness

[Laurana]

Definitely Don't Split the Party.

[Squire Doodad]

Uhhh I vote for Blood Runs in the Family

Don't Split the Party was nice, but it did feel a bit odd at one point or another
I don't have a copy of Start of Darkness with me though...

[Peelee]

Ah, what the hey. Don't Split the Party.

[Sylian]

Start of Darkness.

[137beth]

And voting is now closed! The results:

Match 19: Start of Darkness vs Don't Split the Party (10-6)

Start of Darkness will proceed to the final for a rematch with BRiF! The final round is up in a new thread.

[KorvinStarmast]

Match 19: Start of Darkness vs Don't Split the Party
!

Don't Split the Party. For a lot of reasons, but the primary one was;

Rich had taken the lead character out; Roy was dead.
He used this book as a bridge to the Order going from being defeated to being back on the road to victory while each Character who needed some (Other than Durkon, his was coming later) got some Character Development.

Elan, V, Haley, Belkar. This was a tough thing to do well and it worked.
Also, the scene with Eric.

Also, SoD is a prequel (nothing difficult to do plot wise, in terms of degree of difficulty) and as such it isn't even part of the online web comic. IMO, it barely belongs on this list for all that it offers up some char dev for Redclaok and Xykon.

[Procyonpi]

Start of Darkness