So why are there gods anyway? Or an astral plane?

[Mad Humanist]

So we know the origin of the prime material plane. The gods wove it out of the "threads of reality".

But this just begs several questions:

What are threads of reality? Are other planes, such as the Astral plane, also made out threads or reality? Who made those planes?

Also where do the gods come from? It seems they can have children, so may be these gods are children from another part of reality? Why did they leave? Did they want to do something different from all the old fogey-wogey gods who rule the realms they left? Did each quiddity of god come from a different realm?

So why are there gods at all? We know they can spontaneously ascend, but that requires belief. And belief requires sentient beings. And sentient beings presumably can only exist if created by gods. So how does the whole cycle get started?

[Fyraltari]

Because that one guy had a neat idea.

[Mad Humanist]

Because that one guy had a neat idea.

Okay suppose OOTS was not a 4th wall breaking franchise. Then that scene would not have happened. So how would you answer.

Or of course I could just ask "okay, but who created Dave Arneson?".

[Ron Miel]

That strip obviously was inserted as a tribute to the late Dave Arneson, only recently passed away when it was published. It is obviously out of continuity, and doesn't match the origin story as told by Thor.

[Fyraltari]

Fourth wall breaking is an integral part of this comic, if you take it away you have nothing left. As such I see no reason to disregard this comic.
This doesn’t contradict anything.
Dave Arneson and the others created D&D and all the D&D camping settings exist as separate universes. The gods came from beyond ‘the chaos’ of the not yet ordered universe of Rich Burlew’s setting because he didn’t invent Thor, Dragon, Tiamat and the rest of them and they ordered that chaos into the OOTS setting.

Who created Dave Arneson? His parents obviously. Beyond that, if you are searching for the Ultimate Cause you won’t find it on an Internet forum, especially not one dedicated to a webcomic so uninterested in worldbuilding it gave us the Wooden Forest, Passage Pass and Nottinstory City. The best I can give you is « it’s turtles all the way down ».

[Mad Humanist]

Fourth wall breaking is an integral part of this comic, if you take it away you have nothing left.

You would have nothing left? Really?

[hroþila]

You would have nothing left? Really?

Not literally nothing, but very little. The whole universe was consciously designed as a self-aware stick figure fantasy comic both in- and out of universe.

And Fyraltari is right about the theological implications. The problem of infinite regress is inherent to any creation myth, and you can add an arbitrary number of steps without them being contradictory or out of place. Dave Arneson is in the comic and it doesn't really contradict anything in the comic, so a priori there's no need to dismiss that comic strip as non-canonical.

[BlackKnightJack]

Given the nature of the Astral Plane (particularly based on the little quip about how Thor use to have red hair and Horace talking about how everything in the afterlife is shaped by belief), the gods in OOTS probably work on the same basis as the gods in MtG's Theros or how the Idea of Evil works in Berserk: They were ideas originally created by mortals formed into beings. That's how I took it anyway, but I'm not sure how you would then resolve the chicken/egg scenario this therefore creates.

[Metastachydium]

Except we know the answer to the chicken and the egg. The egg predated avian life by millions of years, and beyond that, the chicken as we know it is a domesticated form of the red junglefowl of Southeast Asia. At some point, an almost-chicken junglefowl laid an egg with what we would consider a chicken in it.

In a similar way, the fact that the gods are the way they are now does not preclude them having existed in some other form in the past—one that we might not have thought of as "gods." It's just that the mechanism for change isn't reproduction and evolution. Or rather, it's memetic evolution, not genetic.

EDIT: I also think you're forgetting that the gods originated "from beyond the chaos." Their initial creation and/or ascension would involve how things work in that other place, wherever that might be, and has little bearing on the story.

That's where the gods come from.

As for the Astral Plane and the afterlives, they are made of thoughts or ideas (and souls, in the case of the latter).

[Dion]

You would have nothing left? Really?

I suppose you’d still have this web forum.

[Mic_128]

You might as well be asking {scrubbed}, or what caused the Big Bang?

[woweedd]

No one knows, and no one cares...Or, rather, the only person whose opinion matters doesn't, I would guess.

[Dion]

What if it’s just like the Matrix? Thor is just part of a simulation, but he doesn’t even know it?

And the snarl is the red pill!

That would explain everything! We’ve totally solved the riddle.

And what’s the deal with “winter”, anyhow? Did that ever get explained?

[brian 333]

What if it’s just like the Matrix? Thor is just part of a simulation, but he doesn’t even know it?

And the snarl is the red pill!

That would explain everything! We’ve totally solved the riddle.

And what’s the deal with “winter”, anyhow? Did that ever get explained?

The deal with Winter is that the author is very old, in poor health, and flush with cash after the umexpected commercial success of the HBO series.

Oh, you were not asking about the conclusion to Game of Thrones, were you?

[RatElemental]

This is like asking why there is something rather than nothing.

The best answer to this I can give, is that if there had been nothing there would be no stick figures to wonder why. Also complete nothingness may or may not be impossible. Like, sure you could have an empty universe, but that's not nothing, that's space with nothing in it. If reality exists there's already something, nothing cannot exist because it demands its own nonexistence.

Or... something. I should have gone to bed hours ago.

[Spriteless]

Well, they are all from Earthly religions, but not dominant on earth any more. I mean, I know Skadi is still dominant in skiing lodges in her homelands, but I'm gonna back off from getting too specific with my qualifiers so I don't break the rules any further.

So it's like, umm. It's like Akira. What doew a god to do? One creates a world with worshipers. If gods have that power, why not build a new one when the old world turns away from you?

And another, when a snarl happens in the plan.

[Quizatzhaderac]

Ideas.

The OotS verse comes from the ideas of Richard Berlew, David Anderson, Gary Gynax, Jack Vance, J. R. R. Tolkien, and others. Rich let many of these ideas pass undisturbed into his work so it would be easier to consume for us and more powerfully relate to ideas in our lives.

For most significant things in-universe, there are two chains of cause and effect: the in universe and out of universe cause. The out of universe cause is necessary for the work to exist in the first place. The in universe cause exists to make the work more relatable; to allow the creator's ideas to flow more quickly and powerfully to the audience.

By the nature of this particular comic, it's important that we see the path many of these ideas take to get into this universe. The order of the sticks is, to a great extent, a story about stories.

Within the universe, ideas and stories have a real metaphysical impact. As Thor says, ideas form planes and gods. Gods create material and souls.

The line between ideas coming from in universe and out of universe is deliberately vague because the stories told in universe are similar to (some of ) the stories told in real life.

So to recap: There are a bunch of ideas in the real life that created a bunch of fictional places and beings. In most of those places, ideas of their inhabitants can shape the details of that place. In a few of those places, the ideas can do so directly without first causing a person to do something (think of it as skipping a step for simplicity).

One such fictional place was created by Rich. In the broadest strokes, all it's ideas enter the universe from outside. To create cause and effect in universe, these ideas enter before the main events of the comic and try to relate to each other in a coherent manner. To ask for coherence from the start on is fine and proper. To ask for coherence from before the start is an exercise in futility.

This is true for realistic settings as well, it's just harder to notice. The big bang theory doesn't explain it's cosmogony any better.

[dancrilis]

I think it there might be a simple rational.

The outer planes, the gods, everything are formed by ideas of mortals - of which there have been ~billions of worlds with ~billions of souls.

In that time on one world it became accepted that David Anderson, Gary Gygax etc kicked off the idea - so they did, you can view this as retroactive application but it fits the cosmology.

i.e the past exists because a) the present exists and b) the present believes in the past.

[Riftwolf]

So why are there gods at all? We know they can spontaneously ascend, but that requires belief. And belief requires sentient beings. And sentient beings presumably can only exist if created by gods. So how does the whole cycle get started?

So why are there programmers at all? We know that computers didn't exist a hundred years ago, and all programmers require computers to make a livelihood. So how does the whole cycle get started?

[Squire Doodad]

Obviously the gods exist because magic

Just magic.

A wizard did it.

I would say ultimately the OotS gods probably could only have organically formed without an additional creator added to the equation by having it be "the threads of astral plane slowly congealed in the form of the many planes, and with it, the gods". Anything else would probably require detailed study into the universe's history, or possibly start to lean on the forum rules.

[Mad Humanist]

Ideas.

The OotS verse comes from the ideas of Richard Berlew, David Anderson, Gary Gynax, Jack Vance, J. R. R. Tolkien, and others. Rich let many of these ideas pass undisturbed into his work so it would be easier to consume for us and more powerfully relate to ideas in our lives.

For most significant things in-universe, there are two chains of cause and effect: the in universe and out of universe cause. The out of universe cause is necessary for the work to exist in the first place. The in universe cause exists to make the work more relatable; to allow the creator's ideas to flow more quickly and powerfully to the audience.

By the nature of this particular comic, it's important that we see the path many of these ideas take to get into this universe. The order of the sticks is, to a great extent, a story about stories.

Within the universe, ideas and stories have a real metaphysical impact. As Thor says, ideas form planes and gods. Gods create material and souls.

The line between ideas coming from in universe and out of universe is deliberately vague because the stories told in universe are similar to (some of ) the stories told in real life.

So to recap: There are a bunch of ideas in the real life that created a bunch of fictional places and beings. In most of those places, ideas of their inhabitants can shape the details of that place. In a few of those places, the ideas can do so directly without first causing a person to do something (think of it as skipping a step for simplicity).

One such fictional place was created by Rich. In the broadest strokes, all it's ideas enter the universe from outside. To create cause and effect in universe, these ideas enter before the main events of the comic and try to relate to each other in a coherent manner. To ask for coherence from the start on is fine and proper. To ask for coherence from before the start is an exercise in futility.

This is true for realistic settings as well, it's just harder to notice. The big bang theory doesn't explain it's cosmogony any better.

I think I like this.

[GreatWyrmGold]

You might as well be asking {scrubbed}, or what caused the Big Bang?

There are actually a number of scientific hypotheses about the latter. After all, the Big Bang and the rest of our universe function on principles that some people understand very thoroughly. Those people can therefore make reasonable explanations about where the universe came from, ranging from cyclic Big Bangs to complicated mathematical models demonstrating how the universe could create itself. (Don't ask me how that works, I majored in bio.)

There are probably beings in the OotSverse who have similar levels of understanding about the nature of their reality. We probably won't see much of them anymore. Good luck finding an answer without them.

So why are there programmers at all? We know that computers didn't exist a hundred years ago, and all programmers require computers to make a livelihood. So how does the whole cycle get started?

Not a great example, for two reasons. One, computers relied on a third class of being to come into existence; we know of no such class in the case of OotS. Two, programmers did exist before computers. Ada Lovelace published a partial algorithm in 1842, for a theoretical computer which was never built.

[BaronOfHell]

Gods may set the rules of "reality", but it is my belief that the gods may have been created from "reality".

We know that:
1) Souls powers every plane, gods, the whole of "reality".
2) Gods are formed by the belief of souls.

We also know that single souls can even become gods, as has happened before and happened with TDO.

As I understood it, TDO rose to godhood after many goblins showed devotion to him.
The gods "feeds" from 3 components according to Thor: https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots1144.html

The goblins showed great devotion to the dark one and as many probably fell in battle, the dark one may then have been shapen from the belief of these goblins and finally for every battle, for every success or even failure, I imagine the goblins prayed to the dark one.
Ultimately he was well fed, and ascended.

I am of course only guessing here, and the world in OotS is probably not even that thought through, but since the acts of mortals can create gods, I would not be surprised if the "soul energy" is some kind of constant that only moves around.

This could also potentially explain how come mortals have souls in the first place.

Also alternatively, some gods could have formed first, and then they created the first world as told by Shojo, but I have a feeling there is more to it that that, and I think it ties in with the planet within the rifts in a way that probably also shows that my guess is utterly incorrect.

[Sigako]

Well, either Astral Plane is the prime cause, with all the ideas being similar to quantum fluctuations, and gods first arising as agregations of some of the ideas and procreating until the pantheon is filled (and they could scrounge some of the needed resources directly from Astral, but decided to make something more sustaining, like world), or they came from the other Prime Material plane(s) far-far away, beyond the chaos of Astral Plane, where they had their own plots, which are beyond the scope of the current story, like, totally.
In second case the problem is just shifted farther away instead of being solved, but this way it's far enough to be someone else's problem, also beyond the scope of the current story.

[Mastikator]

My hypothesis is that the astral plane was once completely empty of thought and the gods were completely without characteristics. (or rather, we don't need to assume they had any)

Here's my reasoning.

• Ideas come from people
• Without people there are no ideas
• You start out with no people
• Therefore you start out with no ideas
• The same goes for the gods, people's beliefs literally shape gods

Formless entities came together to create reality, there's no need to assume they did it for any reason. Actually better to assume they did it without reason. But because they had no personality or traits there's no way any of them could try to work together, so they ended up creating a snarl- a godkilling monster. Before the snarl had destroyed everyone and one of the colors there had been people- people with ideas and beliefs. The gods had had a chance to develop into persons, they used personhood to actually cooperate.

So to answer OPs question:
The gods were created by people. People were created by (the threads of) reality. Reality was created by the possibility of thought.

Most likely there was no "Thor" at the very start, just a yellow singularity of reality. Where did that come from? Chaos. (And chaos came from chaos, etc)

[KorvinStarmast]

But this just begs several questions:

No it does not. It raises several other questions.

In classical rhetoric and logic, begging the question is an informal fallacy that occurs when an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion, instead of supporting it. It is a type of circular reasoning: an argument that requires that the desired conclusion be true.

Do not go gentle into that good night ... rage rage against the dying of the light!

So why are there programmers at all? We know that computers didn't exist a hundred years ago, and all programmers require computers to make a livelihood. So how does the whole cycle get started?

1. French fabric makers used punch cards to standardize woven fabric products.
2. As Grace Hopper might have told you, there was a bug in the system ...

[Peelee]

No it does not. It raises several other questions.

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2. As Grace Hopper might have told you, there was a bug in the system ...

As Grace Hopper might have told anyone, "My life makes you feel inadequate about yours."

Grace Hopper was badass.

[Ron Miel]

But this just begs several questions:

No it does not. It raises several other questions.

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[Emanick]

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Or, better yet:

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[KorvinStarmast]

Or, better yet:

I believe that the term you are looking for is "more annoying yet" but that's just a guess.

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As Grace Hopper might have told anyone, "My life makes you feel inadequate about yours."

Given what a classy lady Admiral Hopper was, I don't think those words ever passed her lips.
I have always wondered if her parents were making a joke about an insect when they chose her name ...

For Ron: if nobody picsk up the trash, the city gets covered in it.