T w e n t y S i d e d
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Oh look. Another secluded place of secret enchantment and arcane mystery.
Yawn.
Wolfenstein II
This is a massive step down in story, gameplay, and art design when compared to the 2014 soft reboot. Yet critics rated this one much higher. What's going on here?
The Game That Ruined Me
Be careful what you learn with your muscle-memory, because it will be very hard to un-learn it.
The Death of Half-Life
Valve still hasn't admitted it, but the Half-Life franchise is dead. So what made these games so popular anyway?
The Brilliance of Mass Effect
What is "Domino Worldbuilding" and how did it help to make Mass Effect one of the most interesting settings in modern RPGs?
The Witch Watch
My first REAL published book, about a guy who comes back from the dead due to a misunderstanding.
After two weeks offline I rejoin the party. You made my morning merry with catching up. “OK, that’s new.” was my favorite line. Ads- wtg
The punch line was extra magical.
You just keep hitting them out of the park, here.
:chortle:
We who build game worlds try so hard to make them extra-special, and this is the reward? Boredom because they are all extra-special!
Of course, if you described it as a perfectly ordinary absolutely non-magical everyday forest replete with non-talking trees of quiet disposition, your players would be even more nervous: there’d be nobody to rescue them from grabby tree-roots or irritated animals. The ranger might know 5 languages, but can he save you from a sharp-aimed squirrel?
Keeps getting funnier and funnier. Are these going to be gathered in once place when the project is finished?
Are these going to be gathered in once place when the project is finished?
I was thinking about that myself. Once it’s all over, I was thinking of releasing the high-res versions a PDF or something. The ones on the site are reduced and compressed a bit to conserve precious bandwidth. It would be nice to release the larger images. Plus, I have a few extra strips that I’ve trashed for various reasons, and a PDF would be a good place to stick those.
Speaking of bandwidth: Thanks to everyone for keeping the ads in mind. I’m surprised at how nicely this is working out.
a PDF of the whole thing would be… magical! Extra magical.Like a plus 30 sword in a level 1 world.
“So noted.”
Pepsi, meet keyboard. Keyboard, Pepsi.
To cap off the fact that I simply cannot read this comic in public (I do not have a discreet laugh) you include an “Excalibur” and “Star Wars” reference in the same strip.
What a great joy this whole adventure is. Well done.
“Plus, I have a few extra strips that I've trashed for various reasons, and a PDF would be a good place to stick those.”
so, just like Jackson, you’re already gathering material for the future extended versions, before the theatrical release even happens.
: )
nice touch!
if you described it as a perfectly ordinary absolutely non-magical everyday forest replete with non-talking trees of quiet disposition, your players would be even more nervous
If your players get obnoxious and you want to creep them out, have them walk up to a perfectly normal forest: “Do you go in?” [possible discussion elided] “Yes” “Roll a D20” [possible discussion elided] … (whatever the roll is) “You don’t notice anything unusual” — and let them worry about it for the rest of the trip through the forest (or around, if they talked themselves out of going through).
That screenshot of the Dagobah cave and Luke Skywalker receiving revelation was … lol, unexpected so to say. But an awesome pun!
Obviously there are copyright issues (“Stolen Images: Various”) but if you can stay under the radar, I would totally cheer for a PDF compilation…and pay you cash money.
I wouldn’t pay you, but I’d definitely read it. You’ve managed to make my whole family laugh with this stuff, good on you.
I’ve been playing D&D for quite a few years now, and I almost wonder if you’ve been spying on my players, :D
Am enjoying the heck out of these, but have one suggestion: a “previous” button on the page would be awesome for those of us who are “cluster readers.” I tend to check in only every couple weeks, and it’s hard to navigate back to where I left off.
Gini: There is a previous button directly under the post’s title.
Gini: you can also do what I do which is to create a favorites link directly to the page of the last day you read, then you click the link and it takes you strait to the correct day.
OK, the Luke Skywalker thing was scary. Not “please don’t ever do it again” scary, more like “Wow, time has NOT been good to that look” scary. Perfectly placed, too.
I have yet to see one of these that wasn’t highly funny. Or better.
Heh, I remember one game…”You hear the bushes rustle,” says the GM, “and a six-foot tall glowing spider moves out onto the path in front of you…”
“Right,” says the guy in front, “is there anything unusual about it?”
(Why, no, no…nothing unusual at all. It’s just your standard giant glowing spider. We get six-foot tall glowing spiders around here _all_ the time.)
To paraphrase that one guy from The Mummy Returns; “This is magical, that is magical, everything is magical!”
Is that Legolas’ arrow pointing at Gimli’s head in the last frame?
It is true that they complain about everything being magical and then you can turn around and give them the plain forest, they wanted and they have to group up and discuss every footstep they take before taking it.
and by the way plain magical items are great but i prefer cursed ones that only reveal their nature after an unexpected alignment change (the lust for greed always gets them in the end).
Well… there’s always the taverns…? Generally about as mundane as you can get, though darn convenient for meeting up with random, shadowy figures. Generally.
The “Excalibur” and “Star Wars” references took me by surprise but were just perfect! Hope Crazy George doesn’t notice. ;)
This reminds me of a game i was in that every time i walked into a bar and asked a question, a fight would ensue. It came to the point that a fighter in our group had to escort me everywhere i went. :)
Thanks for bringing back such great memories!
actually this may just be because of the people i learned from but generally none of the landscapes in my campaigns are magic. the groups i tend to play with either make them full of man maid danger or the players just deal w/ a nice romp in the woods. of course as with everything there are exceptions.
game: White Wolf (mage & werewolf combined), setting: Central Park, NYC, NPC: guy in formal tux ‘n tails with an accent. The gm had us freaking out over a stage magician on his way to work.
next campain i do i’m doing normal forest filled with waring bandits.
No magic.
Just Robin Hood style
“actually this may just be because of the people i learned from but generally none of the landscapes in my campaigns are magic. the groups i tend to play with either make them full of man maid danger or the players just deal w/ a nice romp in the woods. of course as with everything there are exceptions.” – xtehbeastx. Ah yes, i have seen these dangers before, angry legions of maids attacking out of nowhere, armed with thier +2 brooms of dustbunny smiting.
now what is fun, is a live-action-role-play thats d’n’d based, do it in the middle of town, with over 12 of you, too large a group to lynch you see. then involve likly looking members of the public, anything can be magic, “dont go there fair maiden! its full of orcs inside!” an actuall quote from yours truly to a woman going in to a sports shop.
magic places are full of fun, dont see what the fuss is.
Funny as ever.
Also, it seems many readers of this comic make the mistake of drinking something while reading this comic.
This is why I dislike high magic settings.
I like the lady of the lake screen-cap u used from one of my fave fantasy movies: Excalibur.
Just out of curiosity, why are the speech bubbles in panels 4 and 11 split in two?
for steriotypical settings in our games, we now only have round, well-lit taprooms… our DM got tired of us always residing in ‘the dark corner’ we regularly argued that every taproom has one, adn frequently due to group infighting we occupied as many as 7 dark corners in the taprooms we frequented :)
You’re wonderful! Hahaha! Next time ‘my boys’ come over to game they’re going to find a non-enchanted forest, with a non-haunted ruin in honour of you.
There’s a messed up character encoding in the comments.
phadraigin:
I've should be I’ve
I love how you’re joking about this Tolkien campaign being cliche when Tolkien was probably the trope codifier for most of this stuff. You’ve made that joke several times. Tolkien would make for a pretty cliche campaign in places.