#hinjo oots

[canontypicalgoblins]

miko miyazaki they could never make me hate you

[cosmicsodacan-art]

Opinion on Hinjo from Oots? Is he a good boy?

Hinjo AND his big celestial puppy are both very good boys!!! I really like how Hinjo acts as a foil to Miko during War and XPs, and he’s got lots of great moments as a stand-alone character in Don’t Split the Party!

[oots-out-of-context]

[inbarfink]

[tiffany-smith]

You know, what's cool about Order of the Stick is that it dares to be a story where only half the major characters are in a romantic relationship. (Less, depending on who counts as 'major.' I'm counting just members of the Order here, not Team Evil or the various characters like the paladins, Hilgya, or Minrah they've picked up on the way.)

Haley and Elan are, like, the "token representation" characters. Roy gets tossed a girlfriend bc he's the hero ig? She's rarely around.

V had a spouse who was known about for a while offscreen, got three pages onscreen and promptly served divorce papers.

Durkon? Had an affair one (1) night which resulted in a kid 1000 strips and two irl decades later, the mom wants nothing to do with him. Otherwise probably completely celibate.

Belkar will sleep with anyone and romance nobody.

None of the paladins have relationships. Not even O-Chul and Lien, or Hinjo and Lien.

None of the long-lost parent figures are still in a relationship. Elan's parents are divorced and Tarquin had like nine wives (none onscreen, also he's Evil about it). Haley's mom and Durkon's pa are dead. Who KNOWS abt Belkars parents. Roy's are both dead and took 'till death do us part' with gusto.

None of the airship crew have any romances (except for the one throwaway gay couple who got one panel of screentime).

Team Evil does not do any of that. Not Xykon, not Redcloak, not the monster in the dark, not Jirix. Tsukiko was the only one with any relationship drive, and she got brutally murdered (unrelated reasons).

Straining to remember any other romantic relationships ever.

OH! Sabine and Nale! (But that also specifically parallels Haley and Elan, like they explicitly said 'evil opppsites.')

Therkla fell in love with Elan and it was not reciprocated (?) (he cared abt her but not like that. Not to cheat on Haley.)

The gods have their whole thing I suppose but that hardly counts.

Not even Julia, the high school hottie, is ever mentioned having a significant other.

There is one (1) actually married couple. Two soldiers who were nameless until they took offense to being called nameless soldiers and changed it. They got married and she's pregnant.

Order of the Scribble had one couple.

The cast is SO HUGE and there is SO LITTLE romance. Only half of the six-member main cast is in a relationship. Unheard-of. And of the huge cast of side characters, there are 3 only stable relationships. That's all! THATS ALL!

I love it.

Thats the real aspec rep: not just one character who doesn't care, but a whole world where that's Not The Focus.

Instead, OOTS focuses very strongly on familial relationships. Parent (singular) and child(ren). Siblings (twins). Aunts and uncles, even.

And in the midst of all that... the platonic bonds of deep friendship forged between the main cast.

[greatwyrmgold]

I've read both of these comics, and...maybe it's just that I've been reading and rereading OotS since middle school and I binged The Weekly Roll once, but the decision seems obvious.

If the propaganda I submitted doesn't convince you, consider how O-Chul exists in an ecosystem of paladins. There's Miko, the Lawful Stupid Knight Templar, pardon my conversational troping. There's Hinjo, the prince of a lost city trying to balance duty and honor against pragmatism. There's Lien, the idealistic low-class warrior with a good heart and a mean streak. There are good paladins and bad paladins and ordinary paladins, all fighting alongside each other, until a skeleton throws a super-ball, but explaining that part would be a spoiler.

Anyways, one archetype that's absent from the major Sapphire Guard members is the cynical paladin. The Sapphire Guard members we know the most about all believe in their cause, even the bad one. (No, especially the bad one.) But cynical paladins are the least paladinny paladins. Sir Becket is fun, but he isn't half the paladin that O-Chul is.

Round 1, Side A - Sir Becket (The Weekly Roll) vs. O-Chul (The Order of The Stick)

Propaganda:

Sir Becket (The Weekly Roll)

He's my favorite paladin character ever. He has an identity crisis after murdering a family which prompts him to basically try to redeem himself while also trying to stop his party from being murderhobos. Also, LOOK AT THAT HAT. Top tier paladin helmet in my opinion. It's shaped like a bucket.

O-Chul (The Order of The Stick)

OotS is a D&D webcomic, so of course they have paladins—a whole faction of them called the Sapphire Guard, ranging from Lawful Stupid crusaders to rule-bending youths to one old aristocrat without a PC class level to his name. And then there's O-Chul. If Miko is everything wrong with paladins, O-Chul is everything that be right about them. He's noble and honorable, sticking to his paladin oaths...most of the time. Unlike Miko, he's willing to recognize when bending the oaths is Good and when failing to uphold them is inevitable. He cares about friends and allies, doing what he can to protect them; he shows empathy towards many of his enemies, most notably the Monster in the Darkness. He's a good, heroic dude who encourages others to be better. His heroism isn't just a matter of attitude. A paladin has strong fortitude and will, and O-Chul excels at both, even if his reflexes are rather poor. He endured months of imprisonment, torture, and villains betting on whether he'd survive the torture without losing either his life or his compassion towards (some of) the people betting on him. And judging by his implied level and lack of paladin class features, this paladin's paladin has at least twice as many fighter levels as paladin levels.

[rcbirdy]

“I may not relish throwing bombs as much as my uncle did, but I like to think my aim is pretty good.”

[thelightfluxtastic]

Paladiary Day 22: Order of the Stick

Yes, I'm still going this, dang it.

As mentioned before, by paladin identity was influenced (even awakened, one could say) by playing a paladin in a D&D game. So it's influenced by D&D-specific lore (though not limited to it alone). And before I ever played a game myself, my knowledge of D&D was basically learned through reading the Order of the Stick webcomic.

OOTS is an excellent webcomic. It plays with fantasy tropes and expectations of a standard D&D setting. And like any very good satire, it ends up questioning and deconstructing and reconstructing the very fundamental ideas of the world. I find it legitimately tragic that some of the best writing I've ever read will be dismissed out of hand by someone because it happens to be a stick figure webcomic. It has foreshadowing and call backs spanning hundreds of pages and literal years. It has a deep-hitting deconstruction of assigned villainy and 'always chaotic evil' races. And of course, it has paladins.

There are multiple paladin characters in OOTS. And given the satirical nature of the comic, each of them is tackling a different aspect of what a paladin is and what that means.

There's Miko Miyazaki. She's meant as an example of a certain stereotype of paladin players in D&D. She's lawful to the point of self-brutality. She imposes her will, often violently, on others and refuses to see any flexibility or shades of grey. She's holier-than-thou and refuses to accept that she might make mistakes or ever be in the wrong. One of the best moments with her character is when another Lawful Good character calls her out for using the Law as a weapon to use against others, and not caring about the actual worth and dignity of other sentient beings. Miko is a warning, a what-not-to be.

There's O-Chul. O-Chiul is, perhaps, the idealistic example. He's not the paladin I relate to most, but he's the one I look up to. He is wise and humble. He acts carefully, willing to wait for the right moment, but never being ruled by sheer pragmatism, and always looking for the time to act. In many ways everything Miko isn't, O-chul is the one that teaches a monster to care for it's heart and mind, and attend to it's own moral compass. His prominent character trait is persistence (one saving throw at a time).

There's Hinjo. Hinjo is a character study in balance. He is the heir to the city's ruler (who was, himself, not a paladin). And as the events of the story progress, finds himself regularly questioning his role and oaths as a paladin, and his duties as a civic leader. He often does have to take the pragmatic view of things, choose the big picture of his populace over more personal drives (like vengeance) and more high-minded ideals. He acts in accordance with honor and duty but what is honorable or what his duty is changes with the circumstances. Also he has a cool wolf.

There's Lien. She (alongside Hinjo) is perhaps the paladin in OOTS I find most personally relatable. She's not an extremist like Miko or a wise elder like O-Chul or a monarch like Hinjo. Her family are fishermen. But when her city was in need and lives were in danger, she picked up a spear and stood her ground. She's brave and resourceful and has a sense of humor.

And that's not even getting into the non-paladin characters that end up presenting important questions on the nature of lawfulness and goodness and right. I could probably pull pages and pages of quotes from OOTS that exemplify my thoughts and ideals and philosophies in this sense.

[dafukdidiwatch]

OotS 55 End

Look I worked hard to update this pic that seriously needs a better update. Enjoy.

Well, V didn’t do exactly what they wanted to kill Xykon. And Hell is definitely getting their soul after the whole “Genocide The Dragons.” But they managed to fuck over Xykon with O’Chul, and help save O’Chul. Which is good.

And O’Chul helped Shadow-Kun! And Shadow-Kun helped them out with...super magic powers that I didn’t even know he had. Terrifying, but he’s so good.

I hope to god Xykon’s Soul went to the ocean. Because fuck him.

The gang is back together. Belkar is going to die soon. We now have the Elf Kingdom Allies helping Hinjo out. I love communication between friends and couples. Oh it’s so refreshing. Things are looking better, outside the whole “V will go to Hell” bit.

SO LITERALLY FUCK EVERYTHING I JUST SAID BECAUSE I GUESS i AM GOING TO CONTINUE READING NOW

[loopy777]

Is there any bonus strips from the paperbacks you feel should have been inserted into the webcomic proper? Personally ive always felt the single comic with Miko utterly failing in the simple task of inviting two of her colleagues to dinner, was one of the best single page secondary character moments of the entire story, and i really wish it had been in the regular comic proper.

Yeah, that’s a good one. It creates sympathy for Miko while also showing more of why she’s estranged from the rest of the Sapphire Guard. We do have a quick look at that in Hinjo’s reaction to her in his introductory strip, but he’s not really a typical member of the Guard. It’s definitely a more worthwhile bonus for her than the one with the stained shirt.

I’m also fond of the bonus with Shojo’s funeral and how it sets up Mr Scruffy’s return.

And I also think the introductory sequence at the beginning of the first book -- while obviously not necessary since the webcomic has done fine with no real beginning -- adds a shape to the story by giving it something more than a gag-a-day in media res opener. It’s not a great beginning (’On the Origin of the PCs’ is one, but a whole print-exclusive book can’t be considered a bonus strip), but at least it is a beginning, and considering how OotS has evolved into an epic fantasy story (with lots of comedy), it feels like we need something more than that old cast page.

[swipestream]

Order of the Stick Rocks the Fantasy Genre!

Click to embiggen.

The Order of the Stick is one of those things that should never have worked. A comedic strip, illustrated entirely in stick figures, set in a literal D&D campaign world (complete with earning XP and other RPG tropes), with a dense, multi-layered plot, produced over the span of fifteen years, and still not done?

Absolutely should suck. But it doesn’t.

So… why?

First, the art isn’t crappy. (Not that it ever was.) Sure, stick figures lack the complexity of, say, one of your typical comic books, but so what? The simplicity and clarity of the art is impressive in and of itself, and it effectively conveys, scene, action, and characterization. Not everything has to be a Joe Quesada masterpiece to be great.

This is NOT bad art. (Click to embiggen.)

Also, the strip was funny at the beginning, and has stayed funny for fifteen years. It’s not quite gag-a-strip, but it’s 99.9% of the way there, something incredibly difficult to attain. Humor is hard to do, harder than drama, and most humorous strips, shows, and series are forced to, sooner or later, drop back into drama because the writer ran out of the funny. Well, OOTS has brought the funny for a decade and a half, and hasn’t run out of juice yet.

The first strip. (Click to… what, you need another reminder?)

Last is the genuine emotion in the series. Roy’s struggle to prove himself to a distant and disdainful father, while completing a truly epic quest to destroy the lich Xykon, the valor of Lord Hinjo (paladin of the Sapphire Guard) and the self-righteousness and consequent blindness of his fellow paladin (and stone cold bitch) Miko Miyazaki, or Vaarsuvius’ guilt over having sold his soul for a chance to get revenge on one dragon by killing roughly a fourth of all black dragons in existence (plus related half-dragons, dragon-blooded, dragon born)—with one spell: Familicide. (It’s an Epic. Kills you, and everybody related to you, or related to them, or them, or them, etc.)

Familicide.

The characterization is strong, varied, and consistent. No one acts out of character just to make a joke, and each main character, and many secondary characters, are given notable amounts of character development, and even full character arcs (like the orc ninja. Tragedy in one act.) In a culture that has apparently forgotten what storytelling is, Rich Burlew (creator of the strip) still knows what audiences want, and can deliver it.

Sexy. Shoeless. God. Of. War.

Unfortunately, Rich suffered a severe hand injury back in 2012, which has crippled his ability to deliver strips on his formerly robust schedule. The story is still moving along, however, and Roy, et. al., are nearing the end of their quest. The stakes are literally world-ending—the most recent plotline has three entire pantheons voting on whether to destroy the world or not—and Team Evil is apparently ahead, in the ninth inning, with Team Stick desperately trying to tie up the game to force it into overtime.

Fifteen years. 1116 strips (plus extra material in the printed books, two additional background volumes, appearances in Dragon, etc). And eight printed volumes.

It’s been a great ride so far. Well worth the length of the trip.

Jasyn Jones, better known as Daddy Warpig, is a host on the Geek Gab podcast, a regular on the Superversive SF livestreams, and blogs at Daddy Warpig’s House of Geekery. Check him out on Twitter.

Order of the Stick Rocks the Fantasy Genre! published first on https://medium.com/@ReloadedPCGames

[dafukdidiwatch]

OOTS 56 TO BE CONTINUED

So I’m going to be stopping here for the night. It’s getting late and there is a LOT more stories in here than I thought. Either that or I’m just reading slower than usual.

I love all the stories here. I do love how it is shown backwards in time so we start out with it being in sort of present day to slowly seeing how their lives were before meeting with the Order of the Stick.

The Katos are freaking adorable as a married couple. Scruffy is always cute. Lien being this bad-girl just yearning for fish is really sweet. And Therkla’s adventure in ninjaing was cool and also sad given how we know what happens to her. Just all of this is good.

Next story I’m sure is going to be bout O-Chul, then Hinjo and maybe Shojo. Wouldn’t mind seeing what he was like as a spry young Shogun.

[dafukdidiwatch]

OotS 43 End

And the aftermath has fallen, and so has the city.

Oh Miko....she was a good character. Not a good person, but her tried to be, but her fanaticism and rigid ways had doomed her. I didn’t really expect her to end like this, and I’m a little sad she did. I might not have liked her, but there was some....pity there.

No idea why Redcloak sticks with Xykon with him being treated like crap. But I guess they are too tied together.

I hope Diego and Kazumi have a happy life together as knight npcs.

Hinjo is learning how to be a leader, and that requires bending the paladin rules. Hopefully he won’t die yet.

And Haley and Belkar are now fighting the unknown shadow monster to get Roy’s body back. By Cooking. I’ve heard of dumber ways to get what you want so good luck!

Name Theory #SOONIWillKnow: It was just a dick joke this entire time. All Along. Penis.