Guilded Age

The Saga of the Working Class Adventurer – New comics every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday!
  • About
  • Cast
  • Crew
  • Downloads
  • Guilded Age Plus
  • Store
  • Contact
  • RSS

Annotations Every Day - Written by T Campbell & Flo Kahn - Illustrated by John & Jason Waltrip

Cimmerians, noted for their love of erotic roleplay.

Axemas Special 2014 – Page 2

on December 17, 2014
Chapter: Extra Bits
└ Tags: Chrissie, Daniel, Kaye
Comments RSS

Discussion (145) ¬

  1. DDDragoni
    DDDragoni
    December 17, 2014, 12:04 am | # | Reply

    Ooh! E-Merl’s player has the same name as me!

  2. Mordecai
    Mordecai
    December 17, 2014, 12:07 am | # | Reply

    Hunh. Wasn’t expecting to get so many answers so fast. This really IS a Christmas present for us longtime readers.

    • biggmac
      biggmac
      December 17, 2014, 12:23 am | # | Reply

      You’re tellin’ me! So far this is my fave Sepia World ep ever.

      • zero
        zero
        December 17, 2014, 10:26 am | # | Reply

        totally. I’m vested in how this plays out.

        I’m going to guess these players will meet for Christmas, if only online

    • Jim
      Jim
      December 17, 2014, 7:54 am | # | Reply

      True dat. I’ve been reading since day one, and as much as I didn’t like the “meta” twist at first, it has really grown on me, and this is helping a lot.

    • Inlaa
      Inlaa
      December 17, 2014, 10:52 am | # | Reply

      This really does answer a LOT of my questions. I like this page a lot. …I also like the relationship these people have with each other.

  3. Ishmael
    Ishmael
    December 17, 2014, 12:09 am | # | Reply

    Wouldn’t the redheads be from Vanaheim, not Cimmeria?

    Unless Scippy dyes his hair.

    Sorta makes you wonder, though, what the Tubers did to get the Big Four rep. Unless, as a result of being Tubed, they’re that much higher level than anyone else around them. Someone, I think our hawk-nosed reporter, DID mention that they were the first on the scene for pretty much every major expansion…

    • Kamino Neko
      Kamino Neko
      December 17, 2014, 12:31 am | # | Reply

      They’re the core of their RP group (and, presumably, the leaders of the RP guild (ie: the Adventurer’s Guild)), and at the centre of the RP side of every major plot in the game. That’d make them the Big Four to the other RPers on the server (a small group, apparently).

      • Kamino Neko
        Kamino Neko
        December 17, 2014, 12:34 am | # | Reply

        Scratch that ‘presumably’…I missed Kaye referring to them as the guild officers when I read that panel first.

        • Phil
          Flo
          December 18, 2014, 12:07 am | # | Reply

          Often the same thing.

      • Jack Vermicelli
        Jack Vermicelli
        December 17, 2014, 3:18 am | # | Reply

        Isn’t Bandit still commander of something or other?

  4. Loyal
    Loyal
    December 17, 2014, 12:19 am | # | Reply

    E-merl Danielssen. Okay then.

    Also, Panel 5 has the best smugface in the history of smugfaces.

  5. Dave
    Dave
    December 17, 2014, 12:22 am | # | Reply

    Fry’nj is an NPC? She’s an AI? That knowledge makes me kind of sad. :(

    • Ishmael
      Ishmael
      December 17, 2014, 12:25 am | # | Reply

      She could be a normal person of the dimension of Arkerra who only resembles an AI to the muggles of the world.

    • Kamino Neko
      Kamino Neko
      December 17, 2014, 12:27 am | # | Reply

      She’s an NPC in the game.

      In Living Arkherra, she’s as real as anyone else.

    • Mordecai
      Mordecai
      December 17, 2014, 12:33 am | # | Reply

      This is no ordinary game. She may not be a player, but she’s still real.

      • Minando
        Minando
        December 17, 2014, 9:17 am | # | Reply

        You forget the black magic/ Voodoo-aspect of the game.
        It IS alive.
        And so are the the NPCs.

        • Minando
          Minando
          December 17, 2014, 9:18 am | # | Reply

          Whoops, sorry. I was adressing Dave.

    • Dave
      Dave
      December 17, 2014, 1:59 am | # | Reply

      I guess I’m a little unsure how real, in-universe, Arkerra even IS. Certainly The Four experience it as a real world, but from the information Bandit Rachel Scipio and E-Merl’s players are implying here it is not perceived at that level of reality by the MMO players who play the game normally.

      From their dialogue here, Chrissie Lia Daniel and Kaye don’t have a fully-immersed concept of the world as a living actual entity. They talk about the Four as talking “in-character” and speak of the battles and stories they’ve undergone as roleplay.

      It’s fiction to them, not reality. Using Fry’Nj as an example, at what point is she an evolving growing person, and at what point is she just an NPC that Kaye is apparently embarrassed to be romancing?

      • Insanenoodlyguy
        Insanenoodlyguy
        December 17, 2014, 2:25 am | # | Reply

        I’m guessing it’s heads and tails better then most rp games, but not in the “wait a minute, is this thing thinking” range so much as “Wow these NPC’s have really great broad programming”

      • Chantelune
        Chantelune
        December 17, 2014, 5:46 am | # | Reply

        I remember HR mentioning in a earlier strip how the five (now four, it seems) seemed to somehow entice any player interacting with them and cause them to get deep in “rp”.

      • Mr. Mister
        Mr. Mister
        December 17, 2014, 7:29 am | # | Reply

        Always keep in mind that the game’s code includes magic.

      • Jason
        Jason
        December 17, 2014, 2:45 pm | # | Reply

        Yes, certainly Bandit and the other ordinary players believe that Arkerra is just a game. But they are not aware of the existence of magic in SepiaWorld. Even Carol (HR’s secretary) believed at first that it was just a game that they created using magic. It’s HR’s assertion that Arkerra is a real place that they just tapped into somehow.

      • LockeZ
        LockeZ
        December 17, 2014, 7:24 pm | # | Reply

        There’s never been a question of whether Arkherra is real. The only question is whether the other world is real.

  6. biggmac
    biggmac
    December 17, 2014, 12:25 am | # | Reply

    Bandit’s player is thinking: Sure would like to have one of those apples on display. Maybe I could swipe one…

    • DeePseudonym
      DeePseudonym
      December 17, 2014, 10:17 am | # | Reply

      I thought Xan played Bandit…aaaiiieee! Okay, who does Xan play?

      • Ganurath
        Ganurath
        December 17, 2014, 10:58 am | # | Reply

        It hasn’t been stated, but my money’s on Sundar for sheer irony.

        • wwlaos
          wwlaos
          December 17, 2014, 2:14 pm | # | Reply

          I was thinking he was probably Penk’s player, actually, given his general attitude when talking about The Four and the game in general. Reminded me a lot of Penk’s insufferable preaching.

  7. Kamino Neko
    Kamino Neko
    December 17, 2014, 12:33 am | # | Reply

    I am liking Kaye already.

  8. Lingo
    Lingo
    December 17, 2014, 12:40 am | # | Reply

    More and more information!

    So are they saying that there’s so few players at all on their server, or just so few willing to do serious role-play?

    No forumites with similar complaints. Meaning Rachel was the only player deleted, the others were NPCs?

    • Wylf
      Wylf
      December 17, 2014, 12:50 am | # | Reply

      They are roleplayers, those are always a minority. So yeah, they are most likely refering to roleplayers. Hell, even in MMOs with designated RP servers roleplayers are usually in the minority on those very servers, because the “lol the atmosphere is so great here ^^” ‘argument’ is strong with people who have no interest in RP whatsoever ;)

      • Wylf
        Wylf
        December 17, 2014, 12:51 am | # | Reply

        There may be a bit of frustration speaking out of my reply here *coughs*

        • Nightsbridge
          Nightsbridge
          December 17, 2014, 6:12 am | # | Reply

          I feel you Wylf. I feel you.

      • Ibrinar
        Ibrinar
        December 17, 2014, 8:30 am | # | Reply

        It helps if you can just make private servers. I played Ultima Online for a while on a private server and RP works much better when the access is restricted and you can be removed if you don’t play RP. Sadly the game is damn old.

    • Insanenoodlyguy
      Insanenoodlyguy
      December 17, 2014, 1:28 am | # | Reply

      Considering this is supposed to be one of the biggest games for a very large company, I’m betting it’s more the good rper’s are hard to find.

    • CorrTerek
      CorrTerek
      December 17, 2014, 12:13 pm | # | Reply

      Judging from the “pvp wasteland” comment, I’m guessing that the majority of their server is really into the whole Rebellion vs Gastonia thing.

      • Korbl
        Korbl
        December 17, 2014, 6:26 pm | # | Reply

        It could also be that, like (my experiences with) WoW, most of the rp’ers are on the Horde Rebellion side because the Alliance Gastonians tend to be dicks.

        Gastonia is certainly Alliance-esque in it’s “Humans r teh best” and “we need wood, go clear cut a forest and kill anyone who gets in the way” attitudes.

  9. Braineater
    Braineater
    December 17, 2014, 1:00 am | # | Reply

    The one that gets me is Bandit.

    Something just has always been wrong about how she came back from the dead in the game. Yet she also appears to have a real person playing her.

    I always figured there was something going on with her that would eventually be revealed. But maybe not. Still that story she gave was fishy, and I’m not even sure she believed it.

    • Kamino Neko
      Kamino Neko
      December 17, 2014, 1:20 am | # | Reply

      Dude, she respawned. Player characters tend to do that, when they’re not in magical tubes.

      • Insanenoodlyguy
        Insanenoodlyguy
        December 17, 2014, 1:30 am | # | Reply

        It seems like there has to be a tiny bit more to it then that though. Otherwise you’d think Gravedust would have mystics screaming in his ear 24/7 DEATH HAS BEEN COMPROMISED, THE ORDER IS RUINED. From all the resurrections.

        • Mordecai
          Mordecai
          December 17, 2014, 1:41 am | # | Reply

          Might be that Bandit/Chrissie’s explanation was Chrissy going “oh, uh, shit, right roleplaying…how do I explain surviving getting trifurcated…Jesus, these guys take this way fucking serious…uhhhhh, TROLL BLOOD.”

          • The_Rippy_One
            The_Rippy_One
            December 17, 2014, 8:35 am | # | Reply

            I could so see that. If that is what happened, I like Chrissie more now.

          • Inlaa
            Inlaa
            December 17, 2014, 11:01 am | # | Reply

            Yeah, I’ve seen people pull those sort of things before in roleplaying scenes. The trouble, of course, usually stems from either A) people taking questing and such as IC when that’s silly, thus meaning dying during questing is IC B) people trying to kill off other players in RP because they’re silly or C) people deciding to kill their characters off before realizing “Wait, that was my favorite character. CRAP.”

            Honestly, the best way to avoid having this sort of thing happen is to avoid killing characters off in role-play unless it really, really makes sense and is agreed upon by the victim party. There’s so many other ways to handle those sort of RP situations that don’t involve pointing a finger at someone and saying “No, your character is DEAD!”

            As an aside: I really like all three of the players on this page, and I can relate to the problem of finding roleplayers.

          • Andreas Geisler
            Andreas Geisler
            December 17, 2014, 3:20 pm | # | Reply

            #relatable

        • Dave
          Dave
          December 17, 2014, 2:01 am | # | Reply

          What if the spirits Garvedust speaks to are players who have simply not respawned at their corpses?

          • Nathanyel
            Nathanyel
            December 17, 2014, 3:48 am | # | Reply

            “What, I die if I run into 20 murlocs? Meh, shitty game” *unsub*

        • Kamino Neko
          Kamino Neko
          December 17, 2014, 4:06 am | # | Reply

          The game and Living Arkherra interact regularly. Respawning is routine. The spirits would have been screaming at him about ‘death being compromised’ the moment he was first rolled if they were going to.

          • Insanenoodlyguy
            Insanenoodlyguy
            December 17, 2014, 10:49 am | # | Reply

            Then why did Gravedust make it sound like what he did was a big deal? If respawns were common, there’d be no reason for him to be like that. And def no reason for him to refuse to do it again for Syr’nj’s dad, since you’d figure resurrections happen all the time…

            • nightsbridge
              nightsbridge
              December 17, 2014, 10:56 am | # | Reply

              The world can find a way. They didn’t ‘die’ they were ‘knocked out.’ They just barely escaped and were healed back to full. Even Bandit’s makes some modicum of sense. Harky is practically immortal after all.

              • Inlaa
                Inlaa
                December 17, 2014, 11:04 am | # | Reply

                Essentially this. If you want to compare this to WoW, for instance, you’ll notice that resurrection pretty much NEVER happens lorewise. Players, however, can raise the dead at whim or come back to life via graveyards. Roleplayers in WoW typically say “Okay, if lore characters are DEAD when they die, we can’t come back either,” and they roleplay accordingly. Deaths are often roleplayed instead as being knocked out, injured, retreating from the battlefield, or otherwise just a solution that involves not being dead.

                Unless you want to become a death knight. Then you, y’know, die.

                • Korbl
                  Korbl
                  December 17, 2014, 6:30 pm | # | Reply

                  Wait, you mean no one has come up with the “adventurers are just special that way” answer?

              • Arbolamante
                Arbolamante
                December 18, 2014, 12:44 am | # | Reply

                In LOTRO lore, one does not die – one’s morale fails, and you flee the battle. And yet there were still some RP hardcores who did the “death is final” thing, at least when the game started out.

            • Kamino Neko
              Kamino Neko
              December 17, 2014, 1:16 pm | # | Reply

              The same reason Cloud didn’t just sprinkle a Phoenix Down on Aeris – gameplay and story segregation.

              The Tube Team’s story involved them dying for real. Bandit died a gameplay death in the crossfire.

              The Tube Team therefor had an elaborate story surrounding their resurrection, whereas Bandit simply respawned.

              • Cytolus
                Cytolus
                December 17, 2014, 10:59 pm | # | Reply

                To be fair, in FF games Phoenix Down only cures the “unable to fight” status, which was translated as “dead” because character limits. So Cloud wasn’t a *complete* idiot.

                • Kamino Neko
                  Kamino Neko
                  December 18, 2014, 1:25 am | # | Reply

                  ‘KO’ is shorter than dead. ‘Dead’ was a deliberate choice.

                  And, yes, gameplay deaths are different than story deaths, that’s exactly what I’m saying. Story deaths stick. Gameplay deaths (in MMOs, JRPGs, and some western RPGs) can be reversed, or automatically reverse immediately (unless it’s a total party wipe in a non-MMO).

            • JDemms
              JDemms
              December 17, 2014, 4:56 pm | # | Reply

              Perhaps same reason why NPCs so rarely come back in D&D – noone they know has the ability and/or cares enough to do so, -or- they choose not to, since Arkherra Heaven (or what have you) seems like it could be pretty bitching.

  10. Kennerly
    Kennerly
    December 17, 2014, 1:16 am | # | Reply

    You misspelled “that ass”.

    • Phil
      Flo
      December 18, 2014, 12:14 am | # | Reply

      I see you.

  11. Brenden T.
    Brenden T.
    December 17, 2014, 1:32 am | # | Reply

    1. “Big Four?” I thought there were FIVE folks in tubes in the Hurricane basement. What happened to the poop elf?

    2. Do we know who above is who in-game? I’m a little confused.

    • The_Rippy_One
      The_Rippy_One
      December 17, 2014, 8:40 am | # | Reply

      1) Best died, and it seems to have stuck. Ish. I think the word coma has been used by someone. He flat out isn’t in the game anymore, as best as we can tell.

      2) We are pretty sure that, in order, we are looking at Bandit, Scipio, and E-merl, with Rachel being seen last page.

      • Jim
        Jim
        December 17, 2014, 9:36 am | # | Reply

        I think it’s still possible Best is their visitor from Cyberia.

        • Nathanyel
          Nathanyel
          December 17, 2014, 11:05 am | # | Reply

          Nah, he didn’t try anything with any of the females yet. Or do you think physical incompatibilities would stop Best?

          • Andreas Geisler
            Andreas Geisler
            December 17, 2014, 3:22 pm | # | Reply

            Might have gotten a bit of a personality reset, considering that he blew up his own destiny.

      • Abnaxis
        Abnaxis
        December 17, 2014, 9:42 am | # | Reply

        RE #1: There’s probably a whole lotta discussion I’ve missed out on, but that’s not been my impression my whole time.

        My impression is that the game very much resembles WOW, in that players can join either the Rebellion or the Gastonians (hence “pvp wasteland” in the comic). When Best died, I always thought he came back as Penk. They’re both glorified bards, and IIRC Best’s death coincided with Penk’s first appearance.

        I’m sure this has been debated ad nauseum by people who pay more attention to me though, so I would be glad to be shown the error of my ways

        • Ged
          Ged
          December 17, 2014, 7:35 pm | # | Reply

          I’m completely in the same boat as you. That’s what I believed the moment all that happened and still fully do, unless Word of God has said otherwise (which I could easily have missed). I always thought it pretty obvious Penk was the resurrected Best, which is why HR couldn’t get him out of the tube, and how he realized even such abnormal deaths wouldn’t actually free them.

          But, I agree with your sentiments that others who pay more attention may have debated this to a different conclusion and I’ve just not seen the memo yet.

        • nemui
          nemui
          December 17, 2014, 7:47 pm | # | Reply

          You’re right, it has been debated ad nauseum, but I really don’t know why. “OMG, two characters playing different instruments, with literally nothing in common? They must be the same person!”

          • Abnaxis
            Abnaxis
            December 17, 2014, 8:10 pm | # | Reply

            I was wondering if someone had some explicit citation, for saying that Payet’s player is in a coma and out of the game. I wasn’t really looking for a fight over hypotheticals.

            I will say that I see a lot more in common between Penk and Best than you suggest, however…Dammit, now I’m going to have to archive binge because I only half remember stuff from that long ago…

            • nemui
              nemui
              December 18, 2014, 6:56 am | # | Reply

              I tried seeing Penk as Best 2.0 after first hearing of this idea, and I just couldn’t. He’s too contemplative, too subservient to authority, too clumsy with female trolls… I know that alts aren’t always exactly the same, or even similar, but there has to be *something* in the comic to indicate a connection. Playing an (entirely different) instrument is *nothing*.

              • Abnaxis
                Abnaxis
                December 18, 2014, 12:33 pm | # | Reply

                Payet was all of those things too, though, before the wacky old lady decided he was the hero of “destiny.”

                The parallels between the two of them have always been evident to me just based on my gut, so it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what gave me the idea, but it goes way beyond “they both play an instruments”. The best justification I can come up with is that they both have the same arcs: Payet was a nobody poop elf who would much rather be playing his music but music “doesn’t pay the bills” so he looks for crappy poop-elf work to make ends meet. Penk would much rather be banging his drum, but the Rebellion needs soldiers so he drops the drums and becomes a solder. Both of them gain notoriety through luck–Payet because he’s the “destined hero,” Penk because he’s the chosen of Tectonicus. Both were attention-seekers from the start for the sake of music, and both have their desire for attention channeled into attention seeking for the sake of glory.

                While the two treat the gifts they are given radically different–Penk being more subservient while Payet went full-on douche–I think that’s more their reaction to how their notoriety was “earned,” rather than a feature of the characters themselves. Payet’s power was just handed too him. He could be a complete bastard all he wanted and he would still be the “destined” hero. Penk, OTOH, gets his power by divine will, with the full expectation that he use that power responsibly. Penk’s notoriety stems from subservience, so he is subservient and contemplative; whereas Payet’s notoriety stems from entitlement, so he is brash and self-important.

                Finally, I think there’s an argument to be made that the differences between the two might just signify character growth for the tuber. Again, going off of memeory, but IIRC Best’s juvenile behavior is pretty much what killed him. Maybe he learned his lesson?

                That, and they both have instruments that they dedicate themselves to and they both have that scrawny, spiky-hair look going on.

                *I don’t think Payet’s sexual conquests came from him being smooth with women, but more because he could be a metaphorical troll and still get laid, so I don’t see a difference between the characters there

                • nemui
                  nemui
                  December 19, 2014, 5:15 am | # | Reply

                  OK, so answer me this: If it had turned that Penk wasn’t a bard, had no drum to bang, was just this regular young troll… Would you still have thought “Hey, this guys is just like Best, kinda, a little, maybe, if I squint”?

                  Re. those similarities, there is a kernel of truth in there, but most of it is wishful thinking. I mean, every other heroic background is similar to theirs: “I was born a nobody but then fate intervened, and look at me now, bitches!” The specifics with these two don’t match at all, Best being mistakenly picked by a senile old woman who didn’t know better, Penk being picked directly and correctly by the previous Chosen One who didn’t want to shoulder the extra PR burden; still, the former believes in himself fiercely even though it was all an accident, while the latter harbors monologue-worthy doubts even though his god literally made him into what he is.

                  As I said before, you can claim character growth to account for the differences, but not if the characters are 95% different and only 5% similar (bards, spiky hair, kinda chosen by faith, four-letter names). It’s just not convincing enough IMHO.

                  Also, wouldn’t Best 2.0 have the same game-changing influence as the original Five had (and the Four have now)? Wouldn’t it have been super obvious for HR to detect?

                  • Abnaxis
                    Abnaxis
                    December 19, 2014, 12:20 pm | # | Reply

                    OK, so answer me this: If it had turned that Penk wasn’t a bard, had no drum to bang, was just this regular young troll… Would you still have thought “Hey, this guys is just like Best, kinda, a little, maybe, if I squint”?

                    No, because ignoring the drums leaves out 80% of Penk’s character development. An abiding love of music is central to both Best’s and Penk’s characters. Both had no interest in being heroes of Arkerra until they are respectively thrust into their positions.

                    Every other hero is not similar to them in that no other hero starts off disinterested in adventuring. The others might hail from humble backgrounds, but every other hero came to the show because they wanted to make a name for themselves bashing heads in, not because they were ‘chosen’ despite their wishes.

                    Incidentally, Best’s player also had no interest in talking about Arkerra when we see his interview, instead spending the whole time ineffectively plugging his music.

                    I don’t think the differences are 95% growth. I think it’s partly growth, and partly the same person reacting to different situations. Best was corrupt, because he answered to no one. Penk has to answer to Tectonicus. At the same time, Penk has much more prestige than Best–he commands armies where Best only commanded orgies–even if he has to answer to a higher authority. In context, I can see someone reacting differently to those two things, even if they hadn’t just died from a fatal bout of narcissism.

                    I’m not sure why you say Penk has no game-changing influence, nor why you say he isn’t on H.R.’s radar.

                    • nemui
                      nemui
                      December 19, 2014, 4:30 pm | #

                      Re. just the last paragraph, I meant the in-game effect that HR was describing at some point (ages ago). How the Five make all other characters, PC and NPC, somehow more active and free-willed, and thus able to interfere with his prescripted plans in unpredictable ways. Example: It was not supposed to be possible for Bandit to catch Auraugu stealing the Bough from the wood elves, and start a chain of events that completely altered the final outcome.

                      Best had that, and if Penk = Best, the same effect should be visible around Penk. HR would have caught on to that, and wouldn’t be in the dark on what happened to Best after his character’s death.

                    • Speedy
                      Speedy
                      January 5, 2019, 10:01 am | #

                      HR did mention that the Rebellion sent a different character than he programmed to steal the bough. That would suggest that the Five’s influence is effecting the Rebellion, as well. Penk being Best would be one way to explain it.

                      An idea on the Best’s player is really dead side… What if HR realized after Best’s player died, that his brain was still fully functional, and he now has a free, state of the art neural networking computer to play with? Imagine how real he could make Arkerra, with a human brain providing the artificial intelligence? … with five human brains providing the intelligence. (*maniacal evil-genius laughter*) … with seven… (Heh, heh… hmm…)

    • Kamino Neko
      Kamino Neko
      December 17, 2014, 1:08 pm | # | Reply

      Nobody in this group has met Best, who disappeared from Arkherra before the Guild was established.

  12. Chris
    Chris
    December 17, 2014, 1:36 am | # | Reply

    The connection isn’t fully clear yet; Despite fighting a monster that was apparently totally annihilating of NPCs, no one’s proposing that she actually got permadeath’ed. Which leads us to wonder how much of the world of Arkerra they’re actually experiencing.

    • Erdrik
      Erdrik
      December 17, 2014, 2:20 am | # | Reply

      Not immediately assuming perma-death probably has something to due with how the game feedback, and resulting support personnel, responded to her attempts to get back on the character.
      “You character has been deleted” is vague, and the dialog with the CS rep seemed to indicate that they suggested she deleted her own character.
      If it was perma-death, at the very least the CS rep would have clarified that.

    • Chaltab
      Chaltab
      December 17, 2014, 3:28 am | # | Reply

      Well note on the last page Lia said that she ‘went to bed’ and that Rachel was gone when she woke up. In other words, the entire Corrupter Beast fight happened while Rachel’s player wasn’t even logged into the game. So PCs can act of their own accord–they have their own agency, at least as long as they’re in the presence of the Bubble players.

      • nemui
        nemui
        December 17, 2014, 7:56 pm | # | Reply

        Which is what I hate hate hate so badly. It sounds like a horrible story choice to have the players unaware of major parts of their characters’ lives, and still somehow keeping abreast of developments. When they log back in, and Frigg and Gravy start talking about the Corrupter Beast fight and Rachel’s death, what will the oblivious players think? “Uh, these guys must be RPing again, let’s just play along and pretend we know what they’re talking about”?!

        How did no one in Arkerra notice these characters’ schizoid tendencies?

        • Benedikt
          Benedikt
          December 18, 2014, 11:00 am | # | Reply

          I feel similarly. But is it really that (toy story) way? Can we be sure?

          • nemui
            nemui
            December 19, 2014, 5:24 am | # | Reply

            Not yet, but its getting there with every sepia comic that goes by and no one mentioning the circumstances of Rachel’s death, nor discussing how Scipio is doing against the cultist blackness, etc. This one peek behind the curtain is interesting but… discouraging.

            • Speedy
              Speedy
              January 5, 2019, 11:04 am | # | Reply

              Remember, as role players, these four probably have rules against chatting about things that some of their characters don’t know about, yet. (Spoilers, ya’ know?)

              Since character deletion and account lockout are real world problems, Lia was able to tell them that much. But, she can’t spill the beans about Rachel’s death, without giving them info they’re not supposed to have, yet.

              I mean, could you imagine Gravedust somberly approaching E-Merl, saying, “E-Merl… I have some terrible news. Maybe you should sit down, for this..” E-Merl replies, “It’s okay, Gravy. I know Rachel is dead. We’re working on it.”
              “You… you know? Working on it?! But… but, she’s not just dead, she was erased from existence!”
              “Yeah, I know. But, she’s hoping there’s a backup copy of her that can be restored.”
              “Syr’Nj, Fr’Nj… the poor boy has lost it. Do you have a sleeping serum, that will give his troubled mind a respite?”

              Ha, ha. I got a little carried away, there. And, yes, Daniel would fake E-Merl not knowing. But the point is, these social media friends probably are careful not to spoil the story for each other, by chatting about stuff that some of their characters don’t know about, yet.

              Can you imagine not being able to tell your besties that your character died, and that might be why your character was deleted? I mean, she might break their rule, if she thought their characters were in danger of permadeath, too. But, so far, it seems this is an isolated incident.

            • Speedy
              Speedy
              January 5, 2019, 11:20 am | # | Reply

              I got the feeling that when Rachel said, “I’ll be fine.” it was Lia talking. She was making a noble gesture, but it didn’t seem like a “real” person facing a real death.

              In fact, if it was Lia, she probably thought she was saving Frigg from being deleted by her user, because the Five seem like hardcore RPers, who delete their characters if they die. Best supposedly being an example of such.

        • Bumpkin
          Bumpkin
          December 18, 2014, 5:18 pm | # | Reply

          Keep in mind there’s a lot of magic involved here, and it’s entirely possible (and, in my opinion, probable) that players see a version of Arkerra that is similar to the color-world events, but with enough differences to keep them unsuspicious.

          After all, Bandit’s player commented on the Big Four’s tendency to “never talk OOC”, implying that every now and then they (the players) do. Yet Bandit, Rachel, Scip and the lot never speak out of character in the color world – implying that there is a slight “translation” between realities. If that’s the case, there’s no reason for the players to be suspicious of the real nature of their characters.

          • Bumpkin
            Bumpkin
            December 18, 2014, 5:18 pm | # | Reply

            Whoa, italics malfunction, anyone?

          • nemui
            nemui
            December 19, 2014, 5:21 am | # | Reply

            The fact that they don’t break character can be attributed to the Four’s influence that HR mentioned – they somehow solidify the game world around them, making the experience ”
            “more real” for those who hang around.

            There’s bound to be some “translation” between realities, I mean, these people aren’t held in suspended animation, they do know on some level that they’re playing a game… I just don’t want there to be a clear cut, making the players unaware of huge chunks of their characters’ actions. (Going on a boss raid like this should be a huge deal for everyone involved, not something that just flies under the radar when you go to sleep, and never gets mentioned again when you log back in.)

  13. FoolishOwl
    FoolishOwl
    December 17, 2014, 1:47 am | # | Reply

    What’s a “cohort NPC”?

    • Konig
      Konig
      December 17, 2014, 1:55 am | # | Reply

      An NPC that follows a PC, I would believe.

    • NonComprende
      NonComprende
      December 17, 2014, 2:20 am | # | Reply

      A cohort is a member of a group, normally implied as a follower

      An NPC is a Non-Player-Character, a character inside the game, but one controlled by the game, not by a player. The term ‘bot’ is used to describe her because if she’s not controlled by a player, she’s controlled by a computer in much the same way a robot would

    • The Indomitable Eric
      The Indomitable Eric
      December 17, 2014, 5:12 am | # | Reply

      An NPC tied to a player. Example: The Champion class in Lord of the Rings online has a ‘pet’ that’s actually a human character who fights alongside him.

      • Ohmrond
        Ohmrond
        December 17, 2014, 9:22 am | # | Reply

        That’s captain you’re thinking of.

        • The Indomitable Eric
          The Indomitable Eric
          December 17, 2014, 11:39 pm | # | Reply

          Yeah, you’re right. Champion is the tank, isn’t it? I don’t remember.

  14. Nathanyel
    Nathanyel
    December 17, 2014, 3:05 am | # | Reply

    Props to Kaye for being able to RP a well-spoken warrior, despite her inclination for internet speek.

    • Jack Vermicelli
      Jack Vermicelli
      December 17, 2014, 3:19 am | # | Reply

      More like “hardly-spoken.”

      • spanbot
        spanbot
        December 17, 2014, 1:42 pm | # | Reply

        The reason why Scipio hardly ever speaks is because the game automatically filters every sentence with chatspeak as being not RPish enough.

    • Wylf
      Wylf
      December 17, 2014, 3:20 am | # | Reply

      The internet speak on display there kinda scares me. “4 lyffe”? Do people really type like that? D:

      • chase
        chase
        December 17, 2014, 7:16 am | # | Reply

        I think it’s meant to be a joke in itself, ripping on people who DO really type like that.

        • The_Rippy_One
          The_Rippy_One
          December 17, 2014, 8:42 am | # | Reply

          Ah, hipster irony…

        • Tim
          Tim
          December 17, 2014, 9:38 am | # | Reply

          Yeah, I think that’s joke from Daniel (E-Merl) towards Kaye (Scipio).

      • DeePseudonym
        DeePseudonym
        December 17, 2014, 10:19 am | # | Reply

        but yes, some people really do type like that.
        /sigh
        /cannot un-see

    • SotiCoto
      SotiCoto
      January 27, 2015, 5:58 am | # | Reply

      I don’t believe that is her doing.
      Looks to me like Kaye is a blithering idiot who can’t type properly and deserves only scorn… and the only reason Scipio comes across as less idiotic is because he isn’t an idiotic character and the magic filters her crappy typing into decent speech.

      I really can’t abide people who type in such utter shorthand like that (at which point someone is most likely going to troll me about it).

      • Benedikt
        Benedikt
        January 27, 2015, 7:56 am | # | Reply

        U wot m8?

        In all honesty: “deserves only scorn”? Why such intolerance I axe?

        • SotiCoto
          SotiCoto
          April 6, 2016, 10:00 am | # | Reply

          Yes. Deserves only scorn.

          Malice is forgivable, but incompetence is not. Whatever you choose to do in life, do it properly or don’t fuckin bother.

          Communication only functions when language standards are adhered to within a certain degree of accuracy. She is falling short of those standards and shows no indication of effort to improve her condition… and naturally this causes others to suffer the fallout of her own refusal to self-improve. She is sacrificing the clarity of her own communication for the sake of her sloth.

          • Benedikt
            Benedikt
            April 6, 2016, 12:13 pm | # | Reply

            Putting your personal philosophy (“do it properly or don’t fuckin bother”) aside for moment (as it would be another topic):

            Obviously Kaye is understood perfectly well by the ones she is shown communicating with. Therefore your point about her falling short of certain standards (Which would be? Imposed by whom?) falls flat. She is just palstavering with her friends. Y U so prescriptivist?

            • SotiCoto
              SotiCoto
              May 16, 2017, 7:41 am | # | Reply

              Possibly because this is all fiction coming from a unified source. Although Kaye is deliberately being made to type like an obnoxious bint, the mind that determines her meaning is the same as the mind meant to receive it… so there should be no flaw in the communication whatsoever.

              If they were real people, without a single unified source puppetting them, I’d suggest that if others could understand her and did NOT call her out for it… they’re basically milquetoast doormats afraid to criticise for the sake of the group benefit.

              • Benedikt
                Benedikt
                May 16, 2017, 1:17 pm | # | Reply

                You’re presupposing that these others share your prescriptivist notions of language – exactly the certain standards I axed U about be4. So again I ask: Y U so prescriptivist?

  15. kludge000
    kludge000
    December 17, 2014, 3:38 am | # | Reply

    well i just fished reading the everything up to today, and I must say it is every bit as good as any manga that i have ever read.
    Peace in Christ
    kludge000

    • Nathanyel
      Nathanyel
      December 17, 2014, 9:07 am | # | Reply

      I don’t even

    • Benedikt
      Benedikt
      December 18, 2014, 11:01 am | # | Reply

      I accidentally a whole webcomic

    • SotiCoto
      SotiCoto
      January 27, 2015, 5:59 am | # | Reply

      Would you care to share some of those fish?
      Just pilot your Mecha-Jesus (or whatever sort of Jesus you claim to be having peace “in”) over here and get him to spread it around a bit.

  16. Bruceski
    Bruceski
    December 17, 2014, 3:46 am | # | Reply

    “I think we just need to be there for her. In person.”

    Elfstar averted!

  17. Cassandra / Loki
    Cassandra / Loki
    December 17, 2014, 4:45 am | # | Reply

    Unicef is anti-LGBT, grrrrr [/tangent]

    • Ishmael
      Ishmael
      December 17, 2014, 10:59 am | # | Reply

      You’re thinking Salvation Army.

      UNICEF, from what I’ve heard, tries to support and aid LGBT folks.

      • Andreas Geisler
        Andreas Geisler
        December 17, 2014, 3:25 pm | # | Reply

        I think that’s exactly why the Santa is Unicef. At least where I’ve seen them, the pot-stirrers are traditionally Salvation Army gigs, here replaced with a more acceptable one.

      • Cassandra / Loki
        Cassandra / Loki
        December 17, 2014, 8:59 pm | # | Reply

        Yes you’re right, my bad. I meant Salvation Army is the anti-LGBT one. If that’s why the creators replaced em here, that’s awesome.

  18. thumb
    thumb
    December 17, 2014, 5:31 am | # | Reply

    I wonder how “The Big Four” react when players do break character, as I don’t think we’ve seen that yet. I also wonder, in this context now, what did happen to Payet Best?

    And in this context, since Bandit doesn’t seem to be included in “The Big Four” despite being field commander and all, it would imply she knows every bit and is consciously manipulating the interactions between real world players and our main characters.

    • James Rye
      James Rye
      December 17, 2014, 6:27 am | # | Reply

      I think, they can’t even hear that? Like their view on reality is so warped due BEING in the game that “reality” as in comments like “lolz” and “damn, thse guys take rp srsly” just gets deleted in their minds before they can even registre them.
      My theory at least to explain how there was no player breaking character yet in the comic. Because even for rp servers that would be too unreal. A rp server where ALL the players stay ALL the time in character would BREAK the universe. xD

      • Riotllama
        Riotllama
        December 18, 2014, 11:26 am | # | Reply

        Well, remember way back in the beginning, Frigg was trying to fight Byron and definitely said something like “Hits or GTFO”
        Little unconventional speech things like that show up in the tubed characters’ speech.

    • Braineater
      Braineater
      December 17, 2014, 8:32 am | # | Reply

      I have a post about her, but Bandit bugs me.

      Bandit is identified as a character with a real world player, as opposed to a tube person.

      But she came back from the dead in an unexplained manner. Plus Chapter Five is titled “The one where the real fifth member shows up.”

      I had always assumed they were talking about Bandit. She has had more on panel time, and has interacted with the “Big Four” more than anyone else.

      So did they change direction or something with the storyline? She just seems like something is going on with her.

      • Ishmael
        Ishmael
        December 17, 2014, 11:01 am | # | Reply

        Bandit was killed normally within the game. That is, she didn’t die from some eldritch abomination. The character was just able to respawn elsewhere.

      • LockeZ
        LockeZ
        December 17, 2014, 7:51 pm | # | Reply

        The creators have said that the originally planned storyline was meant to end quite a while back, yes. Also, IIRC, that the story was originally going to center around five adventurers, doing adventuring. So their plans for many characters have changed.

        This PROBABLY means that the Sepia World, if it was planned at all at the time, was meant to be revealed in the ending.

    • Minando
      Minando
      December 17, 2014, 9:28 am | # | Reply

      It´s possible that the game filters OOC out for them…

    • LockeZ
      LockeZ
      December 17, 2014, 7:57 pm | # | Reply

      We haven’t seen anything from the perspective of the embedded players yet. The fact that they’re chatting with the other players is the first evidence we’ve gotten that they’re even conscious. (I was pretty sure they were comatose; now I’m wondering if maybe they’re not.)

  19. fishamaphone
    fishamaphone
    December 17, 2014, 6:03 am | # | Reply

    I can’t shake the feeling that Chrissie looks a lot like Karen from P&A.

    • nemui
      nemui
      December 17, 2014, 8:00 pm | # | Reply

      Doesn’t Kaye look like a rough-around-the-edges Sara, though?

  20. Coridimus
    Coridimus
    December 17, 2014, 6:10 am | # | Reply

    Fascinating.

  21. chase
    chase
    December 17, 2014, 7:19 am | # | Reply

    Can I just say that I LOVE that this page implies they all regularly visit and know each other outside of the game? And maybe a bit jealous that I don’t have the means to be able to more frequently visit my game-met friends…

    • Bruceski
      Bruceski
      December 17, 2014, 5:35 pm | # | Reply

      Over the years I’ve had two big guilds I got to know as friends. One of them was the standard “friends in college and their associated friends/family with a few outliers” (shout out to Rose Thorns if any of y’all read this) and the other was pretty incredible for me because it was a linkshell of people my friend and I met in FF11 who meshed well. So we had my friend and I in college, a middle-aged stay-at-home mom, a few other college folks from elsewhere, a blue-collar worker (can’t recall what his job was exactly), and a Canasian sushi chef who would up being shipped to France when the restaurant opened branches there so he could teach the French chefs how to make sushi. It was my first experience of meeting people from really different backgrounds online.

  22. Mr. Mister
    Mr. Mister
    December 17, 2014, 7:35 am | # | Reply

    Uhm, since their names weren’t revealed at that point, you should probably add a “players” tag to this and that one page where their faces were shown on-screen, just so readers taht get to this point can easily find that other page to check who was who.

  23. ThePuck1
    ThePuck1
    December 17, 2014, 8:33 am | # | Reply

    Man, this brings back memories of the Emerald Dawn server on WoW.

  24. Connie
    Connie
    December 17, 2014, 9:06 am | # | Reply

    Don’t worry guys! I’ll roll a RP toon on your server! /sniff

    Just as long as there’s no Pornshire. Ugh.

    • Nightsbridge
      Nightsbridge
      December 17, 2014, 4:30 pm | # | Reply

      there is always pornshire.

  25. Aleister Crow
    Aleister Crow
    December 17, 2014, 9:17 am | # | Reply

    Oh no. They’re going to have a little get together, and then the party gets crashed by Carmen Sandiego with her Penk-ish looking sidekick, then crashed again by a big guy with an even bigger mustache…

  26. Chris
    Chris
    December 17, 2014, 11:16 am | # | Reply

    So the bot thought is true.
    That is some disgustingly amazing AI.

    Where do I sign up?

  27. MoodyDK
    MoodyDK
    December 17, 2014, 12:41 pm | # | Reply

    Wow, guild officers that never break character. That’s just crazy talk.

    I’d stay to make fun of it some more, but Lantresor is whining about missing Nagrand again.

  28. zero
    zero
    December 17, 2014, 12:50 pm | # | Reply

    hmm I dunno why I JUST figured this out, but the big four not breaking character means that when Bandit got killed and respawned, she made up that story about healing potions in her backpack that saved her life, which Frynj found suspect.

  29. Aichen
    Aichen
    December 17, 2014, 1:24 pm | # | Reply

    Characters from other comics tend to reoccur in these comics. Chrissie seems to be a character from Quiltbag.
    http://quiltbag.keenspot.com/d/20120219.html

  30. Bloodvork
    Bloodvork
    December 17, 2014, 2:14 pm | # | Reply

    Starting to… dislike Scipio’s player…

    Or at least very happy that he doesn’t talk like she types.

    • Riotllama
      Riotllama
      December 18, 2014, 11:29 am | # | Reply

      Whatevs. I love her. Finally a character I can identify with.

  31. wwlaos
    wwlaos
    December 17, 2014, 2:37 pm | # | Reply

    Whole Foods Market? Is there a 3/4 Foods Market somewhere?

    • Jason
      Jason
      December 17, 2014, 2:59 pm | # | Reply

      Google it.

  32. Devlerbat
    Devlerbat
    December 17, 2014, 4:46 pm | # | Reply

    Y’know I take it that Chrissie didn’t bother asking the “Big Four” what happened because she didn’t think it would be worth the time, but she really should ask either Frigg, Gravedust, or Sundar (assuming he isn’t an NPC) what happened. Once they describe to the others that the beast destroys souls and what not they might put two and two together and come to the conclusion that Rachel’s deletion is a feature and not a bug.

    Though I am not entirely certain how accurate that conclusion would be.

    • Insanenoodlyguy
      Insanenoodlyguy
      January 6, 2015, 2:54 pm | # | Reply

      More likely they’d go “Huh, soul destroying monster? Give the big four credit, they know how to write something unexpected into the story. Hell, at least they gave Rachel an epic sendoff. “

  33. Psolo Ghoti
    Psolo Ghoti
    December 17, 2014, 5:26 pm | # | Reply

    First, I was like WHAAAAAT they already knew each other?

    Then, I realized that online RPG type thingies have chats and voice chats and… video chats. And forums. So of course they know each other.

    *am not an online RPG type thingie playie person*

    Interest level: strong and steady.

  34. Dr. Shiny
    Dr. Shiny
    February 7, 2015, 5:09 pm | # | Reply

    This is just… weird. So very weird. They’re not their characters. Not-reality is crashing down around us.

  35. dragon8writers
    dragon8writers
    August 19, 2015, 10:59 am | # | Reply

    They really aren’t anything like their characters. I wonder how much control they have over the people in that world, even when they’re on – if they actually know Bandit’s true back story, if they’re really typing the words coming out of the character’s mouth… and if so, how does that even work? Is there a two way street with the magic of this world, where they’re connecting to true people born there and they don’t even know it? Information sort of flowing into their brains?

    Or are they just typing things vaguely analogous with what the characters are saying? …For that matter, since most player characters don’t do things like eat and sleep, I wonder how many of the out-of-battle conversations they’re actually there for.q

Comment ¬ Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

NOTE - You can use these HTML tags and attributes:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>



Guilded Age is co-written by T Campbell & Flo Kahn, and illustrated by John Waltrip. Site design by Samantha Kyle. Fonts by Blambot.com.
Stay up to date with Facebook or Google+, or use our RSS Feed!
Privacy Policy
Guilded Age does not claim ownership of any of the corporate branding that appears in this comic, nor does it claim any affiliation, partnership, or endorsement of any kind.
They are used strictly as an artistic choice for the set dressing of the comic.