Chapter 50 – Page 33
That’s it. We’re donezo. We done did completed ourselves an epic. On behalf of myself, T, John, Jason, Erica, our Patreon Patrons, and everyone else who lended a helping hand in the making of this here fantasy rag, we thank you from the bottoms of our hearts for seeing it through. Our blood, sweat, tears and souls are in this crazy huge body of work, and it’s an utterly surreal feeling to consider it “Finished.”
AND WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?!
We’re going to have a few extra odds and ends, some concept stuffs and shorts, a fire sale of our remaining stock, and updates about printed editions of the rest of the volumes, provided the demand exists for such things! One thing we’re excited to do is “Ideas We Were Gonna Do But Decided Were Bad,” because those are the most fun to reflect on, aren’t they?
We also plan on re-running the series whole hog seven days a week sans filler syndication style with maybe some creator commentary and whatnot, so that should generate some extra ad revenue be fun!
So tune in Monday for… something! Bonus features of some sort! And maybe we’ll do one last comment avatar rotation, who knows? Main story is indeed, done, but that doesn’t mean we can’t provide you with a bit more entertainment after the fact. But for now…
Last.
Encore
Arghh?
That’s really the end, isn’t it? It’s been an awesome ride, from start to finish. Thanks for all the late nights checking for new comics, and all the weekends spent theorizing and worrying about the characters.
Feels good to be done, doesn’t it?
It’s super surreal. It’s also hard to think on what we’ve accomplished vs what we had set out to do.
Yeah, it does.
I’ve been doing this a while, finished about seven major projects (depending on how you count) and there’s no major project I’ve finished without two sets of regrets: the regrets you feel right at the end and the regrets you feel years down the road. I can’t speak to the second set here, but the first set of regrets has never been more muted than it has with Guilded Age (only the final ending to Fans comes close). I went hard to give the series and its characters the best ending I could, I got out of Phil’s way, and I can honestly say I did the best I possibly could.
I got out of YOUR way for this ending, buddy. You nailed it.
“End? The journey doesn’t end here. [It’s] just another path, one we all must take. The gray curtain of this world pulls back and all turns to silver glass… and then you see it. White shores, and beyond… a far green country… and a swift sunrise.”
But, yeah, it’s the end. I wasn’t here at the start, but I’m here at the finish. It’s both sad and wonderful. Sad that it’s ending, and wonderful that it ended so well.
It feels great.
Looking back, even I’m amazed at the amount of work I did. So inspired, so free, it was a great gig.
With you for that swift sunrise.
I’m glad the last word was Gravedust’s, and I’m especially glad that the dwarves were restored to their proper place.
Bravo
Nooo! Rerun the filler! (Aside from the stuff that was advertising Kickstarters and the like.) The filler is good!
Here, here!
What even happened to Carol?
In fact, what happened in Sepia World in general? Did I simply miss the denouement?
Also, was it ever noted what happened to the phycho kid after Bandit hog-tied him? If he had any fate we learned about, I’ve forgotten.
You apparently missed about 2 weeks of Chapter 49.
Bullet-point version:
Carol turned herself in, told the whole story. Is, therefor, likely either in prison or a mental hospital.
Shanna has determined that the story must be told, despite admitting to not knowing most of it. Despite it being crazy and incomplete, it didn’t hurt her career and she got hired at a new job.
The other survivors of the Sepia heroes paired off – Daniel/Lia and Xan/Chrissie. Both couples seem to have gotten a happily-ever-after, though not without scars from their ordeal.
Xan attempted to create a server for the game, so the others could play it, but couldn’t get their characters to transfer, indicating that Arkherra is no longer connected to Sepia World. Chrissie, at least, is cool with this.
Not only is Arkerra no longer connected to Sepia World, the official game servers are offline for EVERYONE. That’s why Xan was trying to make a private server.
Yeah, but what about the 5 bodies in tanks?
Fuckin’ pwned.
Very nutritive mulch.
Exploded when in both worlds HR was destroyed/killed.
Although Kamiko Neko answers a lot of your first question, I would take issue with the idea that Shanna’s story is “crazy and incomplete.” Remember her advice to Carol that “they’re not going to believe the weirder parts?” Because Carol shot HR at the same time the Five did and the gamers’ bodies are decomposed, there’s nothing the general public needs to know that Shanna can’t explain: the five gamers she was tracking were abducted by HR Dedalus for a bizarre experiment involving VR and Kingdoms of Arkerra, and he and his abused assistant started killing people to cover their tracks until Carol realized what a monster she served and shot him in the head.
That version seems a little unfair to Carol, since it doesn’t explain that HR was a clear and present danger to our world, but Shanna knows better than most that the public isn’t ready for the headline “MAGIC EXISTS, GRAVITY APPARENTLY OPTIONAL.” And it’s not like Carol’s innocent; it was her initiative to hire Berten, and she knew what that would mean. Carol’s own version of the story, which leaves out nothing, will find its believers in the parts of the media landscape friendly to conspiracy theories. She’s confessing to abetting seven murders, and despite beliefs one might think delusional, she’s definitely mentally fit to stand trial and would waive any counsel that Hurricane’s desperate investors might find for her. So prison is clearly in her future. But so, one would hope, is a measure of peace.
As for Taro, if you look closely, Sundar forgot about him when carrying both Rendar and Bandit off the field, and those two were probably as much as he could carry anyway. The purplezerkers then made Taro one of them. It’s possible that some of his rapacious nature survived in the form of the giant, merged purple creature, but that creature was then absorbed into HR himself, so one way or another, he’s no longer with us.
But wouldn’t the feds start picking over the remains of H.R.’s work and see he DID pull off the impossible, wouldn’t they secretly gather it all up and pull Carol out of the jail to tap her in how H.R. did his work? This break though, although completely immoral, unethical, and even criminal in how it was achieved, is priceless and needs to be capitalized on. I mean, come on, we accepted Nazi war criminals to improve our tech after WW2, this is no different with what H.R. has done. I can fully understand that this would be top secret level of work. Much like how CIA’s star gate project was.
By Carol’s own account, none of the technical wizardry was hers. HR would bounce ideas off her in their friendlier days, but she didn’t even know what the readouts he had her monitoring actually were.
I could indeed see the government trying to figure something out about this. I could see it failing utterly to comprehend the magical side of what HR was up to– or succeeding. But in either case, I doubt they’d tap Carol for much, and she definitely would not sign on to help anyone else duplicate HR’s work, no matter what that meant to her personal freedom.
For that matter, was HR the first person to find magic, or did others pioneer the art he was expanding? If the latter, I wonder if he wasn’t the only whackjob with a spellbook and a god complex… and what might happen to Sepia World once that stuff becomes the household reality. That just doesn’t feel finished to me.
Someone had to write those books for him to find them and use them, obviously.
There may be another person like HR who would find and abuse magick to this scale but like… the comic is done. We’re not going there.
And in any case, I don’t think they’re a very common sort. If they were, the whole of Sepia World would be a very different place.
P.S.: See my reply directly above, which addresses your question as well.
Wow. I can’t believe it’s over. Nine years, man. Nine fuckin’ years. That’s the longest I’ve ever followed a webcomic update by update from start to finish.
I’ll probably have more to say in summing up later, but for now: Thank you, Phil, T, John, Jason and Erica. Thank you for an epic that’s been funny, thought-provoking, sad, suspenseful, occasionally frightening, and above all just fun to read. Looking forward to what you’ll do after Guilded Age, whether separately or together. Ave atque vale!
One of the other comics I read is ALSO ending, going to be posting their final page next Monday.
And that one was EIGHTEEN years. ( http://www.zebragirl.thecomicseries.com/ )
Both were a heck of a ride, but at least they’re getting proper endings! So many web-comics I’ve read over the
yearsdecades, they didn’t end, they just… stopped.So very true. A webcomic getting a proper ending may be sad, but at least it’s better than fading away unresolved.
Holy crap, Zebra Girl is ending? That one was hiatused for a LONG time, I’ll have to check it out.
Another comic, Unlife, is on it’s final pages. 2018 is the comic apocalypse.
Sluggy Freelance may or may not end this year as well. That one is a longer ride than even GA.
Strange Candy also is in wrap-up mode. Going to have to hope the Foglios live forever, or as long as I do myself, whichever comes first.
Girl Genius will never end at this point. But then again, Buck Godot *kind of * ended…
Thank you so much for making this. ^_^
Congratulations on a great run. You told an interesting story full of colorful characters. I enjoyed every page.
Fuck.
Right?
Thank you.
Why wait twenty years for the irreverent cartoony reboot?
…They SAID to ask anything.
It splits the difference between the ten or so years for Teen Titans Go and the thirty-odd years for Thundercats, I figure.
Wouldn’t that mean more that the time to the cartoony reboot is growing shorter as time goes forward, so you’re looking at 6~8 years?
Well, TTG came before the new T-Cats, so I don’t think so. Clearly two variables isn’t enough and we need a scatterplot graph here.
I can’t believe it’s over. I will admit that I’m in denial.
Well, I’m not.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO…
What a wonderful ride it’s been though, thank you for the unimaginable pleasure it’s brought us all.
Congrats on pulling off a great story arc!
Strange to see it all go. Thank you one and all for sharing this vision with the rest of us.
So what does the future hold for our intrepid creative team? Day jobs at Tim Horton’s?
I think I’ll take a little break.
First comment ever, just to thank you all for this wonderful webcomic. I think I discovered it in its second year, and have been checking it regularly ever since! Please let us know of any future projects you do!
First ever gravatar is appropriate since I’m technically a journalist XD
I liked parts, and I hated parts. I always tuned in. You should all be proud of the work you did. Congratulations.
Yeah, I can relate.
Still, they made it through, and told the whole story start to finish. Major props for keeping the (extensive) reach within grasping distance.
Sooo…y’all goin yer separate ways ‘r what?
It’s the end of one “Journey” and the beginning of another
We have no immediate plans to co-write anything else, but he’s one of my best friends, so it depends on what you mean by “going our separate ways.” If nothing else, the process of the annotations will keep the lines of communication open, and I have some other projects on which I will definitely be seeking Phil’s advice.
Yeah, ‘plans fer the future’ kinda separate ways. Honestly, I shoulda just asked what yer plans fer the future are.
Like I said elsewhere, I’ve got three nonfiction projects on the horizon: a big book o’ anagrams, a comics-connected memoir, and a short comics essay on emojis. Shouldn’t be long before I start coming out with the first of those, at least.
Nothing lined up at the moment. After seven and a half years of three full color pages a week, I think I’m looking forward to some down time. For a little while at least.
I didn’t start reading this webcomic until 2013. I was introduced to it through Fans! which was introduced to me through Penny & Aggie. Can’t believe that was 10 years ago, but I digress. This quickly became a fixture for me and while I’m sad to see it go I have no complaints about the ending. Great job Phil, T, John, Jason, and Erica. If you have any new projects please announce them as I will likely follow it as so I have so many others. Although since I read Dangerously Chloe I know enough about what Jason is up to.
As for questions. What happened to Rana? I was hoping he’d find some peace after everything and while I know it would get clunky to tie up every loose ends I am curious about his fate.
Well how about that. I came here through Faans! too.
Now standing and clapping. Bravo, bravo! This has been my thrice-weekly habit, and I shall miss it as well as you creators and commentators. Thank you for all of it!
We discussed Rana a lot. It was important to me that Penk’s effort to save his life not be shown to fail, but that put us in a bit of a bind, because he was clearly too obsessed and wrecked to recover without a major subplot of his own or a more radical time-jump than the one we did in this chapter, which wouldn’t serve anybody else. I felt that looking in on him would sound a more depressing note than I wanted for this finale, which already has to deal with some heavy stuff like Braggadocio’s state of mind and the unfixable rift between Bandit and her ex-teammates.
In my headcanon, he is currently still kind of a mess and utterly bewildered at this topsy-turvy world where avians befriend humans and go on airship voyages with them. He’s still at risk of doing something dangerous to himself and others, despite Penk and Gondolessa’s efforts to guide him onto a softer path. But he’s alive, and where there’s life, there’s hope.
Thanks for the closure. Considering his emotional damage it wouldn’t have worked if he was fine just a few months after the war so I’m good with this.
Perfect end everyone.
Im gonna miss these characters.
Though that being said…all good games have Expansion Packs these days, I await the patch ; p.
I stumbled upon this comic ages ago, and read it from start to present day and then followed it until the end. I’ve never once commented on a single comic, but since this is the end…
Well, look at the name.
Thanks guys~! Glad I was able to help out in a small way thru Kickstarter. Hell, your version of Saphora even survived, forced to take rage virus treatments notwithstanding, so that was a cool bonus.
Only question I can think of offhand is stupid shippy stuff that was probably answered in an extra before now, so I’ll refrain, unless I work the courage up.
I’ll be sticking around to see what comes next, but regardless, thanks for everything~!!!
Oh shit, this comic has embedded itself into my life the way the rising and setting of the Sun had. It was supposed to always be there along with the puns and enough cheese in the comments to choke a whale.
Just saying “thank you” feels weak but, luckily, someone more talented than me created the perfect song for the occasion: https://youtu.be/R43dYg_Kuc0
Live long and prosper. \V/,
Thank you for your service, Captain.
So Best and Bandit never come face to face, huh? Was that intentional, or just an accident of the writing?
I mean, I know they come with a few feet of each other in Chapter 2, but that’s not quite the same thing.
True! It was accidental at first, but we found we liked it and kept steering in that direction after a while. I’ma speak only for myself here, but Phil may chime in later.
I’m a bit self-conscious about stories where all the original cast members are hanging around in the same group in the beginning as they are in the ending, which sometimes clashes with character growth. You see this in classic nerd TV a lot: characters like Xander Harris or Commander Riker stick around because they’re popular and their actors like making money, even though the most natural thing for their characters to do would be to find a career in some other city/starship.
Since a predestined core cast was built right into Guilded Age‘s plot– only the original five could defeat HR– I felt it was important to throw a kink into it, and Bandit was that kink, the fifth of the five who wasn’t REALLY the fifth of the five. In light of that, her spending no time with Best in the group makes a kind of sense. She was never his alt in a video-gaming sense, but in a story sense, she sort of was.
Testament to my deep commitment to a running gag.
Thanks for replying guys! I have other questions, but I think I’ll let others have their turn.
And thanks for the comic!!! I’ve been faithfully reading since, I think, the whole hullabaloo over Chapter 9 … so 2011? And I enjoyed every bit of it.
You’ve all offered years of entertainment through this comic alone, not to mention your other projects. Thank you all.
Thanks! That was awesome.
thank you, guilded age.
you have been in the shortlist of comics i regularly read for nearly the entire run. you have at times made me laugh out loud, and at times made me come to a consensus with the quietest of feelings. you had an impact on me for something in the neighborhood of eight years, i dont truthfully know.
thank you, for being the greatness that you have been, for sharing this part of your lives and times to us faceless strangers on the internet. thank you for creating a world, for giving us a view into it, and then making it bend and twist so that we question everything about it. thank you for not being easy, for not being clear, for giving us answers and questions on the same page, every page.
thank you.
You’re welcome, man. End of the day, reactions like this are what give us life.
“I suppose I will find out”
*dies*
It’s been one hell of a ride. Thank you.
I wasn’t there from the beginning, but damn am I glad I stuck through to the end. Well done, all of you. Thanks for a hell of a ride (and the opportunity to flex my poetic muscle now and then in the comments).
With that said… “an” close?
I have a file of typo fixes that needs updating, apparently.
Honestly… how could I end Guilded Age without one more typo?
How could you not?
Who let it rain inside? Why are ghosts chopping invisible onions near me. I’M NOT CRYING, YOU’RE CRYING.
Shit, this is the end isn’t it? I wish I could have been here for the entire ride. I regret that for some reason this comic fell off my read list for about 3 years. I am glad I got back for the ending though. I remember when you guys made the extremely short lived guild in World of Warcraft and playing on that and talking to Phil and a few others for the time it was around.
Thanks for bringing along all of us for this journey. It’s been a hell of a ride guys.
So, plans for another story?
If Phil has any ideas for one (outside of possible bonus stories for GA collections), he’s not yet discussed them with me. My short-term plans are more nonfictional, including an autobiography of sorts, a collection of anagrams, and a short comics piece on emoji, but I have a feeling I’ll get back into some kind of fiction before too long.
What kind of person was frigg in real life?
Frigg was not that different from her Arkerran counterpart. Few of them were, really. She was a power gamer, she loved making men throw their controllers in frustration, she was difficult to appreciate in her individuality but those that did found her to be an amazing person worth keeping around, or even following.
This comic should get a gold star.
Well, now it won’t. So, THANKS.
was there ever an official phil kahn rusty sheriff’s badge of disapproval?
i feel like, no? but i have a pretty vivid image in my head; its the gold star but with a surly grimace, a week’s worth of stubble and a stetson, and instead of gold, its dull steel, heavily rusted in spots with balls or discs at the star points.
This comic was special, no doubt. Thank you.
Another bookmark that I can add to the folder that only Dr. McNinja resided in.
“It ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings.”
So?
Where is she?
No? No lady? No singing?
Oh thank cog! There’s still more G.A. to brighten my days!
Right guys? Right..?
I… No, please… Wait..!
(voice breaks, stammers, dissolves into heart-wrenching sobs as fellow commentators randomly disperse, exiting stage left and right, lights dim to lone spot as maggPi’s weeping echoes in the emptiness, body curled in a heap on the well-trodden boards)
Spot turns off to black
Last wail pierces the darkness
Silence blankets all
Been following from the first page (but never commented). Thanks for a fantastic journey and congratulations on reaching the end… It’s been epic.
Has it really been ten years? I found GA very close to its start and have followed it since. It started well and then only got better and better. Congratulations on actually finishing a story that had a beginning, a middle and a resolution. I will not say “end”, for stories never really end for those inside them, but for now we will not follow Gravedust and companions.
I am sad, but it is actually a good form of sad. I hope you find something else to write and draw to entertain us further
Dang, no Sharknados….
Well then. That was a ride.
When I first clicked on the very first strip way back when, I thought to myself, “Christ on a crutch, this is gonna be stupid. I project it’ll be dead within three months.” Never been happier to be proven wrong again and again and again. Sad to see it go, but bon voyage.
Achievement Unlocked!: Didn’t Suck.
Thank you for a real ending. So many good comics ended in hiatus over the years. It is good to see this one got the end it deserved.
Thanks
(Excuse my english)
I don’t even remember how many years I followed, but it was more than 6-7.
I was a great comic, and a great team, both the creators and the commenters.
I am following a lot of comics but I think it is something rare if not unique (especially when it started).
I suppose it inspired and affected a lot of other webcomics.
To be frank (as I always try to be), the ending pages (these last weeks) somehow left me wandering(?) searching(?). I don’t ask a closing page for every character but i seem to miss the final point.
Perhaps I need to read it all from the begining to get all the nuances
I will try
In any case: Thanks again
I wish you all the best
Keep us informed about other projects.
I’m proud of you and the team, Phil. I know that its been stressful and crazy at times, but you made it. man. You guys did it. And it was wonderful. ((personally I’d have had the last panel be a cute shot of Bandit, but I’ve always had a soft spot for her. ;) ))
Thank you for this wonderful comic.
I’m sad that it stops, but I guess that’s better than a comic that goes on too long.
Again thank you for all the effort, time and dedication you lot put in this labor of love.
Thank you for all the entertainment throughout the years and years. Starting off my days is gonna be a little bit bleaker, but it was all worth it. Well, uh, so long, and thanks for all the fish!
This is my first comment on these forums.
I’ve been reading Guilded Age for quite some time. I read many webcomics but I always appreciated that I would have something interesting and well-drawn to read here Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Thank you for the energy and passion you’ve given us for years, and I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say we can’t wait to see what’s around the corner.
So is the big bad boss (forgot his name) really totally gone aka deleted or is he still somehow in this world (as a spirit, reborn with intact memories, as a speck of oblivion waiting for the time to revive again)? Also was this world now a real world a computer game just connected to or was it a computer game that came to life due the experiments of said big bad boss or was it something else?
HR is really gone.
Weo’s explanation of the real nature of Arkerra is correct. Though HR made a duplicate world from the template of the real one, it seems to have its own existence as a world, since Kingdoms of Arkerra is no more but the real Arkerra keeps turning.
So he won’t be haunting Carol the way Asok is keeping Ulak company?
I mean, in the sense that we’re “haunted” by our traumatic memories, maybe? I’m sure finding peace will be a process for Carol. But no, HR, like Rachel, does not get a ghostly afterlife. He’s gone, gone, solid gone.
*tamp tamp* ah I see you have noticed me tamping down the soft earth
It’s been a wonderful adventure. Thank you.
Thanks for the amazing ride.
:( DO NOT WANT
What are the names of Frigg’s and Emerl’s kids?
And what bed time stories does Ardaic read to them?
Hahaha, WOWWW…
Frigg has grown a lot, but I’m not sure motherhood would suit her– taking on these disciples is a lot of nurturing for her as it is. Nor am I sure she and E-Merl will stay sex partners for the rest of their days: to me, they seem less like a permanent varryn-bond and more like what each one needs from the other right now.
But hey, comic’s ending, so I’ll entertain the small possibility. Their names would be Mojo and Wizbang, and on the few nights E-Merl wasn’t telling them something like The Tale of the Traveling Fisherwoman, Ardaic would take it upon himself to read them books of good moral instruction like The Little Police Officer’s ABC. They’d enjoy Dad’s stories more but troll him by pretending they didn’t.
I could honestly see Frigg getting knocked up, especially in a universe that doesn’t have industrialized birth control.
And Ardaic would tell his own war and hunting stories, no doubt. His entire fucking life is a cautionary tale at this point.
I have been here since the beginning. I had my misgivings when you added sepia world, but you pulled it off. Overall, this has been a darn satisfying nine(ish) years, and you guys and gals should be proud of the story you told. Great work, everyone.
Who knew, that June 8, 2018, would be such a bittersweet day…
Many many congratulations on crafting an awesome story and seeing it through to the end. I foresee a binge re-reading in my near future.
The end is always a new beginning. – Captain Cloud
Thanks for the great run!
Thank you for everything. I know it had to end some time. And I know you made an announcement that these chapters would be the conclusion of the story. But… it’s hard to say goodbye after so long. This was one of three strips I read regularly, and easily the best of them. I wish you all the best of luck and please share whatever your next projects are, I don’t want to miss them.
Good gracious. (Good Gravy?) Can’t believe it’s over. I am super excited for the “immediate rewatch” though – so at least that gives me like 4+ years (?) to figure out what to do with myself, lol.
My question is – how did the sepia/Arkerra connections work for the non-5 humans? Was Chrissie ever really “in control” of Bandit? Did logging in to a game character just basically link your screen to their perspective? Did the Arkerrans ever notice “someone else” was there?
This is something I can say we’ve left quite deliberately murky, but Guilded Age is a lot about the duality of our selves vs the characters we play in a game. It is best to say that any “direct control” they had over their characters is more similar to a joint consciousness, just as it is when you are role playing:
When you have your character do something because that’s “in their character,” you’re not really in “control,” are you? Nonetheless, you’re rolling the dice and making the decisions based on your deep, intimate understanding of their person, this harmony of ideas and actions is what it’s all about.
Speaking as an old, fat, widowed grandmother who plays a teen-aged ninja nun in her game… exactly. Even in my younger days, I would never somersault into a cavern and try to stab a giant turtle in the neck, and yet… here we are.
One of the things I cherish about GA is the sense that all the characters are true to themselves and to their story.
Phil’s answer is good.
I never really commented a whole lot, but I’ve been reading from the beginning, and I have to say, I’ve really enjoyed the comic. I’m sad to see it end, yet satisfied on where it’s ended at. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for one of the best stories I have ever read.
Will anyone ever start marketing cruelty-free faux koboleather in Arkerra?
Given that Orcs are being granted personhood slowly but surely, I suspect Kobolds are not too far off.
I dunno if I agree with Phil about kobold personhood. We saw orcs develop their own villages and tools and farms, whereas kobolds always just seemed to raid crops like locusts. Just because they look vaguely humanoid doesn’t mean their brains are… but mostly, my feeling that they’re more on the level of animals comes from the way the Peacemakers were definitely concerned about the orcs’ plight but happy to plow their way through dozens of kobolds. I’d hate to feel retroactively bad about that.
But that wasn’t your original question– it’s not like we need to grant foxes personhood to protest fur. Yes, given enough time, I’m sure a market would open up for faux koboleather.
They were smart enough to fashion clothes and spears, dude. They’re on their way.
Perhaps they are a bit like landsharks in their outlook on combatty death, but with decidedly less focus on the winning part?
“an close” ?
Oh I see someone already mentioned it. Carry on.
This has been a great series, and I’ve enjoyed the hell out of it! Thank you all for your very hard and excellent work. Best wishes on your next adventures, too.
Great job all around and thanks for keeping us entertained for nearly a decade!
I’m sad about the story ending. But I am looking forward to seeing the commentary and the “Ideas We Were Gonna Do But Decided Were Bad.”
John, could you post some of the sketches you’ve done for some of the pages? I’d be interested in hearing your commentary on the challenges you faced with doing the art.
Perhaps that’s something we can do. Phil has every sketch and penciled page I’ve done, so maybe he can post some of them. Are there some particular page sketches you would like to see? I’ve looked back over previous chapters, and I’ve noticed how my pencils have evolved over the years. The first pages are very rough and sketchy, while the more recent pages are cleaner and crisper. I attribute this to becoming more and more familiar with the characters over time, and switching from a wood pencil to a mechanical pencil.(yeah, still use real pencil and paper. haven’t been able to make the transition to digital penciling on a tablet yet. i’ve been drawing since i was three, it’s a really hard habit to break.)
Personally, I’d like to see samples from both early on and later. But there are two pages in particular that I was really impressed with.
Chapter 42, Page 22
Chapter 46, Page 22
Awesome work!
I’ll see if I can get him to post those.
How ’bout it, Phil?!
I’ll keep trying.
Yeah, we’ll do something like this. Check your email later, John.
When can we buy the book of it ALL!? I’ll take 3…
Thank you for a great story! It’a both sad to see it end and satisfying to see a resolution.
My question is: was some part of the consciousness of the five transferred to their Arkerra avatars (in the process of the total immersion experiment) – in other words, does some part of them live on in Arkerra even though they are dead in the real world? Or are/were their real world and Arkerra selves completely disconnected, as with Chrissie/ Bandit & the others?
Short answer: yes to the former.
But did Penk ever get that booty?
I’m not sure who you mean here. Penk lost interest in Strulk as soon as she got into him for the wrong reasons, and Magda wanted Penk’s close friendship but no more. But don’t feel too bad for him. Look at his title and his body. Penk is very, VERY eligible. He may have put off finding a mate until the joined civilization he leads is a little more settled, but I doubt he will be alone for much longer.
Thank you!
I don’t know what more to say at the moment, except hooray for Deleted Scenes & Other Extras to wean me off this story gently.
Hello, longtime reader, first time poster here.
First of all, i would like to thank all of you involved for making this wonderful and thoughtful epic that made each of my days a little bit better. The stories you write are dazzling, the ideas contained within are rich, and the art is amazing. Thank you, Phil, T, Jason and John (and Erica, too!).
With that being said, I do have a question. I wanted to know your thoughts on how you perceive the transfer of consciousness into the Arkerran world. It had already been stated in canon that characters in game would act as they were being controlled by their character as Scipio did without a host, as well as the remainder of Arkerra in chapter 50. But is this a result of HR’s technology/arcana molding the consciousnesses of all Arkerra (and subconsciously dooming his own plan for assimilation from the beginning) or is the input made into such a sophisticated AI worthy of being called a consciousness of its own? (Also assuming, by the way, that HR and the Five’s minds were uploaded somehow into Arkerra and exist there permanently)
A third thought/option comes from “Fans” and the “Flipped Switch” story in which the characters had their consciousnesses grafted (in a far less elegant manner) to one another. Is it possible, then to consider characters like Scipio as hybridized beings with AI piloting a cyborg mind? Or perhaps The Five have transcended as such to better adapt to Arkerra?
What’s in your headcanon?
I would say the first option is closest to what happened there. Beyond the cosmology Weo established, some of my thoughts about such things are vague, because nailing it down too much felt like going from fantasy to science fiction. The one thing I always wanted to be considered true is that Arkerra is really real, however much HR wanted to treat it as “only real when it suited him.” The fact that it was not created the way most worlds are doesn’t contradict that.
Thank you sooooo much for the story! I’ve loved every second of it. <3 Good luck with your next adventures!
Reader from the beginning, first time commenting. I’ve enjoyed every step as it felt like watching an epic game of tabletop.
Would you consider working with a publisher to make Arkerra available as a campaign setting book(s)?
Yes, fucking yes, I’d probably take the first offer that comes, tbh.
I would fund the shit out of this. Just sayin.
to borrow a phrase: “i’m hip”
I’d be into that, allowing for scheduling.
Oh hell yes, seconded. What a brilliant suggestion. I would throw so much money at that.
Amen, and hallelujah (or the Arkerran equivalent thereof.)
While you guys have said it was going to end, right from the beginning, it’s still a bittersweet moment to have reached the end.
But the end fits the story, and thank gods it wasn’t abandoned.
It’s the 3rd webcomic I’ve read that’s had an end while I was still interested in them, the other two being Shortpacked and Multiplex.
Congratulations on all the hard work and I hope you enjoy the time off before whatever projects you tackle next.
Question, will there be a ginormous PDF of the comic to get? Or just all the individual chapters that are currently in the store?
I may attempt to put it all in one giant PDF but that would probably be too big a file for most devices to manage.
To the Guilded Age team:
THANK YOU.
Questions I really want to ask:
– How does arcane magic work in Arkerra? Specifically, when E-Merl demonstrated his spells, he showed off his magic items. I honestly thought at the time that wizardry or magecraft in this world was just based on having artifacts. I realized that such seemed wrong where E-Merl was an actual student of magic and not merely a possessor of magical items.
– I just want to know what kind of adventurer was Colonnus the Congenial. He doesn’t go around in armor, just basic light clothing and his staff at most. Some sort of “monk”? I’m fascinated because he’s such a cool old dude.
– Whatever happened to Mr. Bedard? Of the villains, he was honestly the creepiest. They were all racists. Taro was arrogant and ruthless. Bedard, controlling the media of Gastonia, definitely did his part in the conspiracy. But he wasn’t there for power- he just enjoyed the drama, chaos, and bloodshed because it made for a good story. That’s what makes him such a unique villain: he’s not in it for power, he’s not a direct or overt threat if you faced him in person, and he had no fear when Gastonia fell.
– Magick works about exactly how you would expect, it’s just a ratified commodity outside of sky elf hands. He uses magickal aids in his practices because, well… He flunked out.
– He is pure, 100%, raw and unadulterated adventurer. He’s such an adventurer, he doesn’t even NEED a class.
– He is probably serving time like the rest of them.
I agree with Phil 100% on the first two here.
I would say that serving time is the best-case scenario for Bedard. Yes, his unusual motivations make him more interesting to us, but on Arkerra as on Earth, criminal justice is based on crimes committed, not motive, except in clear-cut cases of self-defense. Considering that Penk talked the World’s Rebellion down from a stance of “KILL ALL HUMANS” partly with the argument that a people aren’t their rulers, and considering that he described Miyamoto’s missed trial as “redundant,” I would say there’s a fairly robust chance Bedard was executed along with the other Altruist conspirators.
I’m not quite sure whether you’re right about motives not playing a role often in criminal justice systems on earth. I think motives often play into sentencing. Hate crimes would be an example.
And manslaughter, I suppose, but in those cases, the apparent motive seems to be embedded into the commission of the crime and how it plays out, whereas the law doesn’t care if I murder someone because they emotionally harmed my sister vs. out of professional jealousy. Let’s put it this way: I don’t expect Penk to care at all that Bedard did it for stories and the lulz instead of power or misplaced patriotism, and I expect the coalition he represents to care even less.
A perfect conclusion to a well-crafted story.
Thank you.
Thank you all for making such a wonderfully drawn, written, framed, and, the hardest part of all, finished story. Some of the best stories I’ve ever read, and always keep in my heart, are the ones that end, and yet leave you with so much to ponder and wonder about.
You’ve made something I truly won’t forget until I’m so old that I don’t even remember what pants are.
I remember finding this comic in high school, and reading it at lunch everyday on my iPod. I also remember this comic being the first to introduce me to alt-text for webcomics, which now that I think about it, I have a good deal of alt-texts to go back and see since I also didn’t know how to properly get alt-text to come up on an iPod at the time.
You know what this comic also got me into? Reading the comments. Because man, I have done my best to read every comment people have posted on the old pages and new alike. Not just to pass the time between each new strip, but because some of them were just so freaken funny. Some of them were well thought out or sweet or the occasional “I just found your comic and binged it”, and so much more. And I loved that. I loved the community of people that stayed with this comic over the years. Even if there were times where there was an unsavory commenter, or what was created didn’t always resonant with a portion of the audience, I never once felt like I wanted to stop diving into the comments. I’ve looked up and learned about so many different and interesting subjects at this point brought up by commenters and comic alike.
That experience will always be so wonderful to me.
You what’s the funniest part? I just remembered that I found this comic because I had a school paper to write involving the “Gilded Age”. I had looked it up, and after a time got bored so I was looking through google images to see what cool pictures there were. And then I saw this colorful little picture of a short blonde woman in purple hanging out some other equally colorful folks. I clicked on it, looked for three seconds before my mother came over to ask how I was doing (so of course I tabbed back to the proper search). But I mentally made a note to look up that comic the next day. And so, I looked it up on my iPod the next day at lunch, and started reading. And I’ve been hooked ever since.
So again, thank you all. I can’t ever thank you more than as a young reader who needed a good story when he was young and friendless.
Thanks for the wild ride. You all have plans to stick together for another project? Or is this your chance to spread your wings and quit tripping over each other?
We will probably collaborate together again (far) in the future, now having reached a complete understanding of each other’s processes.
Best of luck working with other people and finding a team that works together as well as this one did (at least so far as you all let us see).
Congratulations! Thanks for the great comic!
Sooo, ya ever gonna fix that text in Chapter 49 Page 23?
Also, I didn’t say thanks before…so thanks. Look I’m not good at this shit okay!
I intend to gently nag Phil about such typos until he breaks down and fixes them at some point during the reruns. :P
whatever happened to the evil journalist dude? the one who was so chill about being hanged and such?
His name’s “Mr. Bedard,” and see the answers to Messenger, above!
Well done! I will miss this so very much. You are all awesome, that includes the commenters here who have measurably increased the joy in my life as well! Thank you.
Do the sepia-world main five’s “souls” or whatever continue to exist in Arkerra? Or more precisely, are the sepia-world main five distinct from the Arkerra main five, or did they actually get transferred over to another world?
Given that they were permanently irretrievable, I would say the transfer was complete.
Congratulations on completing this long journey! It’s been amazing!
And please, no Guilded Age Go in 20 years… >.>
Seriously, I really enjoyed reading this.
*drops to his knees* NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *sobs uncontrollably*
Thank you so much for the incredible work and the rich characters you’ve given us, you’ve made us laugh and made us reflect on life, and that’s a gift I’m grateful for.
Thank you so much for sharing this with the world. It’s been incredible to follow.
This was one of the first web comics I ever read. It’s been such an enjoyable part of my online experience, and I’m sad to see it end. Thanks for the years of great content!
Also, shout out to one of the most fun to read comment sections on the internet! One highlight that stuck with me is Jean-Luc Picard and a Dalek having an in character debate over the comic.
Link? o.o;
Sorry Cassandra, I don’t recall the page. It’s a hunt!
Thank you. Has been a wonderful story and I will miss it.
BOOO! I mean Booooooo!
Comic was fantastic, and thank you for everything. It was a fun ride!
But now another comic I read is done. Booooo!
Despite the fact I was always annoyed by speculation along this line during the story, I do find myself wondering if any of the main Arkherran characters were linked to people in the Sepia World, other than the ones played by the Sepia heroes? Did Braga have a player who ragequit when his character was taken entirely out of his control and went over the line he was willing to RP? Was Goblawrence tied to Weedgirl420? Was Kur’ik played by someone more interested in RPing than raiding?
For that matter…I’m not sure if it was ever established, and I’ve forgotten, or if it was never clear – did every PC have a real Arkherran counterpart, or was it just the ones who were close to the Five and influenced by the magics surrounding them? If the latter, what happened to the other PCs when Sepia World and Arkherra disconnected? In either case, how did the players whose characters continued running when they weren’t playing perceive what happened when they were offline (aside from obvious stuff like Rachel)?
OK, I see most of the second paragraph was answered above.
Nope, some were players and some were NPCs.
To list out who was what aside from what was already spelled out in the story would be diminishing, I think.
Fair enough.
I wanted to thank the team for this amazing comic. I’ve been reading since ya’ll first started published by and every episode has been a joy to read, take apart, and put back together again. I love these characters, the growing they have done, and the weight that they have shed. Bravo and good luck on future ventures!
I will miss the story, unveiling before my eyes over the years.
I will miss the comments, particularly the pun-smithing.
I look forward to your future projects.
And I certainly hope we’ll see a single-volume, leather-bound, gilt-edged omnibus on Kickstarter, soon. ;)
Thank you all for such a wonderful ride! Rarely has a webcomic touched me in so many ways. Any recommendations for what to read next?
Interesting question. Order of the Stick is one I’d compare to us, though it’s more fourth-wall-breaking. Jumping genres, if you like sprawling casts like ours, I gotta recommend Dumbing of Age, one of my favorite comics ever. Of the work I’ve done, Fans at faans.com is probably closest to GA.
I loved Fans. I think I read through that at about the eight month mark of reading this one. I am currently letting OotS run through a few more weeks before I pick it back up (I prefer bingeing that one in spurts). Dumbing of Age is not what I was expecting, but I’ll give it a whirl! Thanks, T! :D
Guilded Age: The Next Generation
Guilded Age II: The Wrath of H.R.
Guilded Age: The Magic Awakens
Guilded Age: The Quest for More Money
Guilded Age 3D
Thanks for all the fish.
Hey! It was a good right while it lasted. I’ll probably re-read the whole thing in a few years.
Lots of questions!
1. So, regarding the heroes, I think it was mentionned they got the best end they could. Regarding the antagonists, do you feel someone didn’t deserve what was coming to them?
2. Phil, I know it’s like asking a parent to pick a favorites among children, but of the five + cohort NPC, who was the one for whom it felt the most natural to write? 2.5 Who was it for whom it was the most difficult?
3. Same question as 2, but regarding the bad guys.
4. Where can I order books? And can I order them from old Europe?
1. There’s “best” as in “most poetic, best for the story” and then there’s “best” as in “most karmically deserved.” Beyond question, Rana and Yalaria got a raw deal. Harky died more or less as he wanted to, but it’s a shame Gondolessa had to be a widower like that.
2. I know these aren’t aimed at me, but when has that ever stopped me… I’d say Syr’Nj was easiest to write for me overall: her intellectual leanings meant her voice was close to ours sometimes.
2.5 I’d say Bandit. Of all the characters, she was probably the most Phil’s baby. I almost never shrink from a challenge and did some bits with her I’m really proud of, some of which are in this chapter, but she was definitely the tallest mountain for me to climb.
3. I’m gonna say Magda was the easiest “villain” overall. I have an affinity for characters who are just nice, and Magda clearly belonged on the side of the angels from the start.
3.5 Most difficult… HR was a challenge for me for a while until we realized that his changeability was part of his overall arc. I learned a great deal about toxic narcissists over the course of this series. But I’d say Rana was the biggest challenge overall. Right up to the end, felt like I only had one hand’s grip on his reins (his last scene was all Phil, pretty much).
4. The store should still work!
Heh, it’s funny, but I never thought of the World Rebellion as the bad guys. Clearly, they were antagonists, but I always thought of them as “sort of the good guys too”. (Well, maybe with the exception of the Don and the landsharks.) At some points, I had more sympathy for Penk than for the 5, actually.
Bonus question, in case it doesn’t get lost in the forum: How much influence comes from D&D? I know it’s a very broad question, so let me narrow it a little more: are there parts coming from fantasy pen & paper games (as opposed to video games) you wanted to absolutely include? Are there some you wanted to absolutely avoid?
D&D is sort of the ur-role playing game, especially to people of my generation, so I’d say it’s our second biggest influence after WoW. That said, Phil is historically more of a gamer than I am by a lot, so its influence on us was not equal.
I definitely wanted to avoid the “self-awareness” you see in Order of the Stick and other strips, where they’ll stop a life or death battle to talk about the trade-off they’re getting in experience points and hit points. Nothing against OotS, but that wouldn’t have helped us. Once we introduced Sepia World, it was imperative that we not give readers any excuse to think “oh, the stuff in Arkerra doesn’t really matter, this is REALLY the story of these five people trapped in tubes and how they get out, no point getting attached to anything in full color.” As should be clear by now, that wasn’t the way we wanted to take things.
1 – 100% agree with T: Rana and Yalaria got the shortest end of the stick.
2 – The easiest to write for me, hands down: Frigg. She is sort of a direct tap into my subconscious. She’s me from my teens years growing up into my twenties, seeing that life is more than just what you can eat, drink or fuck. Developing a moral compass and a sense of justice around the social morass that is The Internet. Using her as our sales spokesperson is literally just transposing my own manic salesmanship into her mouth. And “Profanity as Jazz” is certainly an IRL hobby of mine T can attest.
2.5 – The hardest of the heroes to write for me was possibly Gravedust, as he posed the greatest challenge to me: I am not a spiritual person by a particular long shot, so having to write from the perspective of one who saw all things as spiritual in nature was difficult, especially in the effort of making it sound believable or real. In addition, I’m not really a man of poetry, and I decided early on “All his incantations should be poems,” so like… Writing Dusty for me was absolutely playing on Hard Mode. That said, I think I got some really great material out of him over the years specifically because I set this bar so high.
3 – The easiest “villain” to write for me was probably Goblaurence for the exact same reasons as Frigg. He’s my inner thoughts as a lifetime of working as a technician.
3.5 – HR was absolutely the greatest challenge to write out of the villains because he is mirror of the toxic influences I’ve had in my life as well as a mirror of the toxic behaviours I am often still guilty of. Full disclosure, a lot of his words and motivations were improvised reactively to the story as time went on, because the position he was in was the same T and I were in: This story, these characters have taken a life of their own and we were desperate for a sense of control, for a way to “bring it back,” for any of it. In many ways, he is the direct translation of my own mental health issues and in other ways, he is directly allegorical for the Creative Process as seen by me. He’s complex to me because just like the toxic men I’ve known before and the toxicity within myself, it’s hard to truly conceptualize them as “Human.” A bit of a ramble there but in the end, HR’s difficulty to write was because of the ambitions we poured into him and his role in the story/our lives.
4 – Yup, the Gumroad is still goin’!
Thank you for your candor.
Thank you for you answer. I wasn’t expecting such a detailed one.
I didn’t imagine Gravedust was so hard to write for. To me, all of his writing read very naturallly, and made sense.
However, from both T and your answer, I understand better how both Frigg and Bandit almost felt like persons more than characters. They really each had their own specific voice, in my head : )
Regarding HR, your your explanations make me want to re-read the whole thing sooner rather than later, with another grid.
I’ve been here since like halfway through Chapter One, and seeing it end feels very surreal. I can’t imagine how it feels for you all on the team. Thank you, truly, for the story.
I’ve always wondered, how did you all feel going into Chapter Nine? Was the reader response about what you expected? Did you have faith that we would have faith? For what it’s worth I was thrown off for like two strips, and then I almost immediately fully bought into the reveal.
I’d say we probably got a little more static than we expected, but not a lot, and thankfully we had faith in our overall story outline. I knew we’d probably outright lose some readers in the short term, but I felt our ambition would gain us more in the long term.
Agreed, the static we got was a bit more than we expected. The True Believers at the time were a great comfort, but what always boggled my mind was that people speculated that The Big Reveal was why Erica left the project.
And like… No, man. She left the project because she got a really well-paying and cool job. It’s really as simple as that. You can’t keep giving your time to a webcomic for free once you get a full time game design position unless you’re a straight up fucking ultra-masochist.
And people believed in this for YEARS. As if somehow we kept The Big Reveal unbeknownst to her while she was sitting there conceiving of the whole damn project with us.
I understood that people were just mad that the artist they liked already got replaced with a new one but at this point, I literally can’t imagine Guilded Age in a style other than John’s now. He has 100% made it his own now and I have huge fucking respect for him for that.
aw… thanks phil.
So when I first read this page, I thought “breaking the fourth wall, are we, Gravedust?”. But then I realized that “take me beyond this ink and parchment” referred to his journal, not the comic.
Some time later, it hits me.
As we know, every scene set in Arkerra, since the very beginning of the comic, has a muted background texture in every panel. Kind of a crumpled old papery, watercolory thing. I rarely think about it, either because I’m accustomed to it, because it’s subtle, or because it fits the scene. Sometimes, it stands out, and it becomes obvious that it’s a deliberate stylistic choice.
And then I look at Gravedust’s narration boxes. They’ve always looked the same, of course. They have the texture, just like everything else. But unlike (mostly) everything else, the texture doesn’t just fit – it IS the narration boxes. Because they are the parchment Gravedust is writing on.
Is this meant to signify that the Arkerra part of the comic is Gravedusts retelling of events? o_o
If so, was this always the intention? Have we been reading “My travels” by Gravedust Deserthammer all along? 0_o
And if it wasn’t, will you say that it was anyway? @_@
I’d say that no matter how much he relied on Weo to get the backstory, there are things Gravedust just isn’t privy to that would make it impossible for the Arkerra narrative to be “his.” For one thing, I can’t see him writing speculatively or otherwise about Fr’Nj and Scipio’s sex lives.
Nah, (somehow) we’re not THAT meta.
Good stuff. Found this comic last spring, read most of it while I was unemployed. Glad I could join you guys on your final ride.
Thank you for a rambunctious ride!!!
What a ride. Thanks, everyone!
So is it now time for you to make the inevitable “Sci-Fi” comic?
Seriously, though. Just re-running the thing isn’t going to fill the void that The End will leave- are you all planning on writing and running another story?
I already did a sci-fi comic on something like this scale.
In the short term, no. I got some nonfiction projects I want to try for a while. Long term, well, I’ve learned to never say never.
Ah! I did not realize. Explains Shanna.
I think I could be up for that.
after a short recess, of course. ;-)