This week’s episode begins an all new story arc for Delve, one that I was never quite certain I was ever going to write. I know things got a bit confusing with the whole “Rescue Princess Sephni” story line, and a lot of the problem was with my inexperience as a storyteller. But, now that I’ve been doing this for what? A decade or more? I think, maybe… maybe… if I try to see things from the perspective of two new characters who have absolutely no idea what has happened in the Delve up to this point, we might have a chance at a more coherent plot.
Maybe…
Just curious, can you folks guess anything about the characters of our two newcomers, simply from the clues I’ve provided in this page?
I’ll probably update the Characters page to include them in the coming week or two, but I am curious to see what you think of them before I tell you too much about them.
So I’m guessing an amazon and a rouge gourmand. Aren’t Dragons supposed to be sentient? Eating sentiant’s is an evil act, soooo….Evil new overlords?
The dialogue leaves it very clear, at least from the viewpoint of the adventurers, dragons are BEASTS (although technically “beast” stands for mammal or at the very least land animal but let’s ignore that).
So edible, yeah.
Philosophically, I’m on your side though: dragons good, dragonkillers evil.
I wonder if that makes dragonkillers edible?
Slippery slope… to vore.
That slope was slipped way back when with that giant white snake. Also I imagine draconic morality depends on the dragon.
Dragons eat humans.
What goes around comes around.
Nah, dragons do not eat humans, that’s a myth dragonslayers invented a posteriori in order to justify their god-slaying unforgivable crime or sin.
Is that something your dragon masters told you? o_O
Yep! Right before they dipped him in chocolate, Mmmmm! chocolate dipped fool!
She doesn’t look very red, so rouge seems unlikely. 😛
My own assumption for the furry character was some sort of mage/alchemist, trying to stop her partner from destroying important reagent (dragons are the magical bison of D&D – every part has a use). This also implies she has a certain degree of detachment, as her concern seems to be more preserving specimens than defeating the dragon (she may also simply have a very high opinion of her companion’s ability to kill the dragon).
And evil? I’d say Teal is by far the least evil character in the story, and she ate a guy during that last fight, so I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that eating sentients isn’t an evil act in the world of Delve.
Finally, that corrosion/rusting effect on the shield after it got zapped is pretty nifty.
I forgot to include, I don’t think there’s been any indication so far that dragons are, in fact, sentient. Still going with eating sentients not being inherently evil in Delve, however.
> I’d say Teal is by far the least evil character in the story, and she ate a guy during that last fight,
Yes, though the guy was a lizard, probably tasted like chicken. But your point is valid.
Maybe the shield always looked that way 😛
I find it amusing our fox? gal is so well clothed given she has such a fluffy coat of her own 🙂
Fox? Thought she was a cat, was gonna ask if she was related to Phawkes… wait, ‘Phawkes’ sounds like ‘fox’, illuminati confirmed!!!
A cook in an adventuring party?! O.O
She’s kinda cute for a furry though.
…not familiar with Dungeon Meshi, aren’t you?
Nope. No idea what that may be. Related to “sushi” somehow?
“Vamos con afán, todos a la vez, a cortar con ahinco las bolas al dragón…”
Heh. I had to look that up.
http://sabemos.es/2015/05/11/vamos-con-afan-todos-a-la-vez-a-buscar-con-ahinco-la-bola-dragon_1771/
have you translated the variation? 😉
New arc begins with a castration joke!
Cute girl, and wouldn’t mind adventuring with her! …And while I could have fun with fanfics, I’d likely wear an iron ball cup around her!
That guy must be the original Iron Chef.
So, I finally managed to catch up, and apparently on the very best day. It took me a bit longer than I thought -I started to read it on Monday-, but I didn’t have that much time for it, sooo…
Anyway, Mr. Hunter, I thank you for your work and effort you put into this comic! I hope you can write it further, for at least as long as you already did! 🙂 (Between us, I’m actually rather picky about the comics I read, so that I want to read it further is quite a compliment from my side 😉 )
As for the new characters… The first impression is good, they seem to be interesting, and also a capable and well-working duo. Yet, my first thought on them was, that they wear more clothe than most other characters did most of the time. 😀
Well, they seem to be in the outdoors, not a climate-controlled dungeon, so clothing is required
Let’s see. If memory serves this is likely Chasta Mistrike, high level Rouge and former owner of the VoidRage armour Bree was given by the Draco Mage before she left his fortress on level 99. Chasta also spent some time as a dental hygienist after her party was defeated in the Delve. I guess she got out.
As for Miko, her lack of armour and visible weapons suggests she doesn’t belong to any of the more martial classes, and likewise her lack of visible arcane implements would suggest that a wizard she is not. I would hazard a guess that she is a Bard or a very laid back Monk. Her colouration would suggest she is from a desert environment.
Dragons have a long tradition of being eaten in several cultures, especially the tails and blood, which is also bathed in, to gain power, invulnerability, ect. As Dergrubben mentioned above, Dragons are like Bison, every part has a use, and is used entirely.
If she’s a high level rogue…why the spear..Unless she got a class change?
Notably, it is much easier to put holes in creatures you can reach; getting past the reach of a large, violent creature with a long neck and large wings is much easier with a spear than a dagger. That said, multiclassing for the abilities needed to survive a foe isn’t the worst idea in the world, and she certainly seems to be in appropriate shape for a combat-based class.
Perhaps the rogue is the one with a cooking dragon’s fetish? The other one appears to be a seriously under armored warrior.
No, Chasta is overdressed to be a warrior: the less clothing on a female fighter means the better protected they are
Okay, just one second! How the heck does Miko know its an amazing recipe for Dragon Balls if they’re just returning to the world?!?
Don’t underestimate the desire to eat balls of furries past… Or present.
It doesn’t make a bit of difference, guys…The balls are inert.
“Returning” is the key word. Ancient lore knows, I presume.
Well, she did say she ‘found’ an amazing recipe, this is the first time she’s had the opportunity to get the final ingredient, and she doesn’t want Chasta to spoil it 😛
Kinda early to make any judgements.
Cjasta seems more a multi classed Rogue/Fighter, and I am going to go with Sorcerer or Alchemist for Miko. In most fantasy settings alchemist would give an eye or limb for access to the remains of any Dragon, the profit to be made from magic item sales alone would buy them replacements if they didn’t find a way to make those too.
As long as Bree doesn’t have to fight Zhaitan or Jormag, I think she’ll be alright.
To respectfully disagree with a previous speaker, dragons probably are sentient. The dragon head on the chimera seemed smarter than the goat head.
As for who is who and what is what — I’m guessing that one of them is a bitch, erm, female canid. From her garb, she could be a ‘rogue,’ assassin, or thief, but, from her wish to keep dragon parts whole? Either a gourmand, as guessed previously, or she makes potions, collects spell components, or sells black-market body parts to other dragons.
The fighter has a tiara? Could be amazon, but also could be the grand-niece of a royal somewhere.
The question is not whether they are sentient or not in hard to discern absolute terms, but whether others think so: for example I think that dolphins and chimpanzees are sentient but some people do not and in some cultures it is vaguely traditional to hunt and eat them (Japanese particularly are strongly adamant of dolphin culling and eating, what for me is abhorrent).
In this case the humanoid adventurers don’t seem to think dragons are sentient in any way: one called them “beasts” and the other seems very fond of dragon delicatessen.
I actually read back through the entire archive after I made my previous post, and just took another quick look through it, and found no chimaera to speak of. There WAS a dragon, back when Bree met the Valryn, but it basically just had a few frames of fighting before Bree’s rock fell on its head.
Again, there has been no indication so far that dragons are sentient. Granted, there hasn’t been any real indication they aren’t either. Now that dragons are apparently going to be a plot point, we’ll probably find out soon enough.
There is a Chimera in “Yet Another Fantasy Gamer Comic”, butt the dragon head is the least smartest out of the three, heck, Lion is smarter than Dragon!!
There is also the debate on the difference between ‘sentient’ and ‘sapient’
Hm. So far:
Chasta seems to be confident, aggressive, sarcastic, in excellent shape, and well equipped; obviously magical spear (glowy gem), headgear (more glowy gem), & shield (blocked that electricity).
Miko seems more cautious, intellectual, possibly bookish, and verbally subtle.
The interaction between these two should be interesting.
In my opinion a bit of a strange logic with dragons that if they are sentient it is ok to kill them but not ok to eat them. A dead dragon is not sentient.
Will the corpse of the dragon feel better if it is burned up in fire compared to eaten? Will a dragon be more likely to carry disease that could hurt humans because it is sentient compared to not?
Excellent points. FWIW, the “eating sentients is evil” meme descends from the “eating humans is evil” meme, which itself is probably due to a combination of an instinctive fear of predation and the observation that historical cannibals were often struck with madness and deadly sickness in the form of prion infections, which looks an awful lot like divine retribution. Quos Deus vult perdere, prius dementat.
While Bree is unwilling to eat other humanoids (as seen when she visits Teal’s family), I stand by my statement that, in the world of Delve, eating sentients isn’t inherently evil (although some cultures may see it as such).
I like your logic, David.
Also haven’t commented on the guess about Chasta and Miko bit…
I can see Miko being an alchemist… But wonder if she’d likely take any levels in Archivist…
And Chasta? Just because of the glowy crystals and warrior look, guessing Psychic warrior… And that’s if the delve is working on D&D 3.5 rules.
WTF? It’s obvious that Miko is a chef with levels in haute cuisine, spiced scargots and sauted entrails, she has not done nor said anything for us to think otherwise, she may cater for some noble house, royalty maybe. Chasta is amazon-paladin: the name Chasta says she is a paladin or nun (Chasta the chaste, get it?, female monks are called nuns, I presume), the clothing makes her barbarian or amazon, she may work for the same boss as Miko but her motivation for that job is not clear to us yet, certainly not the royal cafeteria.
Nah, Chasta is Miko’s hired bodyguard
How was it “in time before legend” if there’s legends about it and dragon ball recipies about it?
Instead of mountain oysters, would these be spicy mountain oysters?
Dragonballs? Aren’t you supposed to wish on those?
*Slow clap that gradually intensifies!*