When somebody says "middle ages," I think, "an agrarian feudal society, snooty nobles and no middle class to speak of." My impression of Lookouts is that this is a tribal hunter-gatherer society by necessity because, I assume, there is no agriculture and no mechanized industry.
Middle-age is what was said.
I read that as middle-aged people, 40s-50s because the Lookouts and Daughters are so much younger. We see the effects of decisions made by them (The Elders), but no real direct intervention. Do they know the facts about the Thornwatch, but choose to keep the superstition? Or are they blind and just following traditions handed down? Is there some unspoken awareness that they know they are doing the wrong thing, but nobody wants to be the first to speak up for fear they will be shouted down and possibly thrown out of office? That kind of thing is much more interesting to me than the "middle-ages".
"Middle-ages" is mostly about feudalism. I'm less inclined to see it go in that direction just because the amount of advancement required for that would be completely at odds with the Eyrewood setting. Mining that much ore for the armor, clearing that much forest for grazing horses, the Daughters wouldn't allow it. Whilst there may be a road through the forest to allow that kind of traffic, those on the road won't venture far from it, and the village is going to be too deep in the forest to ever be impacted by it.
If there is an Age of Chivalry going on outside the Eyrewood, I don't think we will see it. And if it isn't happening, there is a good reason why: the Forest will not allow it.
AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
I really want more of this (and no , I won't stop writing this every single thread) and particularly in an actual long comic book for that I can purchase. Really want them to do a full story, with as many pages/panels they like but without feeling they aren't doing their usual penny-arcade gaming comics dick jokes or whatever at the same time.
But mostly because I really want a physical book of this sort of thing.
When somebody says "middle ages," I think, "an agrarian feudal society, snooty nobles and no middle class to speak of." My impression of Lookouts is that this is a tribal hunter-gatherer society by necessity because, I assume, there is no agriculture and no mechanized industry.
Middle-age is what was said.
I read that as middle-aged people, 40s-50s because the Lookouts and Daughters are so much younger. We see the effects of decisions made by them (The Elders), but no real direct intervention. Do they know the facts about the Thornwatch, but choose to keep the superstition? Or are they blind and just following traditions handed down? Is there some unspoken awareness that they know they are doing the wrong thing, but nobody wants to be the first to speak up for fear they will be shouted down and possibly thrown out of office? That kind of thing is much more interesting to me than the "middle-ages".
I find that hard to get my head around. Like this was written with a 40 to 50 y.o. perspective, or what? I'm not even sure what is meant by that. Is that a trend in fantasy?
There are a lot of slanderous rhymes about the Thornwatch and the Daughters, and I assume these rhymes effectively represent the views of conventional society (i.e. "The Elders").
The rest of your questions I broadly assume that the answer simply is, "Yes, but not always."
1) Plenty of real world people might know that certain beliefs are false or not entirely true, but choose to promote general ignorance because they're afraid of the consequences of a widespread change in belief. The rumors may not exactly be true, but it's worth the price because moral fabric of society and think of the children.
2) Yes, a lot of people blindly follow authority just because.
3) There are also people operating under an unsettling cognitive dissonance or are afraid of social repercussions (e.g. gay rights). We must assume that the childrens' mentor in the original Lookouts is one of these. He secretly cheated the books when and if he could. Likewise, I assume the older Daughter, that Hanna knew met, knew enough about the Daughters but was never compelled to act until it became her problem.
I just blandly assume that all these people exist in numbers inside of conventional society as a due matter of course.
Yes I meant "middle-age" as in "adult" - I was missing an adult metaphor/anachronism to match the two puberty narratives. Fantasy "Trenches", perhaps. The grizzled, teleporting badasses don't strike me as immediately recognizable; perhaps they are just any group of society dropouts, refugees from the rat race? Then I don't get why they, thematically, can't help the Daughter?
Oh, other stuff that are cosmologically reminiscent include Thief (TDP) and Earthsea.
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PedroAsaniBrotherhood of the Squirrel[Prime]Registered Userregular
I find that hard to get my head around. Like this was written with a 40 to 50 y.o. perspective, or what? I'm not even sure what is meant by that. Is that a trend in fantasy?
No, I took it to mean "where are the Elders?"
There are a lot of slanderous rhymes about the Thornwatch and the Daughters, and I assume these rhymes effectively represent the views of conventional society (i.e. "The Elders").
The rest of your questions I broadly assume that the answer simply is, "Yes, but not always."
1) Plenty of real world people might know that certain beliefs are false or not entirely true, but choose to promote general ignorance because they're afraid of the consequences of a widespread change in belief. The rumors may not exactly be true, but it's worth the price because moral fabric of society and think of the children.
2) Yes, a lot of people blindly follow authority just because.
3) There are also people operating under an unsettling cognitive dissonance or are afraid of social repercussions (e.g. gay rights). We must assume that the childrens' mentor in the original Lookouts is one of these. He secretly cheated the books when and if he could. Likewise, I assume the older Daughter, that Hanna knew met, knew enough about the Daughters but was never compelled to act until it became her problem.
I just blandly assume that all these people exist in numbers inside of conventional society as a due matter of course.
1, 2 and 3, pretty much. But so far we haven't seen them, and I am curious as to how they operate. Is the village run by one person, who passes on the "forbidden knowledge" to the successor? A Council, a Church, or even some kind of collective agreement between the adults?
Then I don't get why they[Thornwatch], thematically, can't help the Daughter?
Because the change happening to Hanna is part of the Magic of the Forest, and trying to go against it would be like trying to kick the ocean off the beach.
I really want more of this (and no , I won't stop writing this every single thread) and particularly in an actual long comic book for that I can purchase. Really want them to do a full story, with as many pages/panels they like but without feeling they aren't doing their usual penny-arcade gaming comics dick jokes or whatever at the same time.
But mostly because I really want a physical book of this sort of thing.
Hopefully if/when they do another round of Ad-free Penny Arcade on Kickstarter, we can make suggestions for the projects they should undertake. I think Eyrewood as a Graphic Novel would be a popular choice. In my mind the layout would include the previous comics as either an Epilogue, or at the back for reference.
@pedroasani, there's an edit button next to your post that you can use to add things. Click the cogwheel in the top right hand corner.
I prefer to respond to one person per post. That way if they reply, they don't need to cut out the others I respond to that don't pertain to their part of the conversation. Hope that's ok.
Yes I meant "middle-age" as in "adult" - I was missing an adult metaphor/anachronism to match the two puberty narratives. Fantasy "Trenches", perhaps. The grizzled, teleporting badasses don't strike me as immediately recognizable; perhaps they are just any group of society dropouts, refugees from the rat race? Then I don't get why they, thematically, can't help the Daughter?
Oh, other stuff that are cosmologically reminiscent include Thief (TDP) and Earthsea.
While it's important that stories be written with some purpose (too much fantasy today is written without the intent to say anything), not every element of a story is making a broader point--telling a coherent narrative is just as important. There is not an allusion to the reality of aging within every single character in the story (what does the owl-beast represent??). Also, while the puberty analogy is clear, I would assume that this means less that the entire universe is an elaborate metaphor for growing up, and more that growing up is a real-world phenomenon and thus makes an otherwise abstract story more relateable (sp). There may not be a thematic reason why they can't help the daughter, but there is an in-universe one. Also, Tycho told us his inspiration for the Thornwatch in this strip--not a specific group of society, but rather the "three ways people think they are helping when they're really not". Again, this isn't to make the entire strip a parable, but to infuse the story with realistic people that may remind us of people we've met.
But verisimilitude is the whole problem: "Lookouts" is pitch perfect magical realism ("What if we combine this relatable, mundane thing with a supernatural setting?"). "Daughters" OTOH slides into equal-opportunity fan service; "Thornwatch" is ... product placement? That was too harsh, perhaps, but it comes across as a bit jumbled.
To compare it to some other popular magical realism: "the Magicians" is fantastic because it's so relatable while "Harry Potter" is just a bunch of crap thrown together.
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KalTorakOne way or another, they all end up inthe Undercity.Registered Userregular
What if a Death Metal band was inspired by stories meant to make plastic mans more interesting? Then you and up with World Eater '94 and eventually Josh "the Warmaster" Barnett!
In short, some fields are too fertile not to grow.
Fuck off and die.
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Foolproofthats what my hearts becomein that place you dare not look staring back at youRegistered Userregular
edited September 2013
I very taken by the art, world, and fandom of the Tithe.
I got some more reading to do if there is a thread for each installment. Good.
I didn't take the use of the word witch to be slur-ish. To me it worked with the wolf's eye/last bells.
If anything it seems to be an informed and complementary use of the title. The way the author used it one way and the character used it the other is even better imo.
So we have seen the maiden and mother aspects of the dryad/forest quislings in hanna and the other called lady. I feel the crone will be mostly tree. Three female characters and three male characters seems about right(leaving out hanna's poor father).
The earlier use of the stream to educate hanna makes steve's mention of the river seem more ominous. For some reason I imagined the Eyrewood as an oasis of life in an undead desert or wasteland with the river being one interface and the borders of the forest being the other. I saw human villages above the alpine line on mountainsides. With woodsmen and hunters living there to protect their families from the forest while being able to live off it. I see these humans as taking a different approach than the humans who have used the lookouts style. And the tithe is how nature is getting its due. Dryads seduce some of the hunters and woodsmen and give them daughters. These daughters return to the forest as a protection against the invaders, their own fathers in some tragic cases.
And when the eyrewood does a similar thing on the shores with the undead river or border with the surrounding wastelands? I think that is where the crone comes in. I mean what better weapon against vampires could there be but an immortal tree person thing or even thousands of them standing 'hand in hand' all around the eyre. (For some reason all my rpg world ideas are in zombie/vampire apocalypse worlds right now.)
Anyhow, waiting for monday like a kid on christmas eve.
Who hunts and cuts
for the midnight fire? Ask the daughter's sire
Why did your mother lie
and conspire? Asks the daughter's sire
How is hair and vine entwined
out in the briar? Ask the daughter's sire
How is whole and cloven
found interwoven? Ask the daughter's sire
What gave birth to her
and made her ire? Don't ask the daughter's sire
Yes I meant "middle-age" as in "adult" - I was missing an adult metaphor/anachronism to match the two puberty narratives. Fantasy "Trenches", perhaps. The grizzled, teleporting badasses don't strike me as immediately recognizable; perhaps they are just any group of society dropouts, refugees from the rat race? Then I don't get why they, thematically, can't help the Daughter?
Oh, other stuff that are cosmologically reminiscent include Thief (TDP) and Earthsea.
While it's important that stories be written with some purpose (too much fantasy today is written without the intent to say anything), not every element of a story is making a broader point--telling a coherent narrative is just as important. There is not an allusion to the reality of aging within every single character in the story (what does the owl-beast represent??). Also, while the puberty analogy is clear, I would assume that this means less that the entire universe is an elaborate metaphor for growing up, and more that growing up is a real-world phenomenon and thus makes an otherwise abstract story more relateable (sp). There may not be a thematic reason why they can't help the daughter, but there is an in-universe one. Also, Tycho told us his inspiration for the Thornwatch in this strip--not a specific group of society, but rather the "three ways people think they are helping when they're really not". Again, this isn't to make the entire strip a parable, but to infuse the story with realistic people that may remind us of people we've met.
Fantasy doesn't need to say anything, it just needs to be cohesive and maybe hit a theme. World-building and characters are . . . frankly, held to made-up and illusory standards. A lot of things are simply insinuated to give the appearance of richness and texture, and on their own, do not a good book make.
Earthsea . . . is not remotely alike Lookouts. Especially as it's a Taoist meditation. It's about having restraint in the use of power.
Lookouts is more about parental anxiety issues that's segued into a story about alienation and social anomie. (I suppose that's not surprising given Mike and Jerry's background.)
I have a particular fondness of fantasy with brevity, which is why I'm fond of Earthsea and Robert E. Howard.
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PedroAsaniBrotherhood of the Squirrel[Prime]Registered Userregular
But verisimilitude is the whole problem: "Lookouts" is pitch perfect magical realism ("What if we combine this relatable, mundane thing with a supernatural setting?"). "Daughters" OTOH slides into equal-opportunity fan service; "Thornwatch" is ... product placement? That was too harsh, perhaps, but it comes across as a bit jumbled.
To compare it to some other popular magical realism: "the Magicians" is fantastic because it's so relatable while "Harry Potter" is just a bunch of crap thrown together.
I think you have a little too much cynicism there. Daughters being EO fan service is just bollocks. For one, it explains why the village doesn't just expand, kill off the local wildlife that harasses them and evolve into a more technological town. The Forest fights back, and uses the Daughters as guardians.
Thornwatch being product placement.. I don't know where to begin. The first Thornwatch comic came out quite a while back, and the game is still in the Alpha testing stage. Khoo would never allow such a slapdash marketing strategy.
Thornwatch are the individualists. They see the "balance" argument that the Lookouts and Daughters make as a false veneer over real suffering. They don't accept the status quo of "People will die in service of the Lookouts" or "The Forest won't go against Nature". If you have read the Cryptozoic comics you can see just how many people die whilst either being a Lookout, or through the forest being allowed to stay as wild and hostile as it is.
It seems cool and all, but they're a little too coy with whats going on. I only have a vague idea, and they longer they hold off the more my interest wanes. I have to wait and wait for updates, but the update is still coy. "What's going on here? Who knows. Will we tell you? Nope." MEH.
Looks cool though.
"Freedom is on the march, but it gets winded rather quickly."
Wwen, part of what you're talking about stems from the "3 a week" format. If you read all 10 strips in one sitting you probably wouldn't have a problem with the pacing. Similarly, I know a lot of people like to read Order of the Stick only in batches rather than piecemeal as they sporadically get released. Different strokes and all that.
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HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
I like that she starts to disagree with the name of the berries.
In my head she didn't used to know that berry, and she has no reason to know it, but for some reason she knows exactly just from the description. And that scares her.
This is a great story and great artwork. What is really cool is that if you go back to the first panel you can see Hanna was starting to change before she left home, I just thought she had a flower in her hair in comic one and then later on it looked like she had blossoms from the trees on her head but looking back you can see it was hints of what was to come. Very clever Penny Arcade, very clever. Looks like there is a confrontation ahead with the scouts.
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PedroAsaniBrotherhood of the Squirrel[Prime]Registered Userregular
It seems cool and all, but they're a little too coy with whats going on. I only have a vague idea, and they longer they hold off the more my interest wanes. I have to wait and wait for updates, but the update is still coy. "What's going on here? Who knows. Will we tell you? Nope." MEH.
Looks cool though.
Part of that is the trend in media to spoon feed you conclusions and spell everything out for you. Now you lack patience.
This is a ten part comic. The reveal is going to be in part nine or ten. There may be other questions that are not answered, which leave room for the Thornwatch comic that now seems inevitable (and will no doubt require us to wait a while before it begins) but given the size of the world they are creating this will always be the case.
I'll be honest, I come to PA for gaming related comics which may or may not contain dick jokes, I feel the none video game/dick joke comics get in the way.
Except for this one.
I'm really really enjoying this, though as with anything of this nature I much prefer not to check every time one is posted and instead come back every week or so and do a big catch up.
Posts
Middle-age is what was said.
I read that as middle-aged people, 40s-50s because the Lookouts and Daughters are so much younger. We see the effects of decisions made by them (The Elders), but no real direct intervention. Do they know the facts about the Thornwatch, but choose to keep the superstition? Or are they blind and just following traditions handed down? Is there some unspoken awareness that they know they are doing the wrong thing, but nobody wants to be the first to speak up for fear they will be shouted down and possibly thrown out of office? That kind of thing is much more interesting to me than the "middle-ages".
"Middle-ages" is mostly about feudalism. I'm less inclined to see it go in that direction just because the amount of advancement required for that would be completely at odds with the Eyrewood setting. Mining that much ore for the armor, clearing that much forest for grazing horses, the Daughters wouldn't allow it. Whilst there may be a road through the forest to allow that kind of traffic, those on the road won't venture far from it, and the village is going to be too deep in the forest to ever be impacted by it.
If there is an Age of Chivalry going on outside the Eyrewood, I don't think we will see it. And if it isn't happening, there is a good reason why: the Forest will not allow it.
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But mostly because I really want a physical book of this sort of thing.
it's pretty sad how people don't read anymore
I find that hard to get my head around. Like this was written with a 40 to 50 y.o. perspective, or what? I'm not even sure what is meant by that. Is that a trend in fantasy?
There are a lot of slanderous rhymes about the Thornwatch and the Daughters, and I assume these rhymes effectively represent the views of conventional society (i.e. "The Elders").
The rest of your questions I broadly assume that the answer simply is, "Yes, but not always."
1) Plenty of real world people might know that certain beliefs are false or not entirely true, but choose to promote general ignorance because they're afraid of the consequences of a widespread change in belief. The rumors may not exactly be true, but it's worth the price because moral fabric of society and think of the children.
2) Yes, a lot of people blindly follow authority just because.
3) There are also people operating under an unsettling cognitive dissonance or are afraid of social repercussions (e.g. gay rights). We must assume that the childrens' mentor in the original Lookouts is one of these. He secretly cheated the books when and if he could. Likewise, I assume the older Daughter, that Hanna knew met, knew enough about the Daughters but was never compelled to act until it became her problem.
I just blandly assume that all these people exist in numbers inside of conventional society as a due matter of course.
Oh, other stuff that are cosmologically reminiscent include Thief (TDP) and Earthsea.
No, I took it to mean "where are the Elders?"
1, 2 and 3, pretty much. But so far we haven't seen them, and I am curious as to how they operate. Is the village run by one person, who passes on the "forbidden knowledge" to the successor? A Council, a Church, or even some kind of collective agreement between the adults?
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Because the change happening to Hanna is part of the Magic of the Forest, and trying to go against it would be like trying to kick the ocean off the beach.
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Good to know you don't read Dan Brown books.
But why do you feel this way? What exactly do you see as being "wrong" or "bad" about it?
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Hopefully if/when they do another round of Ad-free Penny Arcade on Kickstarter, we can make suggestions for the projects they should undertake. I think Eyrewood as a Graphic Novel would be a popular choice. In my mind the layout would include the previous comics as either an Epilogue, or at the back for reference.
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My Digital Pin Lanyard
I prefer to respond to one person per post. That way if they reply, they don't need to cut out the others I respond to that don't pertain to their part of the conversation. Hope that's ok.
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While it's important that stories be written with some purpose (too much fantasy today is written without the intent to say anything), not every element of a story is making a broader point--telling a coherent narrative is just as important. There is not an allusion to the reality of aging within every single character in the story (what does the owl-beast represent??). Also, while the puberty analogy is clear, I would assume that this means less that the entire universe is an elaborate metaphor for growing up, and more that growing up is a real-world phenomenon and thus makes an otherwise abstract story more relateable (sp). There may not be a thematic reason why they can't help the daughter, but there is an in-universe one. Also, Tycho told us his inspiration for the Thornwatch in this strip--not a specific group of society, but rather the "three ways people think they are helping when they're really not". Again, this isn't to make the entire strip a parable, but to infuse the story with realistic people that may remind us of people we've met.
To compare it to some other popular magical realism: "the Magicians" is fantastic because it's so relatable while "Harry Potter" is just a bunch of crap thrown together.
In short, some fields are too fertile not to grow.
I got some more reading to do if there is a thread for each installment. Good.
I didn't take the use of the word witch to be slur-ish. To me it worked with the wolf's eye/last bells.
So we have seen the maiden and mother aspects of the dryad/forest quislings in hanna and the other called lady. I feel the crone will be mostly tree. Three female characters and three male characters seems about right(leaving out hanna's poor father).
The earlier use of the stream to educate hanna makes steve's mention of the river seem more ominous. For some reason I imagined the Eyrewood as an oasis of life in an undead desert or wasteland with the river being one interface and the borders of the forest being the other. I saw human villages above the alpine line on mountainsides. With woodsmen and hunters living there to protect their families from the forest while being able to live off it. I see these humans as taking a different approach than the humans who have used the lookouts style. And the tithe is how nature is getting its due. Dryads seduce some of the hunters and woodsmen and give them daughters. These daughters return to the forest as a protection against the invaders, their own fathers in some tragic cases.
And when the eyrewood does a similar thing on the shores with the undead river or border with the surrounding wastelands? I think that is where the crone comes in. I mean what better weapon against vampires could there be but an immortal tree person thing or even thousands of them standing 'hand in hand' all around the eyre. (For some reason all my rpg world ideas are in zombie/vampire apocalypse worlds right now.)
Anyhow, waiting for monday like a kid on christmas eve.
Who hunts and cuts
for the midnight fire?
Ask the daughter's sire
Why did your mother lie
and conspire?
Asks the daughter's sire
How is hair and vine entwined
out in the briar?
Ask the daughter's sire
How is whole and cloven
found interwoven?
Ask the daughter's sire
What gave birth to her
and made her ire?
Don't ask the daughter's sire
I thought this was obvious - a Warrior-Jumper just rolled a critical fail on his "Jungleafy" ability and got a forest instead.
Fantasy doesn't need to say anything, it just needs to be cohesive and maybe hit a theme. World-building and characters are . . . frankly, held to made-up and illusory standards. A lot of things are simply insinuated to give the appearance of richness and texture, and on their own, do not a good book make.
Earthsea . . . is not remotely alike Lookouts. Especially as it's a Taoist meditation. It's about having restraint in the use of power.
Lookouts is more about parental anxiety issues that's segued into a story about alienation and social anomie. (I suppose that's not surprising given Mike and Jerry's background.)
I have a particular fondness of fantasy with brevity, which is why I'm fond of Earthsea and Robert E. Howard.
I think you have a little too much cynicism there. Daughters being EO fan service is just bollocks. For one, it explains why the village doesn't just expand, kill off the local wildlife that harasses them and evolve into a more technological town. The Forest fights back, and uses the Daughters as guardians.
Thornwatch being product placement.. I don't know where to begin. The first Thornwatch comic came out quite a while back, and the game is still in the Alpha testing stage. Khoo would never allow such a slapdash marketing strategy.
Thornwatch are the individualists. They see the "balance" argument that the Lookouts and Daughters make as a false veneer over real suffering. They don't accept the status quo of "People will die in service of the Lookouts" or "The Forest won't go against Nature". If you have read the Cryptozoic comics you can see just how many people die whilst either being a Lookout, or through the forest being allowed to stay as wild and hostile as it is.
Nusquam Findi Factionis
My Digital Pin Lanyard
Looks cool though.
Part of that is the trend in media to spoon feed you conclusions and spell everything out for you. Now you lack patience.
This is a ten part comic. The reveal is going to be in part nine or ten. There may be other questions that are not answered, which leave room for the Thornwatch comic that now seems inevitable (and will no doubt require us to wait a while before it begins) but given the size of the world they are creating this will always be the case.
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My Digital Pin Lanyard
Except for this one.
I'm really really enjoying this, though as with anything of this nature I much prefer not to check every time one is posted and instead come back every week or so and do a big catch up.
PSN: SirGrinchX
Oculus Rift: Sir_Grinch