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New page! The Tanuki god attempts to gain yet another avatar! Three is a magic number as they say. I think that originated with the Druids, but no doubt it’s older than that. Given that humans have been around for at least 300000 years, Druids are quite a recent phenominon.
Makes me wonder about whether there were a whole bunch of other civilisations before the Asyrians and Babylonians and Egyptians and what have you. There could have been dozens of empires and nations who’s evidence was merely never found or was worn away or was even mis-identified (that one strange piece of jewelry found in an Anicent Babylonian dig site was actually tens of thousands of years old when the ancient Babylonians got a hold of it, maybe?…). Makes ya think.
I guess a lot of it will never be known. I just find it hard to beleive that humans were hunter gatherers for 290000 years and then suddenly started building cities. I feel like there may have been cities before. Maybe many times before. Civilisations that fell and were then utterly erased by the hand of time…
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Ahh casual nudity is always nice in a comic. so is not so casual nudity (wink,wink)
Yeah-A lot of comics would be even better with more of that sort of thing 😉
Since the time they speaks and have fun each other ones , i bet that the critters of the area have moved to them now . Leave from here won’t be easy
New cards for Rath and sex slaves for Zeen ?
Animals tend to avoid this place, but there may be other creatures nearby….
Maybe they’ll meet Zeen “main” wife here ? Xb
Hello there.
Name’s Daemon. I have a review Show on Twitter, usually look at more hard-core style content but decided to use BTB as the focal work in a new retrospective look-see style show, where I’ll be covering BTB from inception to modernity, giving thoughts, observations, and overall opinions on it every step of the way.
Neat to see that the latest page is still as chalk full of good-lusty vibes as I remembered. It’ll be fun analyzing the evolution of the comic to get the broad scope on how it gets to this point.
Not sure how many of you folks reading it would be interested in my look-see, but figure I’ll post a link to its first part here (covering the ‘character creation’porcess of the core trio to their leaving the starter dungeon)
https://x.com/Daem0nik/status/1782531749144297754
Oh, and if your interested, I’d be interested in picking your brain for anecdotes, BTBPeter.
I honestly can’t promise my look-see will be positive from start to finish, I originally fell off reading around the midpoint, but I’ve got fond memories of the beginning stretch, and’ll give fair shakes as best as I can.
All in all, this comic helped me get over myself when it came to appreciating good natured saucyness, and also helped spark a love for DnD in me after starting off on rocky ground with so-so 4E sessions, so thanks for that in any case.
Probably going to stick to posting comments further back now in spots relative to my overview of the series.
Cheers all.
Thanks for taking the time to comment and to talk about my work 🙂 Yes, I wouldn’t expect wall to wall positivity of course. This project has always been an ‘I’ll do my best at the time’ affair and my best (as anyone’s is) is limited to my own imperfect abilities, time constraints and circumstance 🙂
I also know that my work is certainly not to everyone’s taste and I’m sure the increased sauciness left a fair few readers behind-But then, I’ve always made the comic to be (hopefully) something that a few people love rather than one that a large crowd tolerates. There’s so much safe, designed by committee grey sludge out there made by the big companies (as well as a lot of smaller creators who try to emulate that sort of content), so I think there’s room for something that’s a lot spicier and stranger than the modern norm 🙂
Not that I have anything against stuff designed to be family friendly and inoffensive. Nor do I mean to offend anyone with my work. But as a lone creator I have the freedom to make something a bit different. It’s the responsibility of creators such as myself to use that freedom and make ‘art’ (for want of a better word) that provides an experience that you can’t find elsewhere.
Those’re basically my feelings about what I’m trying to do. ‘Make a comic that I would like to read’ is the heart of it, I suppose. If I can get a gang of fellow maniacs and misfits to read along with me then I’m very happy and honoured to have them 🙂
I wish history class included unanswered questions and theories (not conspiracy ones, just the educated speculations), and not just learning who was in power when, which wars they fought, and when which technology or art style was developed. I didn’t know that humans were hunters/gatherers for 290K years and only started building cities 10K years ago. It really does make me wonder what happened, especially since parts of the world were still hunters/gatherers when nations in the area that’s Europe now went conquering Africa and America. Why were the native Americans not roughly as developed as European countries when Columbus went there? Why do we still have tribes in Africa? Would we be back in the stone age if the existence of nuclear bombs and thus the threat of nuclear annihilation hadn’t forced the world’s strongest nations to stop warring each other?
Those questions would’ve been so much more interesting to talk about.
Btw: Your explanation that the Tanuki God is an avatar slut came at the perfect time, because I just started wondering what happened to Kazu.
Also I’m very curious how capable Zeen is going to be. Since he’s a mage who suddently got the body of a strong warrior, I wonder if he’s gonna be conflicted about his level progression. If this is still D&D-based, then The Order of the Stick comes to mind, where they’re currently fighting the second evil dragon that has magical powers, so I guess if this was a serious comic, Zeen would probably learn magic that goes well with his strength, e.g. Anti-Magic Sphere (where enemy casters get disabled while you’re still a buff dragon).
Yes, history at school was a mixed bag. Often very interesting but obviously quite limited by time. I don’t have a lot of spare time to read, but I do listen to a lot of Audiobooks and history based youtube (Laserpig, LordHardthasher and Drachinifel are particularly good-though there’s lots to choose from). I read a book called ‘Guns Germs and Steel’ a while ago which has a lot of theories about why certain areas of the world advanced and others did not. I’d also recommend Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History podcast. Very good stuff.
Buff spells could make Zeen a decent warrior, though buffing is less of a thing in 5E (since you can often only focus on one spell at a time). There is a warrior wizard Arcane Tradition that gives the wizard some combat buffs (additional attack and access to light armour plus a special combat stance) so that might be a way to go for him.
Yes, I remember the first dragon getting all her relatives killed by the elf in Order of the Stick. And the halfling killing a lot of kobolds. They seem to have it in for reptilian races in that setting XD Good comic though 🙂
Honestly, I bet there’s a good chance that the next generation of teachers, i.e. people who grew up with Youtube as kids, are going to use Youtubers to make their lessons more entertaining while at the same time getting the kids to actually remember some stuff beyond the exams. I mean, smartphones is all that kids these days know, so what else are they gonna do? 😉
Buff spells are a good idea. I briefly googled if you can combine Fighter and Wizard in D&D 3.5E, because I expect it to be tough because they have no intersection regarding which attributes are needed most, but apparently there’s the Eldritch Knight prestige class that’s mostly a fighter, but who can also cast e.g. Mage Armor and stuff, so I assume you can build him like one of the dextrous fighter types (with Whirlwind Attack etc.) rather than a tanky one. But I know nothing about 5E and I’m not gonna learn it unless some group of friends really wants me to join a campaign or something.
“Yes, I remember the first dragon getting all her relatives killed by the elf in Order of the Stick.”
Oh yes, I had so many mixed feelings about that one, most prominently something like “Sooo…. can any epic necromancer get a spell like that? They’re totally doomed!”.
So, just out of curiosity: Did you read on until they went to Girard’s Gate?
I can’t really remember where I got to that well. I think they were in a city with lots of airships? I didn’t decide to stop reading it or anything-I was still enjoying it. Life just got in the way and I fell behind and forgot where I was up to. I expect that happens a lot with web comics 🙂
Fighter/Wizard can be difficult to pull off and is probably not the best idea, but can lead to some cool abilities. Really though, a fighter and a wizard working together will normally be better than two fighter/wizards-Though maybe not, given the terrible lameness of Fighters in 3.5. 5th Ed definitely balanced that better (though some people still seem to think spellcasters are too good).
There’s an Anime which I keep meaning to watch about a wizard that prefers to fight with his fists. Maybe Zeen could do that. Just stay pure wizard and also attack physically? The anime also has a buff female fighter whome I find compelling on a purely artistic basis… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tNAuQLWhCU
Ok, that happened before Girard’s Gate, so I’m not gonna spoil why I brought it up unless you want to know. 🙂
Wizards in 3.5 were definitely stronger than fighters at high levels, but how are you supposed to balance a meat shield vs. someone who can throw literal meteor swarms around on a daily basis anyway? I guess a fighter would have to get superhuman strength, speed and resilience to keep up with that. So basically like Superman, but not quite as powerful and without the flying, ice breath and the X-Ray vision.
Rune Soldier looks interesting and I think I may have seen that training scene in an AMV somewhere once. I love how Animes often don’t take themselves too seriously, e.g. by having her break a log by twisting her sword around inside it. XD
I thought Alice had a small patch of hair down there….ehn it is early for me, coming out of a sleeping daze.
She could have, I suppose-Though it wouldn’t be very much (since she’s a half elf) 🙂