The characters in the strip have occasionally mentioned feats, spells, skills, and templates which do not exist in the default D&D rules, usually for comedic purposes, such as "Summon Plot Exposition", "Craft Disturbing Mental Image", a paladin ability of "Summon Conscience", and "Evan's Spiked Tentacles of Forced Intrusion", a parody of the spell "Evard's Black Tentacles". Burlew, however, has stated that he does not wish to limit the characters by making concrete character sheets for them. The characters are mostly book-legal Dungeons & Dragons version 3.5 characters. According to Rich Burlew, the author of the strip, the characters are roughly 7th to 9th level when the comic begins, though the characters have displayed abilities that require them to be 13th to 15th level since he made that statement. This section deals with characters that are members of the Order of the Stick. įrom Left to Right: Belkar, Vaarsuvius, Elan, Haley, Durkon, and Roy. Lev Grossman of Time said that Burlew sometimes "imbues them with a weird epic majesty". Time magazine and Black Gate praised the comic characters for their expressiveness, even if they are drawn as stick figures. Burlew attributed the interest of readers in these secondary characters to the continuous, interconnected plot of the comic. Several minor characters got stand-alone comics on their backgrounds as a result of the stretch goals in its Kickstarter campaign. These strips, among others, are collected in "Snips, Snails and Dragon Tales". An alternate version of the strip appeared monthly in Dragon magazine for 22 issues. Among these collections are "On the Origin of PCs", "Start of Darkness", and "Snips, Snails and Dragon Tales". Īlthough it is principally distributed online at the website Giant in the Playground, seven book collections have been published, including several print-only stories. While primarily comedic in nature, The Order of the Stick features a continuing storyline serialized episodes from one to four pages. Much of the comic's humor stems from these characters either being aware of the game rules that affect their lives or having anachronistic knowledge of modern culture, which in turn is often used by the author to parody various aspects of role-playing games and fantasy fiction. Taking place in a magical world that loosely operates by the rules of the 3.5 edition Dungeons & Dragons (D&D), the comic follows the sometimes-farcical exploits of six adventurers as they strive to save the world from an evil lich. Celebrating and satirizing tabletop role-playing games and medieval fantasy, this tale of the eponymous fellowship of adventuring heroes is written and illustrated by Rich Burlew in a stick-figure style. This is a list of characters from the webcomic The Order of the Stick (OOTS). ( October 2011) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)
Please help rewrite it to explain the fiction more clearly and provide non-fictional perspective. The title refers to Elan's belief in the last frame that they are in a dream-within-a-dream-within-a-dream (with the first fantasy being the Order of the Stick comics themselves, as he noted in #889), due to the fact that Roy apologized to Elan and told him he did a good job.This article describes a work or element of fiction in a primarily in-universe style.Roy: And I'm sorry I snapped at you earlier. Roy: Elan, if you have any songs that boost saving throws, now's the time.
Roy: Just because we're outnumbered and outmagicked doesn't mean we can't pull off an upset! Roy: I got to spend time with him knowing, on some level, that he could be gone at any moment. Roy: You know, it's weird.even though I know Durkon is still eing him in the dream sort of let me say godbye. Roy: Elan, I don't think a bunch of.of dreams and good feelings are going to help us defeat an ultra-powerful sorcerer lich.Įlan: Sure they are! It's called, "morale," Roy. For us.Įlan: I'm sure of it now, more than ever!Įlan: And Roy, now whenever you get sad or start wondering whether or not you can do it-just think about how awesome it felt to kill Xykon!Įlan: Though honestly, you may want to work on a snappier one-liner for when you do. We just have to pick one and make it happen.Įlan: I may not get that happy ending.but there's another one out there waiting for me. At least I got to see what it'd be like.Įlan: I don't think there's just one possible happy ending, Haley.Įlan: There are, like, tons of possibilities. I'm so sorry that you had to live through something that can never.you know.Įlan: Don't be. Haley: But that eing your family like that. Belkar: So then what happened in your dream? Was I in it?