Episode 17: The Gate

Season 1
Episode 17
The Gate

Finally, a battle! Hope you enjoy! And many thanks to Sialboats who not only taught me how to make a sniper vision, but also stepped in and helped my with the sabers since Alpha couldn't! So many thanks! Enjoy!

















































Okay, so I'm really happy with this episode! I learned a lot, and I feel that I finally had a good battle! Hope you enjoyed it!

*Sigh*

They haven't been the same since Furball died.

Ooh, I sense Versilles will cross to the dark side in chasing down the sniper villain (love the scope-shot, by the way, and the triangle targeting system), and then get turned back by Ki'lar, and it'll be a fuzzy happy romancio ending, maybe with Lofsurra appearing as a force ghost. MAYBE, just maybe.

Nice comic; the snow effects are making it a little hard to see what's going on. They're OK with close-up shots, but when you pan out with the camera for a wider shot, the objects in the shots are thus smaller and are concealed even more via the snow.

It's still a good battle; maybe make those blaster effects a tad larger.

Remind me again why the mysterious scout-trooper-helmeted fellow is such a threat? He shot someone point-blank while she just stood there, and didn't blow her into tiny pieces. Also, if Versilles does believe that Scoutcloak (congratulations on your new nickname, Scoutcloak!) is a threat, why is he going after him alone? Take a squad with you at least, man!

He's blinded by his anger. Obviously.

80-0 wrote:Nice comic; the snow effects are making it a little hard to see what's going on. They're OK with close-up shots, but when you pan out with the camera for a wider shot, the objects in the shots are thus smaller and are concealed even more via the snow.

It's still a good battle; maybe make those blaster effects a tad larger.

Glad you enjoyed it! Yes, the snow is harder when you pan out, as it would be in real life

And will do with the blasters!

The Jinja Ninja wrote:Remind me again why the mysterious scout-trooper-helmeted fellow is such a threat? He shot someone point-blank while she just stood there, and didn't blow her into tiny pieces. Also, if Versilles does believe that Scoutcloak (congratulations on your new nickname, Scoutcloak!) is a threat, why is he going after him alone? Take a squad with you at least, man!

Um, he din't blow her to pieces becuase she dodged the blunt of the blow (it's mentioned in the next episode, I promise ) Also, Versilles did notchase him down. Versilles simply tried to get at him, and when the attacker fled, Versilles stayed where he was, for reasons you just mentioned, it would be silly to go after him witrhout a squad.

Also Jinja, thank you for reminding me about keeping the text about the same size. after about page 5 of this I tried it out. You're right, it looks fantastically better! I will continue to do my best with it!

Thanks for the commments you two!

How could I have not have seen this !



Now then: The CIS is being painted as another brutal occupier. AOS will give you hell for than and I'm going to shrink away from the concept, as it's trite and overused. Please suprise me somehow. Don't do the inverse of what we're expecting, but do at least something new and creative .

I want to see Scoutcloak fleshed out more as a menace. Has it been established that he is the fellow who attacked the cast on our previous planet? Because if I can't remember, not many others can, either .

Don't kill off the Padawan. I now consider there to be nothing worse than someone set up to die a pointless death . I learned that with Meehan. It just isn't satisfying.

Other than that, another solid comic for your standard, Zeph !

As Sial has pointed out, I should be giving you hell for the CIS being shown yet again as the evil oppressors they're shown to be in just about every frakkin' single other peice of Star Wars media, but I've been distracted.

That Jedi, Ki'lar, or whatever her name was, looked exactly like one featured as a main character in my old and incredibly bad and stupid) series, Droid Trek: http://www.mocpages.com/image_zoom.php?mocid=93898&id=/user_images/8633/12329315485
Why yes, I use those skeleton heads with red eyes for aliens too. Coincidence? And luckily for you, you've been spared my rant.

Tag me!

So yeah, why wouldn't the CIS "treat any prisoners with rights"? If anyone's gonna have a tendency towards war crimes, surely it would be the Republic; a little false surrender on Christophsis is brought to mind. Plus, y'know, it fits. The Republic is bloated and corrupt and probably not immune to a bribe or two to look the other way while the army does something douchebaggy. The CIS, on the other hand, is just starting out and probably wants to maintain good PR so that systems don't start leaving it. Even as a Sith, Dooku was fairly classy. So why are the CIS presented as asshats the whole time? I could understand it in, say, The Clone Wars TV show, but you've got free rein here to do what you like without worrying about ickle kiddies in the audience. Go nuts.

Also, you need to centre the text in your speech bubbles.

Of course the CIS aren't completely evil. I plan to develop almost all my CIS characters. However, the Republic would paint their enemy as taking no prisoners.

On the hand of the padawan, don't worry Sial. I just used her getting shot to move her to a different location, and set up cloak-trooper as a threat. She'll be around for a while

And I'll center them form now on... but I've already edited halfway through episode 19, so you'll see that kick into effect at 20...

An interesting arguement I had with my engish teacher, who happens to also be a friend of mine (in a teacher sort of way, you know?), comes to mind. I complained to him that in Shakespeare, some characters are evil... just for the sake of being evil. Some just are greedy people. He claims that the idea that everything needs a motivation, and explaination, is very new. He explained that there are evil people. They may just be greedy, or jealous, or just do it for kicks, or are insane, but for whatever reason they're just pure evil. It doesn't need to be explained, they don't need a past, they're just awful people. I hope to not use that too much in this, but I do want some characters, actually, only one character, to represent pure and utter evil.

Zepher wrote:I hope to not use that too much in this, but I do want some characters, actually, only one character, to represent pure and utter evil.

Of course! But evil takes many shapes. Don't assume the most trite and comfortable one, either. Evil should be fun. Evil should be cool. Evil should be something we really would like to be if the rest of the world wouldn't scorn us for it, or we didn't have a system of morality. Evil is not a guy who goes around beating up old men for money and siding with rapists .

That's obvious evil. It's miserably basic and outrageously stupid .

Make your evil fellow attractive. While I sort of stay away from the light-dark dichotomy, if I ever had to make a complete and utter baddie, I'd know what I'd do .

My eyes still haven't stopped bleeding from those colors.

Though all my other sentiments have been stated by Jinja and Sial, so I'll just say good job.

Sialboats wrote: Evil should be fun. Evil should be cool. Evil should be something we really would like to be if the rest of the world wouldn't scorn us for it, or we didn't have a system of morality.

Like the Joker in the Dark Knight? Or more like... Maybe Gul Dukat?

Awesome-o-saurus wrote:

Sialboats wrote: Evil should be fun. Evil should be cool. Evil should be something we really would like to be if the rest of the world wouldn't scorn us for it, or we didn't have a system of morality.

Like the Joker in the Dark Knight? Or more like... Maybe Gul Dukat?

Both are good examples, but both are still "obvious evil". The Joker was... well, the Joker, and Dukat was an overtly power-hungry and amoral bastard with a sadistic streak and a manipulative flair .

The matter of the fact is, evil should be seductive. It should be something you want to be. You want to be a "cool", composed, cynical, badass, who has a good time with his comrades, does whatever makes him happy, and has a good life because his ambition is huge. Evil should tempt you. You get to walk around in a slick black cloak, you get to pay people who piss you off back, you have massive wealth and massive power, you get to take an easier path in your challenges. The hero should be tantalized by this all. But the hero defines himself by not caving into this.

But most important of all, the evil doer does nothing to goes out of his way to commit evil-doings. It simply is their habitual state - committing all these objectionable deeds. Talk to a pot smoker, and does he deliberately fill his lungs with the vapors of intoxicating cannabis to be "bad"? No. Furthermore, our villain thinks that nothing is wrong with his actions and behavior. It's simply how he acts. He can rationalize everything he does, and he can justify his actions at all turns without a whit of doubt.

So, my summary of a interesting baddie:

The villain should always be someone you'd like to be. The villain doesn't think he is a villain. The villain can defend his actions. The villains actions should be things that you'd like to do. None of the villain's actions should be committed for the sake of being villainous.

Yep, I think I covered it all .

Sialboats wrote:

Awesome-o-saurus wrote:

Sialboats wrote: Evil should be fun. Evil should be cool. Evil should be something we really would like to be if the rest of the world wouldn't scorn us for it, or we didn't have a system of morality.

Like the Joker in the Dark Knight? Or more like... Maybe Gul Dukat?

Both are good examples, but both are still "obvious evil". The Joker was... well, the Joker, and Dukat was an overtly power-hungry and amoral bastard with a sadistic streak and a manipulative flair .

The matter of the fact is, evil should be seductive. It should be something you want to be. You want to be a "cool", composed, cynical, badass, who has a good time with his comrades, does whatever makes him happy, and has a good life because his ambition is huge. Evil should tempt you. You get to walk around in a slick black cloak, you get to pay people who piss you off back, you have massive wealth and massive power, you get to take an easier path in your challenges. The hero should be tantalized by this all. But the hero defines himself by not caving into this.

But most important of all, the evil doer does nothing to goes out of his way to commit evil-doings. It simply is their habitual state - committing all these objectionable deeds. Talk to a pot smoker, and does he deliberately fill his lungs with the vapors of intoxicating cannabis to be "bad"? No. Furthermore, our villain thinks that nothing is wrong with his actions and behavior. It's simply how he acts. He can rationalize everything he does, and he can justify his actions at all turns without a whit of doubt.

So, my summary of a interesting baddie:

The villain should always be someone you'd like to be. The villain doesn't think he is a villain. The villain can defend his actions. The villains actions should be things that you'd like to do. None of the villain's actions should be committed for the sake of being villainous.

Yep, I think I covered it all .

Ah, I see... Very nice... paragraphs, as usual. I'm starting to think I'm a less advanced version of you, almost. A villian who thinks they aren't a villian is how I've been trying to put things forever. Failpages noobs and thier little comics don't understand this. They'd probably explode if you were introduced to their enviroment.

Of course villians don't think they're evil. War isn't good vs. evil (almost always, with only a few exceptions I can think of). Each side is either looking for personal gain, or defending themselves, or whatever.

However.... :spammers: