The Dreadful -- Chapter 12: James

[MSperoni]

I don't really get why people are saying characters have "DBZ" over powered powers in this. They have whacky awesome abilities, but they can't fly around and do *anything*.

Jeanne and Kit are the only ones so far with super-standard abilities apart from basic magic use, but people using magic in a fantasy story is part of the genre, isn't it?

Jeanne and Kit aren't juggernauts. Kit's really durable against normal weapons, but if she was shot in the head with a silver bullet it would kill her. Jeanne is super fast and physically strong, but she's not Superman. Shoot her enough and she will eventually fall (think Wesker from Resident Evil 5).

Or if you wanna go DnD...think of Jeanne as a very very high level Monk. (or Black Belt from Final Fantasy!)

Umami, Hachiko and Shichiko have ninja abilities, true, but Hachiko's magic stick and Shichiko's eyebeams aren't going to withstand a shotgun blast to the face. Umami also ninja-teleported away when she was fighting Sabueso because the JDA agent pulled a gun on her.

(I kinda figure Shichiko's eyebeams are similar to one of the various rays in DnD. Only instead of coming from her finger tips it comes from her eyes. )

Same with Charsi. Her glaive is super sharp and can slice a demon in half, but two dudes with rifles held her up because she's not bulletproof.

So I dunno, none of this really screams "blow up a planet with a Kamehameha" to me...

Well...except for maybe Judge Catherine but I'm not gonna get into her right now.


As for everything else that's been said regarding the tangents and the design of the comic and what my intentions are... I think I'll let you all keep discussing that on your own. It's very interesting for me to read!

[Moosh]

There is no standard unit of measure of "power level" of characters in fiction, and it is largely a matter of perspective and preference. If people say a given character seems overpowered, there's no real objective way to "prove" it. The more people point it out, though, the more likely it is to be the case.

One of the things that stands out is it's pretty clear a standard human being is essentially fodder in this comic. That alone wouldn't be an issue, except none of the "norms" seem to know it. They tote their guns around like they actually pose a threat. And they can! Off screen. When its convenient to the plot. And it's largely because guns being a threat in this comic quickly became an "informed ability."

It didn't start out that way. Early on we see some actual believable gunfighting between Liz and Erin. This is, frankly, the most tense part of the comic so far, because it seems to be the only time any main character is actually worried about being shot. When the gang of gunmen come and threaten Boozloaf, we don't get any sense of Kit being concerned for even a moment. She shoots everyone's thumbs/guns, then trickshots the only guy there that could feasibly pose a threat (because he has kryptonite silver bullets) without batting an eye.

You point out that characters aren't "bulletproof," but after the gunfight between Liz and Erin, it seems everyone might as well be. Kit literally is bulletproof, aside from silver bullets. Jeanne holds guns in such contempt she goes fisticuffs vs. them. Even when Kit herself, who has proven to basically be a gun goddess, has a gun pointed point blank at the back of Jeanne's head, Jeanne is still too fast to shoot. And now that ninjas are around, they're all too ninja to shoot.

The problem with this is, once you establish a character's reaction/relationship to guns, it will make any future altercations involving guns seem a little ridiculous. If suddenly guns are successful in taking down someone who didn't even blink at them before, it will feel inconsistent and a little dishonest. Once you establish that guns are easily circumvented, there's no reason for the reader to take them seriously, which dramatically lessens the "western" feel of the story.

If you'll excuse the expression, I think you shot yourself in the foot when you made Kit in particular highly resistant to normal bullets. That establishes right away that she can (and does) basically ignore most mundane weaponry, which kick starts the arms race against her as a character. This eliminates any given mundane gunslinger as a threat. The addition of silver bullets doesn't really help the situation, as it creates a "Superman and Kryptonite" scenario. On the one hand they're screwed if they don't have silver, and on the other they're not even going to get a chance to fire them off anyway (because maybe they have a penchant for tossing their gun around like an idiot.)

And the arms race has been kicked into high gear with ninjas appearing on the scene, which introduced themselves by demonstrating their ability to kill you with little more than a sneeze. When you have characters play such high value cards when they first arrive (laser eyes to kill a bunny rabbit), you set the bar really high for yourself right from the get go, and you run the risk of either writing yourself into a corner, or simply pulling a DBZ, where power levels snowball out of control to the point where it anything -not- imbued with absurdly superhuman abilities becomes meaningless (Like guns).

[MSperoni]

You left out the part where Kit puked lightning and electrocuted Erin and killed a bunch of monkey men with an AK-47 and a giant sword made out of a feather.

(after having crashed into their base riding a giant fire-breathing eagle)

What can I say? I like Saints Row more than GTA. I dislike Game of Thrones. I like Star Wars more than Star Trek (I've only watched like three episodes of Trek ever). I think Sengoku Basara is great (where the guy dual wields electric chainsaws for swords). I'm a huge fan of the Resident Evil movies. I like One Piece, Metal Slug, Adventure Time, and DBZ

(for awhile I liked Naruto but I got out of it when Sasuke's bro showed up)

(my biggest complaint is that a lot of these are way too male-centric. I like lady characters better than dude characters. Hence the female:male ratio in The Dreadful).

Some people prefer things super realistic and reserved though. I'm not gonna tell 'em what to like. I do prefer Batman more than Superman, mainly because of the villains. Though I wish comics like that would stop taking themselves so goddamn seriously.

(but I like Marvel more than DC)

I dunno, maybe what's happening character power wise in The Dreadful isn't working, but it seems to be working for me, so go figure. I don't think it's gotten out of hand anymore than I intended, but then again I'm the writer and I can see further into the comic's future than the rest of ya

My main issue with my comic is I start things because I want each update to have a punch and I'm overly desperate for attention. Sometimes I'll put in crazy shit just for the sake of crazy shit, and I'll start little sub-plots, and then forget to finish them because my attention span isn't very

Hey I watched this Final Fantasy IV speed run the other day, it was super hilarious and I'm really looking forward to AGDQ2014 and

So that's why Doom is the best FPS series ever.

Anyway, I'm going to start focusing more on finishing what I start now. I've decided to structure the comic so it never cuts away from the perspective of either Kit or Poe, and that ought to help a little (that won't be evident till a few updates from now). I'm going to try really hard not to stress out over the lack of feedback and just go with what I think works for me rather than what I think works based on trends.

As for the power levels...uhhh...I dunno. I appreciate the feedback but I kinda like things on the nutty side. But I still don't think it's all that out of hand yet.

Compared to the comic I was working on before HIKYM (which you can see the main characters in my NPF banner), The Dreadful is extremely reserved

That comic pretty much was DBZ with women only with a lot of weird philosophical/theological babble and romantic drama added to it. So it was pretty great.

I wasn't good enough of a writer/artist at the time to handle it though. Maybe one of these days I'll try again...

[Glabrezu]

Sometimes I'll put in crazy shit just for the sake of crazy shit, and I'll start little sub-plots, and then forget to finish them because my attention span isn't very

Hey I watched this Final Fantasy IV speed run the other day, it was super hilarious and I'm really looking forward to AGDQ2014 and

So that's why Doom is the best FPS series ever.

Hahahaha xD


By the way we have quite a good example of crazy super powers that ended up successful on this very website: 8-bit ! But unlike you I really don't feel The Dreadful is heading this way.

But rather than going over the whole story to illustrate like you did (I'm lacking time, sorry), I'm going to say that it is something you can sense in the characters' personality and in the overall feeling of the comic. They are all vulnerable to many different kinds of deaths, wounds and containment, even Kit, and most likely even Jeanne. If you can't feel it, if you see them as DBZ characters or Superman clones, well, it's going to take a massive amount of text to convince you otherwise.

Finally I am also very tired of stupidly unbalanced powers, heroes that jump ten stories high and slay thousands of enemies without breaking a sweat, completely disconnected from the reality of their own universe, standing above everything, able to do anything, with only a handful of people being of their level. That's boring me unless very well done, like in Baldur's Gate 2.

So the fact that The Dreadful fits me so well does say something regarding your concern.


Edit: I also like the style of the comic, its personality. It's a crazy world that makes sense, feels real, is serious and yet goofs around a lot; all of this tightly bound together in a way that preserves dramaturgy and ambiance. The way both peasants just died is an illustration of this IMO, but you can find examples that better fit your tastes elsewhere.

My only complaint is that it was moving too slowly, but Matt acknowledged that and sped up the pace recently.

[epcharles]

I don't think it is going DBZ... I've just seen a lot of normal people killed without much thought or effort. Liz and Sabueso seem like the only humans worth taking seriously so far... which does mean that SOME humans must be taken seriously. Kit also get's mighty attentive when a gun is pointed at her, which does mean she can't just brush it off... blah, blah, blah.

Based on your comments, it seems like the "power" characters are much more endangered by normal interactions than we have seen. For example, you mention the power stick of the one ninja... but nothing about that interaction hints that it is an otherwise vulnerable person with a magic stick... it comes off like someone who needn't fear mortals, because they don't pose much threat, and she can just knock their skeletons out of them with anything she happens to pick up off the ground.

I guess in my mind, the desert is still being wandered by some undead spider that shits neigh-indestructible zombies... and there are people around who are like "oh, that's what happens when Kit uses the Dreadful", which means this happens on a semi-regular basis... and so I'm already a bit confused why there are so many people still alive... and then there are a bunch of other more brainy people, who are also evil, and could probably stop one of the zombies at least as well as Kit... and so I don't think we are going towards DBZ destroying worlds with a blast or anything like that... but I wonder why a random towns folk would ever mess with anyone, especially charge a pair of strangers in the middle of town with something as lame as an ax. It seems as if they are very likely to be charging someone who won't break a sweat killing them.

Again, I'm still enjoying it plenty... I'm just starting to get worried about where it is headed, and how it will get out of it. If I had a better sense that the characters were vulnerable, I probably wouldn't be so worried.

[MSperoni]

Hachiko's "needn't fear mortals" has something to do with her magic stick but also has a lot to do with the fact she's an arrogant psycho who thinks anyone who isn't Japanese is inferior to her.

But, she's only appeared in four pages, so we haven't gotten to spend a lot of time with her yet!

And there's not a single person who has appeared in this comic (except for Judge Catherine) that Liz couldn't take out if she had a mind to and was equipped with the right tools for the job. She may be a normal human, but she's very dangerous. Maybe a little like Solid Snake in that regard (and she smokes too!).

The Knights (the group Charsi and Boozloaf belong to) were created specifically to deal with zombies, ghosts, demons, etc. They specialize in the use of silver and magic weapons (both missile and melee) and so Kit can't strut about too confidently when an entire organization exists that could kill her

Maybe it's not all evident yet. I'll be the first to admit I plod along really slowly. I don't really know why that is. All the ideas are in my head, they just take a long time to come out :P

I'll get there eventually though! Hopefully the readers who stick with it will have an enjoyable fun ride!

[MSperoni]

There should be a new Dreadful soon, not sure if it'll be this week or sometime next week though.

Christmas stuff + massive editing + misc = delays.

EDIT: Also I got *super* sick on Christmas and have had the flu for the last few days. So I haven't been able to work on anything, even if I wanted to!

[Gillsing]

Well, there it is: The long awaited update.

Sabueso: Lucky, lucky liar.

Ogre: Not toughie enoughie.

[SaltyKracka]

Wait, Boozloaf is a Knight?

Anyways, Charsi sure is casual about all these cultists stinking up the place.

[MSperoni]

Charsi really enjoys hacking people up with her sword on a stick.