Vaarsuvius employs drastic measures to bring Belkar's healing powers to the fore.
Cast
- Elan ◀ ▶
- Belkar Bitterleaf ◀ ▶
- Durkon Thundershield ◀ ▶
- Vaarsuvius ◀ ▶
- Nale ◀ ▶
- Sabine ◀ ▶
- Hordes of 1st edition monsters
Transcript
- Panel 1
Vaarsuvius: Elan is at -7 hit points and falling! Help me, Belkar.
Belkar: But Nale is getting away!
- Panel 2
Vaarsuvius: We do not have time for that now! Let Sir Greenhilt handle it. Should Elan fall to -10, he will be DEAD!
Belkar: OK, OK, fine! What about Durkon, though? He's the walking medicine chest.
- Panel 3
Vaarsuvius: Sabine's claw attack has drained his energy. I seem to be incabable[sic] of waking him. Belkar, search though his possessions.
Belkar: Hey, I'm all for looting the corpses of my fallen allies, but shouldn't we wait for a better time?
- Panel 4
Vaarsuvius: Search for healing potions, you fool! Hurry, Elan has dropped to -8 hp!
Belkar: Oh, right.
- Panel 5
Belkar: Ummm, all I can find are 2 scrolls of Cure Serious Wounds. But none of us can use scrolls because we can't cast healing spells in the first place.
- Panel 6
Vaarsuvius: YOU can use them.
Belkar: Sh'yeah right. I'm a warrior, the only thing I can do with a scroll is beat someone with it.
- Panel 7
Vaarsuvius: Belkar, you are a RANGER!!
Belkar: So what? That just means I can beat him with both scrolls at the same time!!
- Panel 8
Vaarsuvius: No, it means you can cast healing spells—or at least, you COULD if you did not possess a Wisdom score normally reserved for lemmings!
Belkar (off-panel): Hey, lemmings are cute.
- Panel 9
Vaarsuvius: Wait—Wait! That is the solution! A simple spell shall increase your Wisdom, so that you might use the scroll!
- Panel 10
Vaarsuvius: OWL'S WISDOM!
Belkar: Wow...the world seems so much clearer now...I can understand everything...
- Panel 11
Vaarsuvius (off-panel): The scroll Belkar! He's down to -9!
Belkar: Of course, no need to shout. Cure Serious Wounds!
- Panel 12
Belkar: And another for good measure. Cure Serious Wounds.
Elan: Mommy... I don't wanna go to school today...
Vaarsuvius: We are not safe yet, friends. Quickly, Elan, we must rejoin the others.
Vaarsuvius leads Elan off stage left.
- Panel 13
Belkar (thinking): I've wasted my life on anger and needless rage, when I could have been healing.
- Panel 14
Belkar (thinking): My eyes are finally open. From this day forward, I'm never hurting a living creature ever again.
- Panel 15
V pops back into frame
Vaarsuvius: Dismiss Owl's Wisdom.
Belkar: Let's kill those losers!
D&D Context
- Characters in D&D fall unconscious at -1 HP and die at -10 HP. When they get knocked below 0 HP they will lose 1 HP per round until a healing spell is cast on them or an ally stabilizes them.
- A ranger can specialize in a combat style, one option being "two-weapon combat", which seems to have been Belkar's choice, hence his crack about wielding both scrolls.
- Owl's Wisdom is a spell that provides a bonus of 4 Wisdom to one creature.
- This strip pegs Belkar's wisdom at at most 13 and at least 10, because Cure Serious Wounds is a 4th level Ranger spell, hence requires a wisdom score 14 minimum to cast. Owl's Wisdom grants +4 Wisdom. Later strips would imply it to be at most 9, with him claiming to have an ability score penalty.
- The dismissal of Owl's Wisdom is for comedic effect by the last panel. In any case, it is actually a suboptimal option.
Trivia
- Belkar's tunic turns white under the effect of Owl's Wisdom.
- Belkar's daggers return when Vaarsuvius dismissed Owl's Wisdom.
- Belkar is missing his right leg in the 3rd and 2nd last panels. His foot is still present, however.
- In the later Fifth Edition era of D&D canon, a boost to Intelligence caused an an ogre to repent of his violent ways (after killing, ironically, a halfling), much as a boost to Wisdom causes Belkar to do here, though in the ogre's case it was more permanent.