Vault of Deknar: Part Forty-Six
Chapter: Season Seven
Grizzly Bear in a Ball Pit is my Tom Jones Bluegrass/Black Metal cover band.
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Grizzly Bear in a Ball Pit is my Tom Jones Bluegrass/Black Metal cover band.
Comments are closed.
HOVER-TEXT: My first single would be Red Balls, Black Heart and features a 45-minute washboard solo
Just a thought: some of us actually read the hover text by hovering on the comic, and so will typically see it before getting down to the caption under the title, so when one refers to the other and they are read out of sequence, it can be mildly confusing. In this case, I re-read the comic a few times trying to find the “band name” joke that I knew I must have missed.
It’s a minor thing, but the end effect is reading a punchline before the setup, and so the joke falls a bit flat.
I definitely see your point, Blackbird, but Brian does that as a public service. I and a few others asked him to put the hover text in the comments a few years ago* because we read d20Monkey on our iPads or other tablets, and hover text used to be impossible to see. There was an upgrade that allowed it some time ago, so if the practice were to stop, I’d be alright. Maybe a vote or survey?
*(“..a few years ago…?” Where does the time go? Jeez, I’m getting old.)
I think you misunderstood me Vinnie. I didn’t say anything about having the hover text repeated in the comments, as I’m not complaining about having the hover text in the comments, and that’s really not the issue. The problem is when you read the hover text by actually hovering, so you see it first, and then scroll down to the note below the comic title.
For example, for this particular comic, I read these in the following order:
“My first single would be Red Balls, Black Heart and features a 45-minute washboard solo”
“Grizzly Bear in a Ball Pit is my Tom Jones Bluegrass/Black Metal cover band.”
Now, these comments were clearly intended to be read in the opposite order, but this is how they displayed when reading the hover text actually as hover text. The result was that after reading the hover text (first line), I kept going back through the comic thinking I had missed something. It was only when I gave up and scrolled down that I saw the comic note (second line), and so completed the joke in reverse order.
If the two were not related in any direct way, the order they are read in would not matter. But when one is the setup for a joke in the other, anyone who reads the hover text in the (originally) intended manner (as hover text) will see these backwards.
Unfortunately, I don’t have a perfect solution to this, because as you say, not everyone sees the hover text. The simplest approach would be to not make the two comments related to each other so that they can be read in either order, but I think that would limit Brian’s creative options. Alternately (if Brian really thought it mattered that much and wanted to put the work into it), Brian could run a poll to see what percentage of the readers view the hover text as hover text, and what percentage can only read the hover text in Brian’s first comment, and then be sure to always order the jokes according to the majority, while the others just have to deal with it (and for all I know, I could easily be in the minority here). Brian could eliminate the hover text from the comic image altogether, and just keep the extra line in his first comment, thus ensuring that the lines would always be presented in one order.
Or (the most likely solution), Brian could just ignore one complaining poster, and keep doing things as he has been doing, and people like me will just have to live with it. I wouldn’t fault him for it, and I don’t necessarily expect him to take any action as a result of my post, I just thought he might want to be aware of the mildly disorienting experience that this setup presented to some of his readers (well, at least one; I can’t say for certain whether anyone else considers this an issue). As I said, it’s a mild annoyance; if Brian wants to just keep doing things the way he has, I can always learn to not hover over the comic and instead read the hover text in the comments to avoid future confusion on my part. But if that’s what he intends I have to question the reasoning behind having hover text at all?
Okay. Fair points, all. I only wanted to supply the context. If I were Brian’s advisor (I’m not) and my opinion carried weight (it doesn’t), I would be fine with ending the practice. Apple added some functionality to iOS a while back that lets me see hover text–after the setup, as is proper.
That would be an amazing washboard solo. Best washboard solo in the tri-county area.
I’m going to need some album art for that. Like, yesterday.
After a 45 minute washboard solo those balls would be more than just red.
Brian, I seriously want to see you go back to some of these “This is my such and such cover band” and stat them up once this https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1745101684/rockalypse-the-fate-core-rpg-of-musical-conflict releases.
You know Brett loves Jeanie, but all’s fair in love, war, and tabletop RPG gaming.
Players aren’t the only ones who can spice up game mechanics with flavor text, am I right?
… A grizzly in a ball pit actually sounds cute.
I think the implication was that it would be a ball pit full of small children, who clearly don’t stand a chance against the grizzly.
It’s always good to see Brett back In Form.
Agreed! 😀
I imagined a 45-minute washboard ABS solo.
Send help plz.
Time for a boss fight, with a group who hasn’t done a whole lot of fighting yet.
Bazinga!
I immediately got flashbacks to when a home brewed Deck of Not So Many Things spawned a Bottomless Ball-Pit from Hell. It was both a weird and unpleasant experience.
Screw it, use a fireball aimed for his head, the shield will redirect,but it will show where it is, and have fighters or rogue shoot at the openings, once he’s dead, his coin goes dormant and can be released.
Ricky Scraggs better be a part of Grizzly Bear in a Ball Pit