First read (August 2010)[]
Format[]
Online at Yudkowsky.net. 51882 characters long, which is 27 standard pages.
Journal[]
Read in August 2010. Quite simple, someone from our world has been summoned to a typical fantasy world to fulfil a prophecy to vanquish the Dark Lord. Everything is named for what it is, his sword is the Sword of Good for example. The hero muses how anyone would end up choosing bad in such circumstances, and how the prophesied hard choice between good and evil is going to come about when he's perfectly aware of the stakes.
Rating[]
3/5 (1 in the current system?)
Second read (October 7th 2012)[]
Format[]
As above.
Journal[]
I don't know how much of the significance of it I got the first time around but, whether it's having read so much more of HPMoR, discussing it so much at r/HPMOR, or other things I've read recently, I've definitely found it a lot more compelling this time around.
It's amazing how persistent this perspective is, that we can have coherent and committed views on Good and yet not see Evil in fantasy stories, or real life. That even though I know it this webcomic only hits home when I'm trying to see the conflict, that otherwise it just seems trite.
Hindsight really is 20/20.
Rating[]
Third read (10th June 2014)[]
Format[]
Online, on my phone
Journal[]
It was mentinoned on r/hpmor in June 2014, comparing it to The Metropolitan Man, and I shot through it again to remind myself of what it was about and why I liked it before.
I actually thought, on this readthrough, that it did a relatively poor job of portraying, or rather explaining, the strength of the protagonist's conviction at the end. HPMOR and The Metropolitan Man do it better. And he should have asked the 'Lord of Dark' what his spell was actually going to do, which he didn't... But I still like it.