Now that our regular Comic Contest is firmly entrenched, I just thought up yet another great time waster. I think I stole the idea from Games magazine, but I'm not sure. It just came to me in a flash of brilliance.

In a way it's a lot like the other comic contest. Only instead of me giving you rules to follow, I make the comics and only I know the rules. This is going to be a little more on the puzzle side of things as opposed to the typical fun and games of mocking Obi's mom through cartoons, but the majority of us are geeks. And being geeks, we can probably all appreciate a good puzzle. But maybe not. If this sucks, we can toss it by the wayside like a used condom and go onto bigger and better things, like donkey gangbangs.

So here's the deal. I made up a set of 10 rules, much like the ones in our contests. In fact, four of the rules are straight out of previous contests. The other six are either bastardizations of earlier rules, or completely new. But the majority of them are pretty standard rule fare.

Your task is to figure out what the ten rules are. To help you out I'll do two things... One, I'll post comics occaisonally, stating whether or not they're valid or not. I'll work clues into the comics themselves, and at times try to make things somewhat obvious. I'll also accept yes/no questions. When you think you've got one, post it. If you get it right, or are pretty damn close I'll tell you. Bit by bit you ought to figure them all out.

When the contest is over, if people are still interested and haven't sent me any letter bombs, I'll pass the dictatorship over to the person who got the most rules. Thus it will continue forever like our current contest, or until everyone gets bored.

This will probably take a while, but it might be fun. So have at it...

Here's the first clue. This comic (hopefully) conforms to all ten rules.

20703

This comic, however, is completely screwed and breaks almost all of them.

20705

Rule #1: All of the comics must be made by a total dumbass.

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Now that our regular Comic Contest is firmly entrenched, I just thought up yet another great time waster. I think I stole the idea from Games magazine, but I'm not sure. It just came to me in a flash of brilliance.

In a way it's a lot like the other comic contest. Only instead of me giving you rules to follow, I make the comics and only I know the rules. This is going to be a little more on the puzzle side of things...

So here's the deal. I made up a set of 10 rules, much like the ones in our contests. In fact, four of the rules are straight out of previous contests. The other six are either bastardizations of earlier rules, or completely new. But the majority of them are pretty standard rule fare.

Your task is to figure out what the ten rules are. To help you out I'll do two things... One, I'll post comics occaisonally, stating whether or not they're valid or not. I'll work clues into the comics themselves, and at times try to make things somewhat obvious. I'll also accept yes/no questions. When you think you've got one, post it. If you get it right, or are pretty damn close I'll tell you. Bit by bit you ought to figure them all out.

When the contest is over, if people are still interested and haven't sent me any letter bombs, I'll pass the dictatorship over to the person who got the most rules. Thus it will continue forever like our current contest, or until everyone gets bored.

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Rule #1: All of the comics must be made by a total dumbass.

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How about this?

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That might have been cited in Games, but the game itself sounds like a version of Eleusis, invented by Robert Abbott (Scientific American, October, 1977).

==Ken

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OK, here are some guesses at the rules:

- use every letter of the alphabet, except "j"
- the first 2 panels must use the same characters in the same poses.
- the 3rd panel should contain the same character twice in mirrored poses.
- name an animal
- use an alternate word meaning "penis"
- use no female characters
- use the name of a medicine
- use the lyrics of a Chris Isaak song

This geek salutes you, though I now know why you won bunner's needs to go outside contest. My guesses:

-the 1st character of the second panel speaks in haiku
-1st character of first panel must ask a question
-3 different backgrounds
-name a movie
-use a word with man at the beginning like mantool, manboob, manatee
-the exploding dog trash must be used
-the exploding dog hammer must be used
-clango must be used
-work in this phrase: It's amazing the damage a belt sander can do human flesh.
-work in this phrase: Red and scaly is not a good look for a mantool.

20738

20740

Obi and wirthling have already worked out four of the ten rules. Which is odd, because both of them combined are about as smart as my toaster.

Here they were, in all their glory:

#4 - Some sort of slang for penis must appear somewhere in the strip
#7 - A haiku must appear somewhere in the strip (close enough)
#8 - The name of a movie must appear somewhere in the strip (Did you pick that up from the 'as we've seen in the past' line, or elsewhere?)
#9 - No female characters may appear in the strip.

Score
ObiJo - 2
wirthling - 2

Oh yeah... Those last two comics. The first one is valid. The second, in regards to the six remaining rules, has complied with three and broken three.

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That might have been cited in Games, but the game itself sounds like a version of Eleusis, invented by Robert Abbott (Scientific American, October, 1977).

==Ken

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Wow. I can only aspire to such a high level of geekdom. You have competition, Gabe...

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- you must use 3 characters, twice each?

Three points for you, McWirthling.

I got the movie one from the "as we've seen before" ref. More guesses for your viewing pleasure:

- 1st character, 3rd panel uses eubonics.
- 1st panel must have 2 different characters
- Must spell a word wrong in the 3rd panel
- Use a word with a capital N in the final dialogue box (sad really that I caught this, whether or not it's a rule)
- Name a celebrity
- No one-note characters
-My mind's going Dave, I can feel it.

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I got the movie one from the "as we've seen before" ref. More guesses for your viewing pleasure:

- 1st character, 3rd panel uses eubonics.
- 1st panel must have 2 different characters
- Must spell a word wrong in the 3rd panel
- Use a word with a capital N in the final dialogue box (sad really that I caught this, whether or not it's a rule)
- Name a celebrity
- No one-note characters
-My mind's going Dave, I can feel it.

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The more I hang out here, the more I realize how stupid and unfunny I am.... This is too hard.

I'm going to cry now...

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From the duh corner... must the second character in each panel talk more than the first?

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All wrong. But the capital 'N' was a nice touch.

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- can't use the letter e in the last panel
- all vowels must be used in the strip or first two panels

This is either more fun than I originally thought, or I really need to find something to pass my time.

#6 - Can't use the letter 'E' in the last panel.

Obi - 3
Wirthling - 3

I was sure there was a rule requiring a mention of power tools. I guessed the no-females one, but it was taken.

I think a fun alternative way to run this contest would be that you can't ask about rules, but simply post comics. The judge would then tell you how many rules you broke, and which panel broke each rule. The winner would be the first one to post a comic that complies with all the rules.

The brain I'm using for this? No. It's not my favorite brain. I normally just use this one for trips to the grocery store. My favorite brain is still in the shop.

Temperamental valves...

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I was sure there was a rule requiring a mention of power tools. I guessed the no-females one, but it was taken.

I think a fun alternative way to run this contest would be that you can't ask about rules, but simply post comics. The judge would then tell you how many rules you broke, and which panel broke each rule. The winner would be the first one to post a comic that complies with all the rules.

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Writing haikus and panels without 'E' is a giant pain in the ass. So I'm not worrying about the six known rules. Just the last four. This first comic follows all four.

20888

This one breaks all four. And it disses wirthling, too.

20890

I'm running out of guesses

-name a color
-can't use the word "this"
-can't mention wirthling or diss him
-can't mention ObiJo or diss him (please, God, let the long nightmare be over)
-No felching! (That's a command, not a guess)

Jesus, gabe, give me my fix. At least a reply. Sheesh.

- Must name a weapon
- Must talk about some violent act
- Must use a fucked up colloquialism
- Can't use the word cornhole
- Can't use any of these words either: Is that today's mail? Sure is. There's a particularly juicy letter here from a fellow named Carl. Apparently he's an inmate at the state penitentiary. Gee, I wonder where that came from? Must be some kind of prank. Haha! 'My dearest wirthling... Those nudie pictures you sent got me real hot. I was dreamin' about you when I was cornholing my roommate.'Must be some other wirthling.
Odd that he sketched such a remarkable likeness of you. And winning the Miss America pageant, as well. You look good in heels.
All of you stop staring at me like that. Someone has to win the golden ham. Ok, ok, nevermind on the last one.

There is something to do with question marks, but I can't work it out...

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I'm running out of guesses

-name a color

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Ok. This is the best I can do while at work. I went through my comics and pulled out those I could find that conform to the last three rules. I might have skipped a few, but I'd say out of the 225+ comics, there are these and maybe 5-10 others that might have worked.

Here are a few of them...

2587

2658

3662

3663

4815

By the way, that last comic was me predicting the future about boorite's untimely demise.

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3663

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I'm an idiot.

Two! Two! It breaks two of the rules!

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I'm an idiot.

Two! Two! It breaks two of the rules!

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Ok. A few more comics. If you can't get it from these, god help you. This first one conforms to the last three rules and has about the biggest damn hint I can give you without coming out and saying it.

21052

This too, complies with the last three rules and has a couple of glaring clues as to two of them.

21053

I should clarify... That last one was almost perfect. The strip points out its own faults.

The strip has to suck? Or did someone already guess that...

Actually, the rule is craft a strip so cunning that a monkey could figure it out, but you gimps still can't.

OK, I am guessing that the strip has to contain at least one question (or question mark) but it can't be in the third panel. Of course, this is from just those two strips, and may be really fucked...

Oh, there's another thing - "fuck" or a derivative has to be used in the third panel.

Shit... I just had a look back through the strips, and that "fuck" related one seems to be wrong. *sigh* I'm not very good at this.

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OK, I am guessing that the strip has to contain at least one question (or question mark) but it can't be in the third panel. Of course, this is from just those two strips, and may be really fucked...

Oh, there's another thing - "fuck" or a derivative has to be used in the third panel.

Shit... I just had a look back through the strips, and that "fuck" related one seems to be wrong. *sigh* I'm not very good at this.

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Ooh.. hello. I'm back. Slight variation.. does the word fuck have to be used at some point? Or an anagram of it? Does the strip have to be in English? Does it have to be written by Gabe? Does it have to be posted on this here board?