Our Little Adventure

Highest quality fantasy for the lowest common denominator.

Our Little Adventure is a fantasy webcomic created by Daniel Landolt. It's based on a Dungeons & Dragons campaign set in an original world, using the 3.X edition rules. A young bard named Julie has a dream where she learns she can save the world by finding a pendant which will lead her to the Magicant, a powerful artifact that grants unlimited wishes. She is joined by her fighter husband Lenny on this quest and very shortly after meets her sister Angelika as well as rogue she's travelling with. Using information from "The Palm Tree Ghost" she eventually learns how to use the pendant and goes on a quest to collect the pieces of this Magicant artifact. Of course certain events complicate matters, like an evil spirit Julie accidentally released as well as having to deal with an Evil Empire and followers of a crazy religion.

The comic was inspired by The Order of the Stick's humor and style, but doesn't tell the story with stick figures. The characters are heavily symbolistic in appearance and appear a cross between stick people, paper characters, and Noodle People. The comic doesn't take itself too seriously, heavy with parody and cliché of RPG as well as D&D campaigns. The fourth wall is notoriously weak in spots, and there are some pop culture references here and there.

The comic has been running since Christmas day, 2009 and updated about twice a week on average (including the hiatus). The comic updates every three days, sometimes more often if the creator isn't busy. There are two places the comic can be seen, the first being an official websiteand the second being rogonandi's deviantART account. There is an entry for it on The Webcomic List. It's also got its own group on Facebook where people who like it can get news about it and such, such as updates.

It has a Character Sheet.

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Tropes used in Our Little Adventure include:

• 0% Approval Rating: A story arc in the "second book" has Brian attempting to subject Thomas Stratus to this by ruining his name using magical disguising and premeditated mass murder. This is because Stratus didn't join the empire, and because he learned too much of the invasion plan.
• Adventure Towns: The first being the little village where they picked up Pauline, and then they went to Everwood, a huge city where they met new NPC friends and Julie picked up the Magicant Pendant. They went back to Huckleton to catch a ferry to North Manjulias. They passed through Starlight Point and went through the Rosoro Underground to reach Llanadario, a "gateway city". Latter it's vaguely established they're heading toward Autumnson.
• All There in the Manual: On the official website there is information on characters, the cosmology as well as planar diagrams. Reader beware, spoilers everywhere... and Brian even lampshades that at the top of the page.
• Ambidextrous Sprite
• Ambition Is Evil: Janusine, the goddess of ambition, is considered neutral evil and is the ruler of demons.
• Are We There Yet?: Rocky and Lenny sometimes say this.
• Art Evolution: The characters and backgrounds look much better than when the comic started. Lenny lampshades this in the comic's 100th page. Lampshaded again when the comic gets another background graphic upgrade in this comic.
• Artifact of Doom: The Magicant, in the wrong hands.
• Attack! Attack! Attack! / Super-Persistent Predator: Most of the non-humanoid random encounters throw themselves at the group with little concern for their own survival. Sapients encounters often surrender or flee, on the other hand.
• Beat Panel: Has a few of them.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: Brian and Angelo of the Souballo Empire, and they are married.
  • Brian seems to be the "good cop" of the two. He's friendly and charming and enjoys non-villainous hobbies like hot chocolate and lounging around. But he can still be quite the moral bankrupt, especially when bowing to his husband's wishes.
  • Angelo, the leader of "Angelo's Kids" seen in this comic here. He seems to be a more traditional evil overlord, but is still extremely attentive to his husband's happiness. Woe betide any who make Brian unhappy.
• Big Fancy Castle: Brian and Angelo's, of course.
• Black Bead Eyes: Part of the drawing style, except for Elves of course, and for some Eye Takes.
• Black Comedy
  • The story arc involving the plan to ruin Thomas Stratus' name is full of it.
  • Various enemy deaths have elements of it, too.
• Blackout Basement: Many parts of the Rosoro Underground Highway. Julie and/or Angelika have to use the Light spell in order for them to see.
• Brick Joke: There are a couple.
• Burn the Witch: Angelo's Kids do this to their opponents.
• Calling Your Attacks: Activating magic involves calling out the name of the spell, though Julie gets to sing a lyric about the nature of the spell...
• Captain Ersatz
  • When putting on a magical disguise, Trevoricus assumes the form of Terra from Teen Titans.
  • The harpy the group fought in this comic looks alarmingly like Medli from The Legend of Zelda the Wind Waker.
  • Also "Thog Parody", an orc barbarian Jason fought in his backstory comic.
• Chest Monster: The group fight one in the Rosoro Underground Highway.
• The Chosen One: Julie. The pendent only reacts to her. Revealed to be played with as it turns out Julie was the third person The Palm Tree Ghost chose to do this quest. She wouldn't talk about what happened in regard to the first two.
• The Comically Serious: Joyelle the Erinyes

Joyelle: I would smile, but I lack the facial muscles required to do so.

• Cosmopolitan Council: Brian and Angelo's four imperial department heads, though they're different from one another in terms of age rather than race (except for Exillon). They range from the very old Janice, to the very young Sophia.
• Curb Stomp Battle: Confusion spell + invisible rogue = dead Angelo's Kids

Terramycin: This is like shooting fish in a barrel. Confusion is an absolutely horrifying spell.

• Day Hurts Dark-Adjusted Eyes: Angelika overdramatizes it, though.
• Demon Head
  • Played very straight by Angelo.
  • Pauline could get quite scary too.
• Eldritch Location: The world where the Palm Tree Ghost resides. It's still hazy, but we get to see some of the background "life".
• Expospeak: Julie, almost compulsively (at least in the beginning).
• Face Palm: Regularly.
  • Angelo in the last panel, in response to Janice's "You Never Asked."
  • Lampshaded:

Umbria: You guys are gonna make me faceplam every other minute, aren't you?

• Fantastic Racism
  • The Souballo Empire is infamous for their hatred of Elves. Brian and Angelo like to make fun of Dwarves too, but at least they're not actively hunted and battled like Elves are.
  • Some Elves also have less than charitable feelings towards humans, though their dislike is more understandable due to the Empire's brutality.
• Fashionable Asymmetry
  • Angelo, with one glove and short sleeve, a boot longer than the other, and differently-colored metamagic rods. Which also makes the fact he's an Ambidextrous Sprite quite obvious.
  • Quite a few of Angelo's Kids copy their Beautiful Worship.
• Filler Strips: Arguably the entire Freedom Shrine Dungeon arc.
• Fire-Forged Friends: "... except with ice."
• Five-Man Band
  • The Hero: Julie
  • The Lancer: Lenny
  • The Big Guy: Pauline
  • The Smart Guy: Rocky
  • The Chick: Angelika
  • The Sixth Ranger: Emily
  • Team Pet: Norveg, Angelika's rat familiar.
• Flat World: The plane of Manjulias (the world in this comic) is flat.
• Follow the Leader: Originally it looked like an Order of the Stick(ish) comic, and the creator has said that the comic was inspired by it. The comic itself isn't a stick figure comic, and through a gradual change in style, the trope is averting itself by the character designs getting further and further away from The Order of the Stick and the backgrounds being much more detailed.
• Forced Level Grinding: Played straight and lampshaded, also the source of some of the comic's padding.
• Foreign Queasine: Halflings eat some pretty disgusting food in this comic.
• Foreshadowing
  • The "Black Palm-Tree Ghost" provides plenty in Julie's dream.
  • "If she ends up coming on our journey, I quit." Exactly two hundred pages later...
• Four-Fingered Hands
• Goomba Stomp: Umbria performs one as part of the Sudden Videogame Moment.
• Gotta Catch Em All: The five Magicant pieces, explained by some random imperial mook.
• Gravity Screw: The Afterlife has rather subjective gravity.
• Gray Rain of Depression: Pauline gets rained on while standing watch. It ends as soon as someone comes to replace her.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: The PC party, usually, with the exception of Pauline.
• Ha Ha Ha No: Umbria here.
• Happily Married
  • Julie and Lenny.
  • Brian and Angelo.
• Hammerspace: Lampshaded by Angelika.

Angelika: It's part of my inventory just like your sword and Julie's weaponry. When it's not in use, it's not seen here.

• Head Pet: Angelika dislikes when Norveg does that, but he usually has a good reason.
• Heroic BSOD: Julie suffers one when Pauline dies.
• Hidden Eyes: Julie after Pauline's death, and whenever reminded of it.
• Hopeless Boss Fight: A non-video game example. The second they realized he was who he said he was, they didn't even bother trying to fight him and avoided a Curb Stomp Battle... well, except for Eva. Those who read it know how THAT turned out for her.
• Hulk Speak: The S&M Minotaur the group fought.
• If You Die, I Call Your Stuff: Another adventuring party they meet toward one of its own dead members
• I Have Boobs - You Must Obey!:

Angelika: If you don't join the group, Rocky... you'll be a pussy and girls hate that.

• I Hate You, Vampire Dad: A wight thanks them for killing his mother.
• I Need You Stronger: The Palm Tree Ghost helpfully suggested Julie gain a level or two before hitting Everwood.
• Informed Attractiveness: Angelika's supposed to be a rather hot piece of Jailbait Candy. Too bad Angelika's such a pain in the ass in close company.
• Innocent Fanservice Girl: Eland the dryad, though downplayed in that in the comic she's less anatomically correct than a Barbie doll.
• Is This Thing On?: A dwarf with a recording amulet.
• I Take Offense to That Last One: After Angelo breaks Umbria's petrification spell, she immediately jumps to the conclusion that Angelo wants to punish her. The first three things she mention are pretty legit reasons for punishment, but the one knocking Angelo's uniform choice was probably the one that got Angelo so annoyed with her.
• It Is Not Your Time: Julie talks of this after getting stabbed by Umbria. Rocky and Pauline could not help but roll their eyes in response.
• Killed Off for Real
  • Subverted with Jane, who comes back as a ghost.
  • Played straight with Pauline, who tells Julie not to raise her.
  • Played ultimately straight with Eva who was crushed into a bloody cube, and soulbound into a gem.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Our rogue, after tricking a wizard into identifying scrolls, actually lets her have the one she needs for free; this is her reaction.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall
• The Lost Woods: Everwood Forest and the bigger Silverfronds Forest.
• Made a Slave: The life of a wight.
• Magic A Is Magic A: Played pretty straight, following the D&D spells.

Julie: If you had ranks in Knowledge: Arcana, you would've known that would happen.

• Magic Mirror: Brian and Angelo use one to talk to one of their lackeys, and Peganone uses one to do her scrying spells.
• Man-Eating Plant: Julie and her crew were attacked by two Assassin Vines.
• Medium Awareness: Comes and go, mostly for gags.

Angelika: How did you get special colored text in your speech balloon like that?

• Metagame: Julie sometimes has the tendency to use the table top variant of it as one of her bardic powers. Up until recently it's been Handwaved, but this time she gets punished for it by getting swatted by the Assassin Vine they were fighting immediately after revealing its game resistances.
• Mind Control Eyes: Characters acting under the influence of enchantments have eyes that usually glow yellowish green.
• Missing Episode: Lampshaded by Lenny in the webpage's banner in "The Long Lost Prologue".
• Missing Mom: Julie and Angelika's. With great effect on the family.
• Monster of the Week: Most of the enemy encounters Julie's group face between cities.
• Mood Whiplash: Comic #187.
• My Eyes Are Up Here: Angelika exploits this trope to hide Norveg in her cleavage.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero
  • If Julie hadn't activated the black wand, she wouldn't have a psychotic clone running around now.
  • In #210, Rocky's bluff may have given the Empire an excuse to attack the Elves.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed
  • The trio Julie needs to talk to in order to get item she needs are a fantasy take on the original American Idol judges.
  • When Angelo showed his cronies a picture of what Julie might look like, he showed a picture of Idina Menzel. Trevoricus and Jason even lampshade this by talking about some of the works they saw with Idina in them.
• Noblewoman's Laugh: Toby and Johnathan, two of Angelo's Kids, are male examples of this.
• Nominal Importance: Played with.
• Noodle People: The drawing style of the comic.
• The Noseless: Part of the comic's drawing style, though there are a few exceptions. Lampshaded by Julie when an ugly receptionist she dealt with actually has a nose.
• Not That Kind of Mage: Angelika is a sorceress, not a wizard. Rocky frequently ribs her as useless for not being able to learn spells from scrolls.
• Oh Crap
  • During the Minecart Madness sequence, the rest of the party has this expression when Julie reveals that wands like the one she has been using to make the jumps on the tracks are not 100% reliable.
  • We get another example of the trope, mixed in with This Is Gonna Suck with Umbria/Zaedalkaah. She escapes Randi and Peganone only to collide into the horse of a Paladin who is also on the hunt for her.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: Dwarves look as they would in pretty much any other RPG and fantasy piece; beard, armored, etc. They might not speak in the expected Scotish/Irish twinges, but most of the dwarves Julie and the gang have dealt with ARE Soul Brothas.
• Our Elves Are Better: Elves have larger eyes, as opposed to humans which are smaller dots. Elves also have long ears and hair in all colors of the rainbow, including blue. And see Theme Naming.
• Our Gnomes Are Weirder: Gnomes have the cone hats but they also have yellow skin and pointy tails.
• Paint It Black: Spoofed when Angelika dones a Cloak of Charisma that immediately gives her a Darker and Edgier look.

Norveg: ... Oh great. The cloak is cursed and it turned you evil.
Angelika: I don't feel any eviller.
Norveg: That doesn't prove anything.

• Path of Inspiration: Angelo's Kids is a pseudo-religion composed of young adventurer fanatics that do Angelo's bidding.
• Peek-a-Bangs: Part of Angelika's new look starting with #307.
• Perpetual Frowner
  • Rocky, especially in the beginning of the comic. He's lightening up a little bit as the story progresses.
  • Joyelle the Erinyes in a more literal way; she says that she lacks the muscles in her face to ever smile.
• Pillar of Light: When Julie activates the Magicant Pendant.
• Pimp Duds: Julie obtains the look thanks to a Hat of Diguise.

Rocky: ...I said your sister dresses like a ho but that doesn't mean you should start pimping her out.
Norveg: I beat you to that joke when Julie donned the hat in the store.

• Plot Coupon: The Magicant Pendant.
• Port Town: Huckleton and Starlight Point.
• The Promise: Angelika tries to get one from Lenny; he asks for one in return.
• Rainbow Pimp Gear: Peganone's adventuring outfit is truly truly truly outrageous.
• Rapunzel Hair: Daytranna's. So long it drags behind on the floor (and collects caltrops).
• Rollercoaster Mine: In the Rosoro Underground Highway, the group go on a pretty wild one starting with this comic here.
• RPG Mechanics Verse: Lampshaded by many characters, and Umbria's plan to train her orchestra hinges on taking advantage of this trope.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The demon released from the black magic wand. She calls herself Umbria. Her real name is revealed to be "Zaedalkaah".
• She Cleans Up Nicely: Pauline looks much better in a dress and without all the scars. Too bad she's dead.
• Shoot the Medic First: Averted during a battle between Julie's group and Kayla's group. Kayla is an imperial cleric and spent the battle healing and empowering her groupmates. Rocky complained about Julie telling him (and probably Angelika too) not to attack Kayla. The trope is even lampshaded in that comic's title.

Rocky: (next page) This wouldn't take nearly as long if someone would let us take out the healer!
Kayla: I thank her for that.

• Shoot the Shaggy Dog: The whole Eva story arc. Eva failed to find and destroy Umbria/Zaedalkaah, and ended up having A Fate Worse Than Death at the hands of Angelo. This whole mess is all due to Eva not backing down to someone clearly more powerful than her.
• Shot in the Ass: Rocky in episode #299. He later comments that this bow hits like an elephant gun.
• Shout-Out: Too many to count.
• Silent Scenery Panel: Used mostly to show scene changes.
• Splash Panel: Seems to be a developing trend whenever Julie's group gets to another city, or Brian and Angelo's castle is shown.
• Spock Speak: Joyelle the Erinyes. She even has a different font in her speech bubbles to reflect it. And she scolds her underling for daring to use contractions.
• Steampunk: An airship makes them discuss the prospect.
• Sudden Videogame Moment: Moratios' dungeon for beginners is in Super Mario style, complete with Goombas.
• Take That: There are a few instances of it. The webcomic begins with a pretty big one in "The Long Lost Prologue".
• Talking Animal: Three so far. This seems to be a trend with wizard/sorcerer familiars, and special mounts.
  • Angelika's rat familiar, Norveg.
  • Simonicus' cat familiar, Ebony. (Strangely the cat is white.)
  • Eva's paladin mount, Charismatic Seaweed.
• Talking in Your Dreams: A driving force.
• Talking Is a Free Action
• Terrible Trio: The adventuring group Umbria travelled with for most of the first book. It contained Jason, Trevoricus and herself.
• Theme Naming: Elves seem to be named after various kinds of prescription drugs, such as...
  • Avinza (the Aeris/Aerith parody character) is a pain reliever.
  • Peganone (the Everwood Idol judge and councilwoman) is an anti-seizure medication.
  • Keppra (the Elven bounty hunter after Umbria/Zaedalkaah) is another anti-seizure medication.
  • Kaletra (the first name of Julie's elf alias) slows the progression of HIV.
  • Terramycin (the prejudiced innkeeper) is an antibiotic.
  • Daytranna (the innkeeper's son and curiosity shop owner) is a patch against ADHD.
• Tranquil Fury: Julie goes into a very unpleasant state when Pauline dies. She went into a Heroic BSOD for some time afterword, but got mostly better.
• Trickster God: "The Palm Tree Ghost"
• The Undead: Julie's group fight them sometimes as random encounters.
• Unholy Matrimony: Brian and Angelo, the two main villains.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: The sun explodes at the end of every day. Night falls rather quickly. The sun and moon can both talk as well. The characters sometimes comment about this as well.
• Wall of Blather: Angelika and Rocky on the second strip.
• Walls of Text: Julie sometimes when explaining something.
• Wham! Episode: The death of Pauline.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Stratus gives a rather low-key version of this to Pauline in the afterlife, telling her that she should have gone back when Julie tried to raise her. Her dead family wouldn't have waited that long for her due to the way time works in the afterlife, and Julie's group could use a competent melee fighter. He caps it off with a reminder that, unlike him, she is of Good alignment.
• Who Would Want to Watch Us?: In the website's original design it was Angelika commenting this at the top of the comic archive page. Now it's Umbria/Zaedalkaah commenting how much the comics suck because she's not in them often enough.
• Who Writes This Crap?: In the prologue.

Palm Tree Ghost: Ugh. Who writes this drek anyway? It sounds like the beginning of some stilted Lord of the Rings wannabe novel...

• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Angelika has a problem with the Sun. Sure it has a face on it, but the others think the fear's quite silly.
• World Shapes: As seen in #134, Our Little Adventure's world, Manjulias, is a flat, rectangular plate.
• Wouldn't Hit a Girl: Lenny asks Julie to hit Angelika for him and complains about the inherent double standard.
• You're Insane!: Stratus rejects his former student Brian's offer to join him by telling him that his plan is insane and will cause the deaths of countless innocent people.