Story Arcs
- Comic
- 01. Imaginate!
- 02. The Game
- 03. Cat Tail
- 04. The Raccoons
- 05. The Adventures of Spot
- 06. Fido's Return
- 07. Mouse Mouse Revolution
- 08. Thematic Arc of Questionable Quality
- 09. The Zoo
- 10. The Grove
- 11. Housepets Christmas
- 12. The Yarn Ball
- 13. The Further Adventures of Spot
- 14. The Vet
- 15. A Mouse Named Spo
- 16. Zap!
- 17. Fall of the Pridelands
- 18. The Continuing Adventures of Spot
- 19. A Sinister Shadow
- 20. Roadtrip Woo
- 21. Down At The Farm
- 22. Money Sharks
- 23. n-ple Date
- 24. The Uncanny Adventures of Spot
- 25. The Visitor
- 26. Oops I Arced
- 27. It's A Wonderful Dog's Life
- 27.5 All the King's Men (prose)
- 28. Ocean's Two
- 29. Imaginate, Too!
- 30. The Present
- 31. Spot McCloud Presents Comics
- 32. Dog Days of Summer
- 33. Theme Park World
- 34. The Adventures of Stripe
- 35. Movie Night
- 36. Scaredy Cats
- 37. Noob Tube
- 38. Hope of the Pridelands
- 39. We're Snowed In!
- 40. The Preeminent Adventures of Spot
- 41. The Arc Specifically About Being Naked
- 42. Not All Dogs
- 43. The Great Water Balloon War
- 44. Let's Imaginate Macbeth!
- 45. The Interview
- 46. The Case of the Aztec Gold
- 47. A Respite In The Country
- 48. Spots and Stripes
- 49. A Holiday at the Zoo
- 50. Housepets Babies!
- 51. Show Business
- 52. What Money Buys
- 53. The Mall
- 54. The Critical Review of Spot
- 55. The Trial in Heaven
- 56. Let's Imaginate Guys and Dolls!
- 57. Testing Grounds
- 58. Taking Cover
- 59. PsyCon
- 60. Getting Physical
- 61. PsyCon2: PsyConner
- 62. The Retroactively Continuous Adventures of Spot
- 63. Temple Crashers
- 64. All Hallow's Ween
- 65. The Unbearable Lightness Of Being A Dog
- 66. One Cat's Treasure
- 67. Love And War
- 68. Jack Of One Trade
- 69. The King and I
- Guest Week!
- News
- Comic
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mind over matter
Being first I mean. Chess isn’t that hard all you do is say “Look over there!” Then as your opponent is distracted you knock over the table. When they ask “What happened?” you say “A griffin, a really big one….um named Pete” and in the ensuing questioning of your sanity they back out and you win! That works in the real world right?
speaking of griffins, I wonder if Pete knows Gilda…
Probably. They’re both jerks. Maybe they’re in the same “be mean to the protagonist” club.
At least it was precognition chess instead of precognition tic tac toe
Sabrina would probably always win if that was the case.
Let’s see who can get the joke first. ^-^
Dunno what joke you’re trying to make, but Xkcd has a comic detailing the optimal tic-tac-toe moves.
http://xkcd.com/832/
Still, that’s one neat graphic :O
A tie would be a cat’s game. Sabrina is a cat.
C’mon Tynach x3
We have a winner!
Like there’s any other kind of chess.
the best part:
if you know a good opening that your opponent doesn’t see, this comic is almost truthful.
met a few people who could checkmate in under 10 moves if you didn’t know the opening.
SURE, Checkmate, Tarot… whatever you say… the medium of a infinite size dragon can be the best at whatever she wants.
Or maybe, Peanut distracted Sabrina at a critical moment! Perhaps Sabrina’s freakishly tied up eye really was a significant handicap.
Now they need to look into the future (or future of a parallel Universe) and see who would have won if Peanut had not interfered.
Rematch?
Quantum chess, where you get to see all the possible outcomes of each move.
Tarot: Check, Mate 87%
Sabrina: Check, Mate 9%
Tarot: Draw 3%
Sabrina: Peanut knocks the board over: 1%
Tarot: Sudden clucking noises: 1%
Peanut: What what what what…?
Tarot: Called it!
Tarot was the one who tied her eye behind her back
Playing chess without moving a single piece? I love it!! Even though i suck at the game XD
Same here. Love the game, can’t play if my life depended on it.
I havent won a game of chess in over 2 years
Now to add in a speed timer like in Central Park.
lol but why even set up the game pieces then?
Because you need the intention of playing it! Of course after that, causality falls apart but we don’t care.
But wouldn’t thinking about intending to play it be the intention of playing it anyway?
Perhaps, but at that point a likely future could be deciding not to play. Okay I’m just making up explanations, stop thinking about it too hard!
lol I know I was thinking about it to much
I’m just having fun pointing out stuff like this when I see it.
We will never stop questioning your awesome theories!!! :p
Agreed with AuvaAkita!
‘Course, I’m the type to propose my own theories as well.
… I have way too much free time.
Sabrina: “What a strange game, the only way to win is not to play.”
Maybe it already was set up and they just sat down to get ready to play their game of mind chess
I’m pretty sure that the spirits don’t like that and would punch you in the face for trying.
It’s like deciding to read a book and then seeing in the future to know how it ends.
It’s all about technicalities. Or, really, technicalikitties…
http://www.housepetscomic.com/2010/03/19/technicalikitties/
The really tough spirits will just think about punching you in the face, which gets really hard to explain at the emergency room.
Not necessarily – every decision theoretically splits the Universe in two: One Universe where they play chess, one Universe where they don’t. They simply need to have the intention of playing chess to cause both Universes to exist, and then they simply look into the future of the OTHER Universe to find who won.
If you count each chess move as another Universe split, and also count each subsequent possible move set that each of them makes off of those splits, it turns into a battle of who can most accurately and consistently determine all sets of Universes in order to find the desired outcome.
And of course, a battle of who can make it most probable (as that determines the structure of the alternate universes – I imagine it sorta as a tree structure similar to that of filesystems) that they win.
O.o I’m not even gonna touch this *backs away slowly*
I not only have too much free time, but I also have an obsession about alternate universes.
I blame that.
I will handle this the way I would handle the task of defusing a bomb. *Takes a deep breath* Okay, here we go. OH MY GOD!! *Blue Screen of Death* Okay, I’m good now.
And Tynach, stop making excuses, It’s pretty obvious where the blame REALLY lies. *Glances at Tynach’s gravatar image* Someones been watching too much Doctor Who! Wait, you can’t watch too much Doctor Who. Now I’m even more confused!
“Observants look at time like they’re watching a parade. One thing after another, passing by in sequence right in front of them. I see the parade from above. All the twists and turns it might, or might not, take.” never thought i would get to use that
Where’s that from?
Clockwork from danny phantom… i think
Actually, what happens is the state vector of the universe becomes more complex, until the classical view of the state vector can only be described in terms of two non-correlated interactions. We call these “different universes”. While it appears that the universe “split” at the decision point, the classical divergence in the state vector may have (and almost certainly did) happen long before the “decision” took place. It is likely that there are a large and possibly infinite sets of “universes” in which the decision went each way.
If you want to read more, I recommend _All the Myriad Ways_ by Larry Niven.
Sounds awesome
Will look into that book.
It’s a short story.
So I went out and re-read it. And now I want to disrecommend it. It makes the same mistake I was talking about.
Ah, the good level III many-world multiverse.
Well, look at this! They are not splitting universes until they give an utterance
Speaking about a battle of who can most accurately and consistently determine all sets of moves in order to find the desired outcome, this is exactly how AI for chess programs work. The most advanced programs actually can look at 19-20 moves ahead while master level humans can only go for 12-14. Deepblue was capable of evaluation of 8 million of positions per seconds back in 2006.
That’s why they’re not calling them “AI” any more, because they aren’t using deep understanding of chess strategy… they’re just being stupid very very fast.
You cannot alter THIS reality while inside the Source Code!
A medium to help out Sabrina of course.
If I may cut in… this is the LONGEST and SMARTEST reply thread caused by a single question I’ve seen on this comic in forever. Congratulations! You’ve won a… actually you will win in the future. Although, now that I’ve told you, there’s the possibility you WON’T get the prize, but that knowledge isn’t what’s going to drive you insane. It’s the question of what would be your prize in the dimension I’m speaking of.
How do you tie one eye behind your back? O.o
very carefully
A surgeon and a sailor walk into a bar…
The bartender asks, “What is this, a joke?”
“Why yes, yes it is.”
http://skin-horse.com/comics/05092011/
awww! i was going for Sabrina, lol
Hmm. I am interested now :3
Wait. Tarot’s eye is green.
That’s mean the one who play is dragon?
No, her eyes turn green when she uses her powers too.
Wait a minute – if Tarot has one eye tied behind her back, wouldn’t only one of them turn green?
It’s her inner eye she’s holding back.
Kinda takes the fun out it, but okies. X3
If my post above is right, it completely transforms the game into something far more intricate than us mere humans can comprehend (easily).
Probably fun for psychics and/or transdimensional beings.
Nice! I love the games you make for the comic. Well, I simply love the comic. Good for Tarot, but I think she has some advantage… Maybe she’s not the dragon, but the real Tarot?
I like how Tarot’s bubble is outside of the box…
I’m sure being able to cut/paste 3/4ths of the strip, with Peanut being added in the background of panels 2 and 3, was purely coincidental, and not Rick being lazy or anything like that…
(I’m joking, in case it wasn’t obvious.)
LOLZ! Love it!
If it’s precognitive, any attempt at checkmate would invalidate itself, provided both parties can see equally as far into the future.
Knowing whats coming doesn’t mean you can prevent it, eventually one of them would run out of moves
Great game, though not quite as fun as dueling with Ancient Egyptian Laserbeams.
Did something similar to that in my so-jitsu (Japanese spear) class once. My wife and I went into guard position twenty seconds later we came out of guard and I had one the sparring match. The only ones who knew what the outcome of the match other than my wife and I was the sensei. He then told us not to do it again because it confused everybody else. We both agreed later on exactly how the match would have played out had we actually had moved.
Win!
Also, sounds like the Sensei needs to watch more Dragon Ball
so dose this mean that they now have to play through the game that they just foresaw there by making it true or do they not and there by making the future they sow a lie?
That’s what I was wondering (although, I was afraid to ask it for fear my head would explode).
Oh nice. Wish I’d thought of that.
Oh come on Tarot. Crush her. She’ll learn more that way.
Or…
Or… Sabrina would be crushed and lose all desire to learn the game; if someone’s introduced to something with a constant expectation to lose, what motivation do they have to learn and play in the future, to become great themselves? Granted, it’s possible to do so through desire to overcome the ‘oppressor,’ but should one really seek to be more a rival than a friend? *shrugs*
or your thinking too much because that’s just how they are, they probably dont think about anythign more than face value well other than the dragon also sabrina is tarots student so there is bound to be times when she needs to test her to make sure her powers is growing still and going easy on her wont help her learn
Or, are we really over looking a crucial factor. Exactly WHO’S eye is Tarot hiding behind her back?
Sauron’s.
Sabrina looks…different to me somehow. o.o
I think the fur is more detailed but I might be wrong.
Yeah, I think she looks a bit like a dog in this strip. Not a lot like one, but just a bit. I wonder if Rick is trying out new drawing styles? Either way, the muzzle looks a bit too long for a cat.
the last frame looks good to me
Her winter coat is growing in
It’s her serious face that’s throwing us off, I think she looks adorable.
It’s pointless comment time! When is King going to be back?
King will be back when he’s back. This comic has several primary characters; King is not the sole star. There was a King-centric arc not too long ago.
And that’s what made it a pointless comment.
King has never left, he just happens to be off-camera right now.
He’s been here all the time, he’s just gracious enough to give people some spotlight.
Meh chessfreaks do that AL the time without any powers.
That’s basically what chess is anyway, just not as advanced. I also love green eye Tarot.
So… this is more precognitive than normal chess? I didn’t think that could be possible.
“I predict that you’ll move here.”
“Well I predict that you’ll move there”
So on a so forth…
Nappa: GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH! I see what you’re about to do there!
I just remembered something. You can’t call checkmate if you haven’t called check. Or I could be wrong. It’s been a while since I’ve played a game of chess.
no ur mostly right you can only call checkmate when your sure you have won the game check is when you got the king but the person needs to “check” to make sure they didn’t lose or if they did lose
She predicted that she’d call check, so she didn’t actually have to do it.
The problem is that you also have to tell how many moves until the check or mate.
Touches queen’s knight.
“Mate in 153 moves”
Touches king’s bishop’s pawn
“Mate in 87 moves”
Touches king’s knight
“Mate in 23 moves”
“Good, I don’t have time for a long game.”
moves knight.
Way I remember, you call check when you are capable of taking the king in the next move. The opponent then must move the king out of danger. It’s checkmate when the king can’t move out of danger.
Pretty close. You call check when you are capable of taking the king in the current move, but it can be blocked by other pieces. Checkmate means that it cannot be blocked.
And obviously the move cannot be blocked, because it already occurred in whatever alternate universe Tynach is in.
(So, you wouldn’t necessarily require check before checkmate)
She could also have called check sometime before Peanut arrived.
*reads all of the replies* Thank you everyone.
“Would you like a piece of candy?”
“Do you already know whether I’m going to take it or not?”
“Wouldn’t be much of an oracle if I didn’t.”
“What’s so amazing about a rat running through a bloody maze!?”
“I only built the maze this morning! I won’t teach her how to run it until an hour from now!”
cheater she looked ahead to turn 7 when we were only suppose to Devin up to turn 6 to allow the butterfly affect to take work.
Anyone wanna play with me?
Pawn on E4! XD
Newfangled chess notation doesn’t let you make as many puns.
Rook at d7
illegal move
Wha?
Knight to King’s Secret Panel, and I see you and raise you ten quatloos.
Its all the choice of Steins Gate!
Why play? You can already tell who’s gonna lose before even starting!
If they don’t play, there will be no future to look forward to thus making it impossible for Tarot to know if she won or not.
It’s final: Tarot is my new favourite character. She is just so /adorable/ in this! Then again, I’ve always thought she was especially adorable. :3
i made that decision a loooooong time ago lol
Hugs Tarot!
(Tarot: “Ferret germs!”)
Agreed.
I’d have to take a long break just to clear up my head from considering all the possibilities of the first two moves on one side.
Everything that could have happened!
Pregogniton Chess? I Don’t Get It……
Precognition is knowing something before it happens. In this case, it’s knowing the moves that happen before they’re actually made, and in this case not bothering to physically move the pieces.
Thanks For Explaining That. :3 And That’s Kinda Creepy. XD
wow So Funny XD
I play chess a lot and I approve.
Unfortunately I only have a silver medal and not a gold one so my argument is not valid.
http://verydemotivational.memebase.com/2010/11/17/demotivational-posters-valid/
You were saying?
A big part of chess has to do with predicting the opponent’s next move. Chess is a strategy game but it can also very well be a gamble.
All I was saying was that your argument is valid… also, it took me forever to find that again. I should have searched Very Demotivational in the beginning
You win a gold star sticker, for perfect use of a demotivational. Congratulations.
You know what? That made me smile so much, you win two stickers.
Tarot: “It’s so easy I can even do it blindfolded!”
the wallpaper at Tarot’s house is weird. Just saiyan.
This is beautiful! I really love the different article. What a great decoration! I think I should try one. If only I had more time.
That’s so awesome