Piandaos Secret

The gag in this strip is going to be lost on about 90% of the people who see it. For those of you not familiar with the material I'll try to fill you in.

Sokka's holding 'The Book of Nine Swords', a Dungeons and Dragons supplement book focusing on martial skills. It also has the reputation of being the most unbalanced book in the entire history of the game. The Warblade is a character class, presented in this book, has been banned from most games due to it's broken nature. I can say, with no exaggeration, that a high level warblade could fight any bender from the show, including Aang in the avatar state, with no chance of defeat. Warblades can face challenges that normally tax four or five adventures without breaking a sweat.

So the joke is that Piandao, the greatest swordsman in the Fire Nation, is so great because he is a Warbalde. Like I said, I don't expect most of you to get this, but anyone who's played along side a Warblade knows what I'm talking about and can see what an amusing situation it would be for Sokka to take this path. ("Watch out for that earthbender" Sokka uses Adamantine Bones Strike, bolder shatters against his face, "Showdown with the Fire Lord" Sokka uses Feral Death Blow, the gang helps him climb out from the crater he made around Ozai's corpse)

It's silly and obscure, and they say the first rule of comedy is 'It's not funny if you have to explain it.' Still, I mainly did this for a friend of mine who loves The Book of Nine Swords to death, so as long as he gets a laugh out of this I'll be happy with it.