Grrl Power #1107 – Tube… of DOOM
This is a weird page, and drawing isometric stuff is harder than I thought it would be.
The picture is supposed to be a simplified model of the base, like a LIDAR scan, not a photograph. Chimyriad is hanging her commandeered phone out a window and passing it back and forth a few times and… I guess the phone has a “construct isometric model” app or something. Or hell, maybe she found a drawer with early plans roughed out and snapped a shot.
I have a book series recommendation. I’ve developed a bad habit lately of starting a new series, and 15% of the way though the first book it’s not for me. That’s fine by itself, but I’m currently 3 for 3 with coming back a year later and giving it another shot and deciding it’s my favorite series in a long time. Part of it is simple timing, and part of it comes from trying to read the book, then when I return to the series, its because I’m looking for a new audiobook to fill my ears while I draw. It’s not that I’m a lazy reader, but the need for content I can multitask to helps me get past the “establishing phase” of books which is usually my least favorite part.
Anyway, the series is probably something you heavier readers have heard of, called “Expeditionary Force,” the first book of which is titled “Columbus Day.” In some ways, the first book is structured a bit like the movie “From Dusk till Dawn.” If you haven’t seen the movie, it’s a fairly straightforward “bank robbers on the run filled with Tarantino-esque dialog,” and then out of nowhere and without any foreshadowing, the third act is like “You know what? Fuck it. Vampires!” I wish more media had the balls to pull a crazy move like that, but the money people are always going to be worried about burning their existing audience. Expeditionary Force doesn’t have anything to do with Vampires, there’s just a fairly dramatic change of circumstances about 2/3 of the way through the first book. It starts off as the very opposite of a HFY story, which is usually not my speed, but… eh, I don’t want to spoil anything, I’ll just say the series become sort of a master class in lateral thinking. I just finished book 13, and by then… it’s… kind of a HFY story? Not really but… arg! It’s good. I recommend it, and I especially recommend the audiobooks, because the narrator does a fantastic job with the main characters. The only caveat I’ll give is the that the whole story is incredibly high stakes, like it starts at “if we screw up, humanity will go extinct,” and it only gets worse from there. 13 books of that (actually 15, I’m still working through it) is a little stressful, there were times I felt like having a palate cleanser with a Robert Asprin book or something, but I was still compelled to forge ahead with the next book.
The November Vote Incentive is up!
I went a little simpler with the art this time, which is to say I didn’t add like 9 passes of lighting and detail work. I wasn’t trying to chintz out on the time input or anything, I’d been browsing around ArtStation since I like torturing myself with all the amazing art there, and found a few people who do nice clean styles that are more Arcane (the League of Legends Netflix show) than Love, Death and Robots, and by LD&R I mean the ones that are like “Look at how realistic our skin textures are!” and not the ones that are more Pixar-y or just like 2D cell art or whatever.
Enjoy variant outfits and lack thereof over at Patreon.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
Another feature they seem to be sadly lacking is escape tunnels, which they be sorely missing in a while.
Reread Maxima’s 3rd area of focus.
Literally in the 7th Speech Bubble.
Or the 3rd on the right of panel 1.
Escape tunnels are of course hidden behind clocks, statues and other odd objects.
Those are always, long convoluted and lead to instant death traps. No long tedious and inevitably easily escapable traps. Nope, always instant death potassium cyanide is a personal favorite. The actual ones never are in the expected places, often clearly marked because nobody would do that. That they all have instant fatality traps that activate after authorized personnel have passed by is a given. Oh, and you should really check out of comprehensive medical, dental package with standard legal representation.
So a standard Anasigma base. Why do we work here again?
The nice thing about a base in north central Texas is that a relatively short escape tunnel can lead to downtown Paris….
eww, nobody goes there. ;)
This town is a proof that everything is not bigger in Texas:
Paris Texas a small town population 24,171 area 37.07 sq mi (96.00 km²)
Paris France a metropolis population 2,165,423 area 18,940.7 km² (7,313.0 sq mi)
Maybe Texans just hate France and named a small town Paris as mockery :)
It’s odd France is one of the few nations who granted semi-official recognition of Republic of Texas on September 25, 1839. In 1841 the French opened a legation which still stands in Austin, (a few miles from the site of the current Texas Capitol building), and Texas in turn opened an embassy in Paris (french one).
I’ve doubt about Texas hatred.
And for famous last stands Texas have Alamo ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Alamo) in 1836 but France have Camaron in 1863 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Camar%C3%B3n ).
“I’ve doubt about Texas hatred.”
I am admittedly basing this on King of the Hill.
I am rather surprised that the Ascenders set up their lair in Archon’s back yard.
It cuts down on the commute, and there’s not really a lot of anything immediately outside of the DFW metroplex, but there ARE volcanoes in New Mexico.
(last eruption in the state was 50-60k years ago)
Backyard?
…Wait, where is ARCHON HQ, anyway?
When 2 or 3 members of the team can fly at supersonic speeds, I feel everywhere counts. Infinitely more so when one member can casually do sub-orbital flights or more…
The serious answer is Archon is in the USA, therefore anywhere within the US is not that far for them relatively speaking.
Unspecified, but it’s roughly somewhere in central America so that they can respond (relatively) quickly to both coasts. Possibly a Texas city, possibly Denver.
Hm, last time I checked, Texas was not “Central America” :-D ;-)
He said ‘central’, lowercase ‘c’, indicating the center of the USA, not “Central’, uppercase ‘c’, which would’ve suggested the center of the Americas.
Do you mean central to the United States of America or Central America – the relatively thin strip of land that connects North to South America, i.e. between Mexico and Colombia?
The following countries are in Central America:
Belize
Costa Rica
El Salvador
Guatemala
Honduras
Nicaragua
Panama
I suspect Archon is near Omaha, NE. Very central in the US, and has a long history of military airfields.
They could reach anywhere in the US within 2-3 hours.
In the Ascenders’ backyard, of course.
1) This lair was set up before Archon went public.
2) Presumably the lair is set up for the connivance of it’s American masters.
3) There may be more than one lair, this was just the closest.
this is the one they took ‘red chief’ too. bet they would like to ransom him cheap now.
I see what you did there, and I approve this message. One of my favorite authors.
50-60k years? Sounds like they’re about due for another.
the genre savvy comments proliferate. North Texas so many temptations, so much backlash. I fully expect there is this much stupid money available in North Texas. one thing to do after securing the place. report it to the local tax assessor. once word get out of how much an underground lair raises your property taxes that will discourage further experimentation in this area.
“I may be mad enough to fight Batman. But even I am not mad enough to mess with the IRS!” – Joker, Batman TAS.
Unless of course the IRS are supervillains with secret underground bases.
The GQP thinks they are and have them. They don’t know where because “SEEcrit”
Having trees down there IS a nice touch for the lair, though, at least. They really spruce up the place.
I tree what you did there …
Panda will be along to sycamore ninja squads on you shortly
Now hold on, there could be an aldernative explanation…
When Pander sends the ninjas, I walnut pine fir yew.
Oakay, we’re all axing for it now, Pander willow us all hit squads. At least she can’t call the copse.
If she hasn’t twigged it by now, I’m nut sure this effort will bear fruit.
NINJAS! NINJA HIT SQUADS FOR ALL OF YOU!
DOUBLE NINJAS IN FACT BECAUSE YOU ALL DID PUNS TWO OR THREE TIMES IN A SINGLE SENTENCE!
SO MANY NINJAS!
Single ninja for Dan but for the rest of you double ninja hit squads! Even for Ray because he started this!
Leaf it out, have an olive branch
You expect me ro shake like a leaf but your ninjas bark is worse than their bite.
Calm down, take two Aspen and call me in the morning.
Ninjas for EVERYONE.
A global apocalypse of ninja hit squads.
Oak rilly? Because, staff protection is part of the compensation package (though HR is on me about my excessive PTO due to some time relative duties) fern another poinsetta. This a rough bark for any ninjas after me. I’ve pruning hooks and know how to use them to root out pesky ninjas…lots of training with crab grass.
weren’t you cutting back? may the ghost of the Christmas Shoe Child find you when your wallet leaf expects it. Walnut you know I’m reaching here.
There is no more Christmas. There are only ninja hit squads now. Your puns ended Christmas. Hope you’re happy! Little Timmy isnt getting a new wheelchair. He’s only getting a receipt from the Ninja Emporium.
You really need to quit birching so much, @Pander, and do something a-bough-t it already.
Now not only has Christmas been cancelled due to the ninja apocalypse, but so has Hannukah and I guess Kwanzaa, Saturnalia, and Festivus.
*litters Panders house with empty vessels. (and not a few)*
*then leaves one nice bottle of olive oil.*
“I have a lot of prob-puns with you people!”
Clearly we have af-frond-ed you, too late to leaf you an olive branch? Don’t know if we can ever recant and make a full tannenbaut… er, turnabout.
Some green is often poplar at work.
I “boooooed” all of your comments. They earned it.
No ninjas for you. You get cookies.
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/a1/50/fa/a150fa1418d6922ce9c2188112500f77.jpg
Embrace the power of Both
Oh hell now I need to actually bake ninja cookies because those look perfect.
The evil base set-up remind me a lot of the Institute in Fallout 4 with the big tower/ascender in the middle and the rings of levels all around.
I was going to say the same thing!
It is also reminiscent of location from the “Resident Evil: Degeneration” movie. I don’t think there was a central tower, but it had a green environment in the middle, with rings of rooms around it.
I think they hired the architect who did the Atlas Missile silos.
yup. pretty sure that was the inspiration.
Not a volcanic lair…yet.
Are you WANTING the San Antonio supervolcano incident to happen?
Thats south central Texas, not north central Texas.
Yes, please, no Texas super volcanos…little ones, are fine… up around Dallas… knowing us we’ll turn it into a tourist attraction. Like Yellowstone, but spicier.
So any super capable of being a Hyperpenetrating Submunition Drone in WMD capabilities?
And for giggles-
The parking garage pictured above turns out to be hotel parking where a comics convention regular happens and Sydney is at dealer table at it.
Well, Maxima could throw Achilles or Anvil really, really hard. Like, “Rods from God” hard.
But as they said: Hostages.
There’s also the tectonic repercussions to consider.
Texas architecture isn’t really built with earthquakes in mind.
Yeah, a few places even took minor damage from the Oklahoma fracking quakes.
It might not be a volcano lair, but they do get points for including the subterranean green space, so that employees can relax during breaks. So few supervillains bother to do things like that.
I know. Productivity is was up since w,, the boss hired some mental hygiene staff. Pets are allowed at work also!
It probably also helps with oxygen generation if they have to seal the base off from the outside environment for an extended length of time
That won’t produce anywhere near enough oxygen, but it does freshen up the air a bit and helps people resist stress.
Just because you are a evil megalomaniac doesn’t mean you can’t be nice and take care of your minions. It worked well for both Deus and Hank Scorpio.
The jury is still out on exactly how or even whether Deus is evil.
.
..
…
Megalomaniac on the other hand is so open and shut you’d think it was a camera shutter.
Anyone who looks like Deus is evil re LOTR “seem fair but feel foul”
this base design reminds me of the Institute from Fallout 4.
Yeah they both do have a very ‘Guggenheim Museum feel to the architecture.
Just wanted to second the recommendation on Expeditionary Force! Very fun sci-fi!
Volcano bases are hard to justify when the millions of hard-stolen money you’ve sunk into it, could become melty. Magneto could pull it off, because if the volcano decided to become active again, he could just go, “no” and it’s over.
If you have super powers for digging it or super materials to insulate it from the heat, volcanic bases are amazing at generating a lot of energy for your mad inventions for practically free.
For the tropes: I do hope they do have small maglev carts to get around the lair, at the very least. *grins*
I know of no song about bumper cars. this is a missed opportunity.
really? not even ‘Bounce wit me’?
Bumper Cars song – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHk8HEgl0lQ
Pfft, never set up your lair in Volcanos, Swamps, Skyscrapers, abandoned military bases (which is a shame that was a sweet deal on that old missile command base) No, anywhere but those places. I know of one that may or may not be in an abandoned shopping mall, the best part is the security. It’s out in the open and you still don’t notice them. Hints will not be provided as the staff get bonuses on how unnoticed their work is in removing snoopers.
Actually, a shopping mall would be a great location for a supervillain base. The superstructure is already reinforced to heck and back, you’ve already got offices and storerooms ready to go, you’ve got every excuse to have some level of foot traffic as long as everyone at ground floor is wearing civvies,
On the books, call it an ‘office park’, owned by a company who purchased the mall and rather than tear it down used it to make office space for some of the most boring companies in existence. Which also nicely diverts attention and explains why you occasionally have large shipments of equipment come in.
That… hmm, that actually gives me an idea. Lemme write that down…
… Sounds like you described ArchonHQ…
or you can set up operations in a film studio, lots of strange & out of the normal activity being completely normal, with tax deductable losses as films never seem to make a profit.
https://www.shadolibrary.org/ops/equip4.shtml
That was considered, but the people we’d have to deal with. UHG, creative types. Y’know? Oh, well clean up in the parking lot and I’m on sea bass feeding detail the rest of the week. Man the money we’d make selling the stuff we use for clean up…we’d clean up. Works on tree sap AND blood. Which is nice.
In PS238, The Revenant builds his bases under fitness centers that he owns. It’s a money-maker, he’s always got a place to train, and no one bats an eye when a bunch of overly muscled people meet there.
That was discussed. And even with the egos involved, NOBODY on the board wanted to have the staff have to deal with all the “Gym Bro’s” of any gender. I mean ‘REALLY?’ Most of them never put the weights or gear back much less wipe down the bench when they finish. (Shakes head sadly) Then one of the guys with issues gets upset and I have to go clean up if you take my meaning. Seriously, it’s a pain finding all the bits and splashes. Sure, glad the stuff the lab came up with gets all the stains out and undetectable after.
And a fringe benefit is that employees can do all their shopping on the way out the door.
The problem with that is thar the constant crowd of public foot and computer traffic would be an absolute security and secrecy nightmare.
If your layer is a volcano yet … dig deeper!
That actually kinda makes sense, as long as you can get the USGS’s GIS and water table data. Probably on the north side of the metroplex, north of Denton perhaps? Far enough that the only neighbors are cotton, corn, and cattle, but close enough to be able to draw on DFW Int’l Airport (and Love Field, if necessary) for shipping. For the really big bulk stuff, you can ship it up from Houston Port up I-45 (maybe take 635 around Mesquite to avoid downtown traffic.
Either that or maybe Waxahachie area. Still sparsely populated, but you’re on 287 which goes up to I-20 right where 360 heads to the airport, and I-35 to ship bulk up from Houston without having to actually go through the metroplex to get to you. I-35 also gives you a more or less clear shot to Austin so your guys can influence politics and keep your place off the map.
You could probably make it work anywhere between the Metroplex and the Red river and as far west as Wichita Falls for all of the aforementioned reasons. There is lots of construction and an anonymous warehouse or office building doesn’t draw a second glance in this area. So yeah, transport hub, lots of money in the local community, plenty of opportunity for cover businesses to launder one’s ill gotten gains. Throw up yet another cookie cutter gated community and you can keep your minions close at hand with plenty of shopping and a good school district.
How would Max look wearing an outfit similar to this person…
https://www.yojoe.com/images/resize/w/MAX/imagestore/109/38642.jpg
Now you’re expositioning with portals!
Is it wrong that this was the first thing I noticed about the page?
I saw those portals.
Whoops, added another comment on this one, my bad! It is a creative way to show the flow of conversation. :D
It’s not the first time DaveB has used that method of patching together word bubbles.
Of bloody COURSE it’s in Texas.
Texas is not Florida. thank goodness.
And neither of them are California or New York, which is why so many people are relocating there. It’s so bad that California has tried (and failed) to pass an exit tax on people moving away TWICE.
Almost every person I’v heard of fleeing *those* states did so because of the crime, economy or both. Others because of lack of housing or employment opportunities. Texas and Florida may have thier problems, but not enough to discourage people leaving worse places.
The California “exit tax” of 2020, and the proposed wealth tax, both apply to people whose net worth is over $30 million. People who have over 30 million don’t move states due to “crime”. Economy, sure. There’s always somewhere they think will be more conducive to growing their dragon hoard.
“Many people are saying this.”
“Everyone I’ve heard of…”
“They say…”
“You know it it’s true folks…”
Let us know when you’ve got independently verifiable statistics to back up any of this nonsense.
Just ask Bernie Horowitz.
She kinda looks like 90s Jubilee with those goggles. I wanna see some fireworks!
“construct isometric model” app: It’s known as photogrammetry.there are a number of phone apps for this (with server ls to do the computation), sone of them free; I’ve used one of them to scan objects or rooms for import into 3d modelling and printing apps. I am guessing that in this case they wouldn’t mind using a paid version that could handle more complicated models, or perhaps ARC has their own that can be cheated into the phone or use uploaded videos.
Dave could have chosen to draw usa-foot-ric instead of isometric, like any true-blooded American spitting on ISO and the metric system… ;-)
First these bad guys have no time for a good sinister interrogation and then their secret underground base turns out to be a boring looking underground office complex. They really need to step up their villain game.
My take-away from this one? Building without a permit is a superpower.
I suspect this was concreta’s first task.
Oh good call actually. Although I have to disagree with the premise, most contractors would be more than happy to skip permitting and inspection processes while also getting paid more under the table to not file paperwork.
wouldn’t the city monitor or notice the concrete usage? that stuff has to be made nearby and is kind of obvious when moved. once could say its as subtle as a brick, but that isn’t a pun. I’ll get into the aggregate punning somehow.
I don’t see a way for local (or state) government to track that, batch plants are privately owned and operated. Why would they even want to monitor how much concrete was being made and distributed by private contracting companies? Perhaps traffic cameras could be used to detect an unusual number of trucks going to an unpermitted site, but they’d have to a) be looking for that specifically and b) have the budget to spare for it. Even a single large authorized project nearby could easily hide the number of trucks required for this facility.
I suspect any government that has an interest in collecting taxes would put at least some effort towards monitoring large projects.
The project itself is of little interest beyond the building department though (who mainly monitors the quality), it isn’t taxed directly – the construction company’s profits are, and perhaps the final owners.
This is where you quietly pencil in an ARC-DARK agent who has the power to map out areas via some sort of psychic link that can be activated when needed with each member of the unit as a whole. They can then, of course, share this map via said link with the appropriate individuals to whip up a rough working model.
They had better get a wiggle on. Assuming that Goon Squad’s copied phones are all copies of the same SIMM card, every one of them will have that screenshot in their history as soon as they have any bars. The writers of Primer did the research on what would happen if you copied or time traveled a smartphone.
They’re not all copies. That’s why it said “Goon XYZ”.
It’s too useful to give every goon a phone so clearly they’ve got cheap ones they hand out.
North Central Texas? Waco? Nothing good ever comes out of Waco.
Collins Street Bakery.
Eeeeeh….
*noncommital shrug*
Lived in the area for a decade, can confirm. Don’t get me started about Harker Heights.
This is one of those villain lairs where I wonder what happens to it after the bad guys have been cleaned out.
This could house a number of legal organizations.
Especially for people with super powers that go into the private sector.
I mean, since I saw Colossus bring up the X-Men’s Blackbird jet I have been thinking how stupid many super villains are. Examining and/or salvaging ships, demolition, living space rocket getting stuff into orbit, construction. There are so many applications of super powers.
In short, it would be nice to see what happens to this lair after some time has gone by.
If it isn’t demolished during the coming raid that is.
Archon is about to acquire a new super containment facility! Or some senator’s new party hotel…
Data storage. The State of Texas maintains literally tons of medical records from the state hospital system. Less so since they went to an electronic medical record but there were still “core” documents that had to be physically maintained.
Speaking of skull-shaped, I imagine the following exchange:
Dr. Light: Wily, why did you budget ten skull-themed castles in various exotic locations?
Dr. Wily: Can’t a man have his hobbies?
The one in Mexico is entirely sugar-skull-themed.
Probably not the first, but calling it here that Sydney, Dabbler, and Anvil will have to rescue the rest of the squad.
But that would require them to somehow defeat Maxima, which would be quite a feat.
I have a feeling that it’s more likely that it’s one of 2 things:
1) the author wants to show off the rest of the team/side characters but couldn’t justify Max not going. Or
2) somehow, by being there, one of those characters would mess up the intended plot, so, they get their own side quest to distract them.
For the record, just in case you’re somehow tapping into my dreams for inspiration, thank you for this. I officially relinquish any copyright I may have somehow held regarding this base to you, as an attempt to compensate you for bringing it to life more than I ever could. I will not take any umbrage if your superheroes wreck it. :)
I dunno, if Lex Luthor could make an abandoned subway station into a supervillain lair, I’m open to a parking garage getting the same treatment.
For a moment, I thought the reference to a Texas volcano was a shout out to Empowered.
Wait, wait, wait… A group called “The Ascenders” has a base that does the exact opposite?
These people really do have zero style. They need to hire Deus as a image/brand consultant.
He is good at getting money out of all six or seven sides of the villain/supervillain/government/business/charity/research puzzle, isn’t he?
Au contraire, “Ascender Base” is very descriptive of the people themselves – can’t put any plans in motion until they ascend to the surface world.
they cant afford Dues’s rates. nor his thread count requirements.
… Now I want to see a retractable skull-shaped laser.
No can do, was cancelled due to budgetary constraints and in a universal vote among staff deemed “too bloody stupid looking”. It might please you to know that the “genetically modified drop bears of doom” project was green lighted. But first the infrastructure to contain development.
p.s. also, did you know our ‘janitorial staff’ make more than field operatives?
I appreciate the use of the portal colors from the Portal game to simplify following the speech bubbles. :)
A volcanic lair sounds really cool, but hardly anyone can afford the insurance premiums.
For some reason I’m mainly surprised that there are trees at the bottom of the underground base, considering there’s no sunlight and it would all be artificial light. Also seems a bit impractical to bring full grown trees down there,even if they’re doing it for, like…. oxygen replenishment, when they could be using CO2 scrubbers or many smaller plants that would be less conspicuous to bring into the parking structure than trees. I’m assuming they were brought in as saplings, although seems like they’d have grown really fast. Although I guess it could have been grown or placed there via superpowers.
Still, I find it funny that of all the cool things about this base, I’m most focused on the trees. :)
We shall see if Dave will comment on the uniqueness of them being there at the appropriate time!
The sapient trees are the masterminds behind the Archon attacks.
Durkon was right in the end, beware the trees.
It’s nice that they put the cafeteria level on the bottom floor so minions can look out at the trees during their lunch break.
So, are goggles in the same color as Maxima’s skin standard ARC-SWAT issue?
Not quite a volcanic lair, but this allows you to power your secret underground base with geothermal energy *anywhere*.
https://www.eavor.com/
I hope they tell sydney about that obligatory mention lol
Going to point out David Webers book Out of the Dark as a reading option then on this book recommendation.
No volcanic lair. Next year for Christmas, though!