Grrl Power #123 – It’s only trivia until you’re quizzed on it
So Leon evidently has his nerd chops in order. And don’t worry if you had trouble parsing “When does the narwhal bacon?” It is in no way a proper sentence, but to some of us, it makes sense. I will grant it is more of a Geek reference than a Nerd one though, according to my own private definition if the words.
Now something else to entertain you, Fred Perry of Gold Digger fame, which I’ve mentioned a few times before as being my favorite comic is finally doing a webcomic. As well as continuing a regular schedule with Gold Digger, cause Fred is a machine. You don’t even need to read its About section to tell that it’s heavily influenced by Adventure Time and My Little Pony. It’s called Action Time Buddies. It’s just getting started but still swing by and give it a look see.
Edit: A bit of an update, I’ve replaced Bochs with Puck, despite my memory, Bochs was a double amputee, and not actually a Dwarf. Also I’ve added Carrot – there’s a lot of dwarves I could have included but there’s only so much space and Carrot is one of the more notable ones.
Isn’t Bochs the character from Marvel Comics Alpha Flight? A dwarf (until he got better).
That was Puck.
Puck was his codename, his given name was Eugene Judd. In his back story he went by the nickname “giant Judd” because he was over 7ft tall before he lost half his height, but not his weight, due to magic.
Ding! I thought more people would get that, but I guess Alpha Flight isn’t as big a book any more. I was reading it when John Byrne was drawing it, so maybe it was a more prominent title then.
Getting your legs cut off doesn’t make you a dwarf.
they wern’t cut off he got his powers via magic…actually now that i think of it pucks powers are the polar opposite of The Juggernaut
Bochs wasn’t Puck.
Indeed. Roger Bochs was the original Box. He lost his legs some time prior to developing the Box armor.
Not a dwarf. Not to be confused with Eugene Judd, a.k.a. Puck.
Hey, I know Alpha Flight original, so don’t sweat it, Dave.
However, Bochs and Puck are two different people.
Bochs was the guy without legs, who used a robot or exoskeleton to go super-heroing. The concept changed at least a couple of times. Originally, it was a telepresence deal, where he sat someplace and was electronically linked toa his robot. Then the robot became something he actually merged with.
Puck (Eugene Judd) was a dwarf with acrobatics plus high strength and speed.
Of course, given that Leon mistakenly says Bochs AND Sydney doesn;t call him out on this, maybe they both know of a dwarf called Bochs in a book, movie orr TV show.
Given that Dave has already indicated he got Bochs from Alpha Flight I’d say the mistake is his: Hey, does this count as one of Dave’s easter eggs?
Bochs created the Box armor with the help of Forge.Forge started using it after Bochs died. Puck got his prower from the fact that he was the living prison for a demon, which was only release once because of some stupid fight or another don’t remember what it was though. Oh if memory serves me right Bochs also came back as a villain bitter that Alpha flight had failed to save him, but that was and X-men cross over if I remember correctly.
Wow, I guess it’s been a lot longer than I thought since I’ve read Alpha Flight. I could have sworn Bochs was a Dwarf. With this many fact checkers I’ll have to stop making assumptions, even about stuff I’m relatively sure of. I’m learning that nearly everything I know is almost correct. :P
It’d be cool to have Sydney call him on it, but that would involve changing the art and redoing some of the dialog, so I’ll probably just change it to Puck when I get a chance.
Maybe just have Sydney quietly come up to him later to avoid embarrasing him (also would mean not having to mess around with the page)
Leon fails miserably in geek/nerd test in the first two panels.
“Newton” is International Standard Unit, but “inch” is Obsolite Imperial
Unit. These two unit systems should never be mixed in engineering.
The proper way to express pressure or stress is 1 Pa = 1 N / m^2
(pressure is force on area, Pascal is Newton on square meter).
Obsolite way to express pressure was 1 psi = 1 lbf/in^2 (pounds per
square inch is pound-force per square inch).
The word “per” is used commonly with Obsolite Imperial Units, as in
“miles per hour”, “feet per second” or “furlongs per forthnight”.
In countries where SI units have been used for several generations,
people use “in” or “on” instead of “per” in normal speech. Speed or
velocity is expressed as “kilometers in hour” or “meters in second”.
You’re overthinking it, Sheldon. Sydney said joules per square inch. He only corrected the part that was technically wrong, not the part that he would have worded differently.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UHiWvfwD6M
Between a Nerd, a Geek, & a Dork, who would most likely be the best at =accurately= mixing these disparate terms?
(…I refer to the “Newton/Inch” issue above…)
Mind you, I’m not suggesting these terms SHOULD be mixed – just that it might be done to impress others of their clan with their obscure researching-skills.
I will have to strong disgree with you “Kilometers per hour”, and “meters per second” is far more common than “kilometers in hour” or “meters in second” epscial as “in time period” is past test usage only. you traved 100 kilometers in an hour but you travel at 100 kilometer per hour.
I agree, I’ve never heard “kilometers in hour” before. Maybe Farmind lives in some distant and exotic land where they speak an odd dialect of English? (E.g. Australia)
Nope, they may speak some abominationly mutated version of english, but they still use ‘per hour’
Not only is “X per Y” more common, it’s actually grammatically accurate while “X in Y” isn’t. “Per” is basically “for each” or “in each” depending on context i.e. 10 mph = 10 miles / 1 hour. Using “X in Y” alone leaves the sentence without any quantity for Y; it’s undefined in the same way that any number divided by zero is undefined.
I think the issue here is a translation one.
In English speaking countries, rates or differentials are referred to as “X per Y,” which is a shortened form of “a number of units of attribute X per 1 unit of attribute Y,” or “for every unit of attribute Y, there are a number of units of attribute X.”
In other languages, this is termed differently, and so translates into English differently. Literally, they are saying “X in Y,” but the equivalent phrase in English is “X per Y.”
Also, it’s possible, but unlikely, that Sydney may have meant energy per unit area, in which case she should either have used the SI units “joules per square metre,” or, as she is in the USA, “calories per square inch.”
I was thinking this too as soon as I read it. I was confused by the mixing of imperial and metric. Pascals is probably what a true nerd would correct her too, as it is metric, and pressure/stress/force-per-unit-area.
That said I agree with Roguebfl that if he wanted to say it, Newtons per square meter would be the weird but more common way of stating it.
And no dwarves from BoatMurdered? Geez. There is a spy among nerd-geek hybrids who no longer has proper cave adaptation!! ALERT!!!
Hehehe, even Urist McDwarf Would have been enough XD
1701 recieved a refit, but no new letter. A already had refit specs :D
Geeks are everywhere!
Just wanted to say I love this comic :D
and I spelt received wrong… but it is 6am, so I have an excuse
I should probably change my comment under the comic, as it’s been repeatedly pointed out that it’s wrong. One thing I’m learning while doing the comic is that nearly everything I think I know is nearly correct.
side effect of living in the information age
no matter how much research you do
no matter how much you check your facts
there’s always one who will point out a mistake
I am disappointed that when naming dwarves Leon didn’t mention Carrot Ironfounderssen
What about Sir Schmoopy of Awesometon?
Is he related to Mr.Michael “Schmoopsie-poo” Waschowski (sp.?)
Also, after reading this strip, I suddenly find my nerdhood inadequate.
I very much agree on both of your comments…
In spite of my phd in engineering I also find my nerdhood inadequate.
What? He didn’t mention me? Brodder FoamyMugs? Of EQ fame? The Vicar of Liquor, Demigod of the Dram, The priest of yeast? Oy! – :P
Like Carrot I’m a size challenged Dwarf…
Brodder, you’re here?! Man, I miss EQ. Gonna have to log in again one of these years.
We missed you dearly when you left.
I think this strip probably took the most research thus far…
Five bucks says Max’s time with Sydney causes her to break down and starts blowing everything up.
Well, yeah, that is a giving, the real question is: how long does Maxi last before the Breakage of the Downage
Like a mosque?
seems the dwarf question has opened a can of worms too
Dwarfs are a popular trope in fiction.
especially in tossing them.
Oh and Dwarf on Elf has apparently become popular in some seedy parts of the gaming industry.
can of worms?
all things considered equal, i think I’d rather have some puddi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sEI1AUFJKw
(Btw, the narwhale bacons at 3am, not midnight…)
Shhh…
If you keep giving away the secret codes like that someone will send the R.S.P.(Reddit Secret Police) after you.
Depends on the time zone, really.
Actually, The Enterprise before the refit was a Constitution Class ship. The specs that were used for 1701 A was more of a “redesign” of the Constitution Class than a refit, thus becoming the Enterprise Class of starship. Enterprise Class of starship is nothing less than a complete *overhaul* of the Constitution Class configuration, becoming so “new” that a new Class of starship was born.
I may not be a nerd, but I am a Trekker.
:D
Technically Flint & Bruenor are in the same universe, just different settings… a la Spelljammer.
Correct: Krynn, (the name of the FR world is currently escaping me, but used to know it) and the planets for Grey Hawke and Dark Sun are all in the same ‘dimension’ (as opposed to ‘universe’)
FR is Faerûn (for the continent); Toril for the whole planet, Abeir-Toril for both planets or the one that remains after the cataclysm that was 4th Edition.
Thank you, used to know Toril by heart (and Faerûn), but haven’t really had to think about it for a few many years (even got the Oriental Lands/Kara Tur rule book and read about the ‘Aztec’/’Mayan’ continent in a series of books) but didn’t know there were two planets (thought Abeir-Toril was the full name)
Why not take it from the viewpoint of Planescape and the city of Sigil?
Although perhaps we’re quibbling/nitpicking too much on the separation (or lack thereof) of universes.
Actually Fred Perry has been doing webcomics for years at https://www.gd-tangent.com/ , including but not limited to “Level Up!” ( https://lvlup.tsunami-art.com/ ) which has chronicled his adventures in Final Fantasy XI since October 2005.
What? No mention of Alberich from “Der Ring des Nibelungen”? *sigh*… all that anybody ever remembers are the Valkries….. (behold the power of boobies!)
There were Valkeries in that? Thought it was the Norse/germanic equivalent of river nymphs/mermaids
um… not really sure if you are serious or joking…. the title of second opera of the Ring cycle is “The Valkyrie” (with the famous “Ride of the Valkyries”)
Yes, was serious, saw a movie about the Ring couple years and don’t remember any mention about Valkyries in it (have heard “Ride of the Valkyrie” but only knew it was from an Opera by Wagner)
I love how the first one he said was Sleepy.
I call unfair bias on Syndey’s nerd test! 3 out of 7 questions are Dr. Who related! C’mon! If Leon was a Lesser Nerd or a Nerd w/o Dr. Who exposure, he’d have failed!
Also, any true nerd/geek test would be incomplete without some questions from some form of tabletop RPG (eg DnD)…
and rightly so
Unless designed by committee (with all the pitfalls *THAT* entails), any suite of tests will display bias – & the nature of the bias reveals the nature of the questioner, in turn.
Or maybe the list of questions was weighted by the responses given, if he had shown Whovian weakness maybe Sydney would have focused on Marvel/DC, Naruto, Stargate or Blake’s Seven; the world of Nerdistry is vast and unlimited.
I say you badly misjudge Sydney. Many of those were not “there’s one right answer” questions, but more like invitations to play. Especially the dwarves question. And she never said he was wrong on any of them.
I imagine if his response to “How many doctors?” was to start rattling off Dr. Strange, Dr. Fate, Dr. Occult, Dr. Doom, Dr. XXX, Dr. Doctor, etc., she would have accepted that.
Final note for the night:
Leon’s first answer in Panel_5 would double (perhaps even triple!?!) if he referenced the ST_episode in which the Doctor writes an “Uncle Tom’s Cabin”-type of novel about the rights of holographic persons, & then must defend it against suppression. I recall the final scene is underground, where at least a DOZEN copies of decommissioned Doctors are working as miners. Despite their matching faces (& source-code), their differing life experience (before being decommissioned), defines them as individuals, & allows them to be counted as individuals.
Bonus points for accurately counting the number of different Doctors in just that one episode!
@Killbane; I think the nerdiest thing I’ve ever seen was a guy wearing a T-shirt at a performance of “Das Rheingold” that said “Fafnir and Fasolt Construction”.
Dunno if anyone asked this yet or not, but is Sydney resting her head on Max’s shoulder in the last panel?
Now that you point it out… Her face does have like more of the ‘smooshed’ look one would have while resting your head on someones shoulder rather than if she was just tilting her head towards Maxi
Maybe they’re already at that stage of their friendship.
Or Sydney is at least, no word back from Maxi yet :D
People are commenting how they expected them to kiss: the only place can see Sydney kissing Leon would have been on the end of his nose
Oh, regarding the whole ‘geek’ vs ‘nerd’ vs ‘dork’ thing? To me, a ‘dork’ is a hybrid geerk/nerd who simply doesn’t care about the ridicule/scorn that either gets heaped upon (as opposed to just a convention-stye geek/nerd hybrid)
You forgot Constable Cuddy.
Lord Farquaad?
I think nerddom also has a generational aspect. Not many gamers today would know how to avoid being eaten by a Gru. Also there can be some national differences like until we got BBC over here most people never heard of “The Doctor”.
On the other hand a Nerd isn’t supposed to be most people :)
Grue, not Gru. And stay out of dark rooms/dungeons.
Yup (I might have mentioned before my lackluster typing and spelling skills) and for those into retro computing here’s a fun little video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nigRT2KmCE
OMG, the Doctor Who dialogue made me drool!
What about Mulch Diggums?
“The Curse of Fatal Death.” Oh, so close.
Yeah not sure how I did that, but I’ve fixed it.
Oh, and while you include all the tributary Enterprises, what about the original NCC-1701? I think that’s the one you’re referring to as “A” when you talk about the refit – NCC-1701-A never had a refit, due to its shorter lifespan.
It’s fine to forget NX-01 though.
this is the most awesome page yet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Suprisingly people forget Tattoo from Fantasy Island. (Yes I am old LOL)
he’s must famous line
“the plane, the plane”
Close but no coconut: the correct quote was “De Plane! De Plane!”
To me he wlll always be “Nick Nack.”
…or “the little breather”.
You know you are a huge nerd/geek when you know each and every reference on this page……………… :P and you even catch the imperial/SI unit mistake without reading the comments first :P
Farmind was on the right track although he derailed himself a bit with the Eurocentrism. Imperial units (usually called english [engineering] units) are just different than metric units. Some of them make sense, some of them don’t. The biggest concern there is that colloquially pound is used as a measure of mass / weight wheres it’s really the measure of the force of gravity on your mass (actually slugs in english units).
At the end of the day the nice bit with metrics is you’ve got (usually) conveniently sized units that are easily scalable with powers of ten between them. Really all it does is change the math and conversions (which in engineering *can* be a big headache).
The real sin here is twofold. 1) mixing metric and english units as in N/in^2 not only might the shorthand overlap in unexpected ways but is certainly a faux pas. 2) in the current wording pounds is just right out. If you made that second half “sorry pounds per…” rather than “or just pounds really” it would be him correcting his own mistake as he went along stream of consciousness style, but truthfully the whole point she was making is that for the same force you get better damage due to the smaller area (presumably via increased pressure).
Slugs are obsolete, pound-mass and pound-force are 2 different units (numerically equivalent on earth though)
DOCTOR WHO REFERANCE!!!!!! <3 <3 <3 Been following the comic for a few months, this is the first time I've had a reason to really comment. Love all the real life referances you use. And my head kind of exploded from epic overload on this page with all the names I recognized. :D
I was about to reply and say this wasn’t the first Doctor Who reference in the comic but… now that I think about it maybe it is. Geeze that’s neglectful of me. Maybe I’m confused because there are other DW references that I’ve had planned for a while but haven’t put in yet.
I got one question.
What happened to the deposit?
and the poster tube
She only needs the tube to conceal the Orbs
The deposit is at the bank where it belongs. Even if she didn’t hand it to someone in the bank offstage it is in a bank bag with a deposit slip so anyone who works there knows what to do with it.
How did the Shoggoth get on the roof?
Tentacles.
No Fair .______. i’m sapiosexual and you had to make a character like him
…..
I am not a nerd, or a geek, apparently, since I only got about 3/4 of those jokes…..
:-(
What is this about NARWHAL BACON???
That’s good eatin’!
Google is your friend.
Ok, his Nerd cred checks out. What about his Geek cred?
Level, Race and Class of his most played D&D Character:
Processor, RAM, Graphics, and OS of his computer:
GURPs, Hackmaster, or RIFTS?:
GameCube, PS2, or Dreamcast?:
Star Wars, Star Trek, StarGate, Farscape or Firefly?:
What race is Richard B. Riddick?:
Keanu Reeves: Vulcan, Android, or Founder Changeling?:
Second Life, Instant Message, or IRC?:
What does DOS stand for?:
What does PINE stand for?:
– Varies, Human, Wizard
– Which computer? His Linux box, the Mac, the IPad or the SparcStation or Sequent boxes in his basement?
– ?
– Custom Unix box that will play media for any of them. Just need the correct virtual environment.
– Yes please. Why be picky?
– Human with weird eyes.
– He is The One. orWhy associate him with those others? You just make them look lesser than they are. Keep in mind Vulcans actively hold their emotions in check. Most androids do not have emotions in the first place. Founders do have emotion and express them, but being alien, their emotions are different from ours. Mr. Reeves is generally actually trying to show emotion.
– Skype
– Disk Operating System or Denial Of Service. Way to early of Dozing Off Soon. Leon is too old for Dad Over Shoulder.
– Pine Is Not Emacs
I’ve tried to use ELM once. And I have used Emacs before. I’d rather program in LISP. (Which I have.) :P Oh, and about Keanu Reeves, the point of the question was if he were to play a Star Trek character, which type would he be able to play best. Sorry I wasn’t clear. I think he was excellent in Much Ado about Nothing, and I hear he plays alien quite well. However, my favorite rolls for him would be Neo and John Constantine. But since he is an experienced Shakespearean actor, he’s qualified to play the captain of a starship. I think he’d make a killer Vulcan, but that’s just me.
Ok, in that regard, Keanu would make a better Changling: someone learning what it’s like to be human, a ‘blank slate’ as it were but one looking to become more, whereas both a Vulcan and an Android are a permanant ‘blank’ (Mr Spock and Data don’t count as they are unique: Spock spent wayyy to much time around Kirk, and Data kept having his programing tampered with, both self and outside tampering)
To me, Mr Reeves will always be Theodore ‘Ted’ Logan to me
Oh, forgot to mention, that’s some seriously sweet hardware. I haven’t even seen a SparcStation in ten years. I’ve just got an HP Pavillion g series because I can’t afford the Mac Book Pro I need, yet.
+9999999 geek points
>Level, Race and Class of his most played D&D Character:
In 1st ed 7th level Elf. In 1st ed AD&D 44th level Elfen Wizard Rogue. In 2nd Edition AD&D 32nd level Human Wizard. In 3rd ed AD&D Wizard 8 Duskblade 8 Bugbear. In 3.5 Human, Paladin 7, Monk 8. In 4th Human Warlord level 2 (icky system). In Pathfinder… Half-Elf Half Dwarf Ranger 4.
>Processor, RAM, Graphics, and OS of his computer:
Phenom II 1045T Six-Core, 8GB DDR3, Radeon 1GB DDR3 dedicated. Windows 7, because 8 is evil and Linux sucks.
>GURPs, Hackmaster, or RIFTS?:
Rifts… with Ninja’s and Superspies material added for flavor.
>GameCube, PS2, or Dreamcast?:
PS2, duh.
>Star Wars, Star Trek, StarGate, Farscape or Firefly?:
Yes.
>What race is Richard B. Riddick?:
Furian
>Keanu Reeves: Vulcan, Android, or Founder Changeling?:
His real name is actually Keanu R. Eeves. That should answer.
>Second Life, Instant Message, or IRC?:
OpenRPG or IRC
>What does DOS stand for?:
Don’t Order Sushi
>What does PINE stand for?:
The Pledge of Allegiance
“Processor, RAM, Graphics, and OS of his computer:”
Computer, singular? He’s probably got 3 under that desk, and at least 3 of his own at home (running, not counting retired ones). And if you don’t think that he secretly considers the Archon servers “his”, just suggest that he should hand the server admin duties off to an underling.
FYI: Gurps, Dreamcast, Firefly, Furian, Vulcan, IRC, Desk Operating System, Pine Is Not Elm (ELM being ELectronic Mail).