Grrl Power #1343 – Parting is such and such
Sciona definitely controls the senator, and the senator does sit on the committee that deals with Archon’s budget, but that doesn’t exactly give her much power over Archon. Not that she is necessarily gunning for them directly, anyway. Well, she might be, but trying to cut their discretionary budget 15% over the next five years is hardly the kind of slam dunk she’s looking for. She just put herself where she is because anyone who has access to military budgeting can probably get away with a lot.
Lorlara is fun to write, but god, she would be exhausting to be around for any extended length of time. I do kind of feel like doing a few comics in the vein of “A day in the life of…” about her though. Or maybe just the Galytn crew in general. Hmm.
I drew Deus way too big there. He looks like he’s pushing 6’11” or something. He’s supposed to be 6’4.” Oh well.
I’d originally intended that this page would be my stick figure page since I did this one the same week of the move, but I didn’t quite manage to make myself do stick figures, so instead it’s… this. It’s not my favorite art. You know, you see sketchy, loose art that still has a sense of style to it and you think, that looks like someone drew it in 5 minutes. Sure. If that’s their regular style. If it isn’t, then capturing that almost spontaneous, free feeling takes a surprising amount of work. Oy.
Anyway, we’re “moved in” in that the stuff that came with us in the 27 foot truck is mostly unpacked and distributed around the house. Now I just have to deal with the remnants of me and my wife’s house – all the major furniture is out, but I’m still not set back up with my usual drawing setup. I’ve got my computer and several extra screens moved over, but the array of desks I ensconce myself in is still over at my old house. I’ll show you a setup when I get it all, well, set up here. It’s fairly elaborate. I also have two 16′ POD containers to deal with. I have a feeling I won’t actually be able to park our cars in the garage for at least 6 months while we sort everything out. The new house is actually a bit larger than my parent’s old house, square footage wise, but every room in the old house had a walk in closet. Even the front office. (In American real estate terms, any room with a window and a closet is technically considered a bedroom.) In my personal terms, there has to be a closet and carpeting. I know you can put a rug down, but we passed on one of the houses we were considering because the master had finished, hard floors. My mom is a fall risk, and no way am I putting her in an uncarpeted bedroom.
I tell you what spending the last 2-3 months looking at houses has done to me though. It’s made me want to design houses. I just don’t understand some design choices that people make. Like every house we looked at was basically fine except for one stupid architectural choice. Yes, the houses I design would probably be a touch boring, architecturally, but they would be functional. Also probably a bit on the large side, if I’m honest. I like walk in closets. I don’t even have that much clothing, but I’ve lived in enough apartments and houses with those shitty bifold closet doors and closets that are 2′ by 5′ to know that I want some storage space.
I’m going to try something with this new vote incentive.
This month, I’m closing on a new house, selling my Mom’s house, finishing packing Mom’s house, moving city to city to the new house, forwarding mail, canceling utilities, all that. And after that’s done, I get to start the process of selling my old house, which needs a little work before it can realistically go on the market.
SO. I’m going to try and do this vote incentive in stages. Currently it’s just pencils. The TopWebcomics one will update with colors and detail until we get to the no clothes versions, then that will continue over at Patreon. Also there will be a comic or two in between each version to fill out the story.
I know it’s hard to tell from just the pencils, but this is Heatwave and Jiggawatt. The comics will explain why they’re doing what they’re doing. Although I feel like even saying that much makes it easy to guess, but hopefully the journey will still amuse.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
I wonder what pot talk with Duas would be like.
probably a recorder somewhere on his person. he’d get lots of interesting info
Honestly I was half expecting Sidney to go, “you call that a portal, mine’s better” and show her Aethereum Causeway right in front of the person she just forgot is Sciona…but then I also realize…would that senator have access to that information and thus Sciona that Sidney can make such a interstellar bypass?
I’m pretty sure that Maxima has made it sufficiently clear that that’s right out. And Sydney isn’t “rebel against authority” so much as somewhat forgetful in the whirlwind of her brain.
It is possible to remember things without being terrorized even with ADHD.
Sydney’s not in this scene.
She’s not on panel, but she is in this scene. She was right there in what in-universe would be minutes prior, Deus gave her a replica Klingnon weapon, she is running around in the background right before this conversation. So there is no reason to assume she is anymore than a hundred feet from this conversation, close enough to see this portal.
Sydney would definitely come running over, geeking out, when the stargate opened.
I could imagine her in the next scene charging through full speed trying to get to the portal before it closed.
And considering what full speed is for Sydney if she remembered to use her orb, “full speed” is really saying something.
Sydney was probably on camera when she met NDGT and popped off to get him an order of grakz (sp?). There’s no way the entire world doesn’t know she can do that.
She at least had the sense to pop outside first
Really need to learn to read posts fully before replying :(
Or just read in general
Earth yes, still surprised someone outside didn’t have a camera. However most Earth people, even if some humans were outside and saw the portal, don’t have a frame of reference for what “real” wormholes should look like. So between Opal, Sidney, and Hench Wench, all having different looking portals they might now know one wormhole is better or more special than another. She opened a wormhole to space, for all they know that’s what an interstellar wormhole looks like. Now aliens, aliens with exposure to different kinds of wormholes can tell the difference and know the specifics about them to tell that one wormhole going to the station is a must adjust for gravity, time dilation, objects in the way (like a Star Gate), while another making the same trip can just bypass physical space entirely and bridge two points anywhere regardless of distance without concerns for what is between the two points. And the energy requirements for both. As Cora said, what spelled out to her Sidney’s orbs were Nth tech instead of some magic orbs was the fact they are so small and using energy that would take a Xevoarchy capital ship or sacrificing a whole bunch of “psykers” to pull off. The Xevoarchy stated to be basically tier 2 civilization. But why this bypasses tier 3 and goes past them we assume is because of the type of portal and energy in something so small even being beyond what ascended tier 3 beings tech had been seen to do…guessing in this setting the ascended ancients have like large vaccum energy crystals…which going from (massive ship) to (a crystal that fits in one room) is still a massive leap in power and technological progress, now leap to (its a palm sized orb….and it does other stuff). Not sure if Cora was shown it, but likely super top secret but that impressive Autherium causeqay was Pip ONE of its chain. So if Cora and Dabbler were told that, they definitely are in the..this is tier 4 or above tech.
I feel like, in another world, Sciona and Max could have been a great team.
I’d love to see that picture!
They are similar in a few ways, except Max has a moral compass, Sciona doesn’t.
Huh? Sciona *does* have a “moral compass”….. It’s set to “Alari” and *not* “Human” .
Judging actions of extraterrestrial life forms by human morality ( of which there are a few flavours already, choose carefully…) is plain stupid and most likely counterproductive.
A thing that’s been adressed a couple of times already in this comic.
Isn’t Scion in trouble a lot of the major houses among the Alari for breaking even their own rules and morals?
She breaks certain House’s rules, not Alari morals.
And typically not her House (or any aligned with hers), ie rival Houses who hate her simply because she doesn’t belong to theirs
She did seem to be aligned with at least certain Alari Houses since she was in communication with them days before the planet was attacked by the space-kaiju.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-640-not-really-a-badum-tssh-moment/
(panel 8)
It seems more to me that Sciona’s “moral compass” is set to “Sicona” rather than “Alari”, but if her actions are ok by Alari standards, it just makes the whole culture evil instead of just her.
Arguing that there is no universal moral standard is very bad, because it potentially allows an individual or a culture to get away with any kind of evil stuff.
Judging from what we know of the Alari, I would say that the culture is pretty evil, but that Sciona is extra bad, even for one of her people.
There is no way that her and Max could be friends, as she is a selfish evil bitch while Max is a good person. I am not even sure that Sicona possesses enough empathy to have friends.
@Kris Lighthawk
There is no universal moral standard, nor can there be one. The universe doesn’t care about us and there is nothing in the laws of physics about how intelligent beings should relate to one another. Every moral standard is created by the people who follow it, its foundations are chosen by those people, and the only way to judge among the various standards is to look at their outcomes.
The four main systems I’m aware of are virtue ethics, deontology, utilitarianism, and humanist ethics. The last is the one that I believe produces the best outcomes; it’s a variant on utilitarianism that adds the veil of ignorance, which says “design a society / analyze an action as though you didn’t know who you would be in that society / which participant you would be in that action.” For example, Gilead is a wonderful society if you are a white Christian man but it’s terrible for women and minorities; is that a society that you would choose to live in if you didn’t know whether you would be male or female, atheist or Jew or Christian, black or white? Probably not.
It nicely gets around some of the edge cases in utilitarianism, such as “if you eternally torture one child then you will guarantee a perfect life for a hundred people.” That’s a good deal on a pure utilitarian basis where all you care about is maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain, but it’s not something you would likely go for under the veil of ignorance.
“the only way to judge among the various standards is to look at their outcomes.”
And those outcomes are determined by the universe. The laws of physics are going to make some systems perform better, and some worse. The assumption is that whatever is constant throughout the universe is going to cause those various moral systems to converge as they’re tested. They exact rules will presumably differ based on local conditions, but one underlying moral framework is going to emerge as optimal for producing the best outcomes, that a society following that moral framework will be more productive, happier, resilient, and more competitive in the universe than one following a different moral framework.
I think the same point on alien standards of morality was made, repeatedly by various people, when Sydney’s succubus friend went slightly out of control.
I don’t understand this whole category of thought. The notion that culture excuses problems or that ethical standards are meaningless because of origins feel like a woefully incomplete thought. We have ethical standards (among other reasons) to facilitate working with each other because hopefully making known a way that others might usefully predict some of our actions is useful and desirable. A warlike culture might want enemies who quit or flee, a merchant culture might want to meet others for trade, etc… But whatever they do, they still do. The victims of a warlike culture will be dead while the victims of a merchant culture might be ripped off. The ethics don’t excuse this, they explain it.
Early colonialists genocided people, they needed resources, genociding was cheaper and easier than negotiating. Genociding was their culture, but us in modernity have nearly universally agreed that was bad. The people of the time felt their actions were justified, but even if justified doesn’t mean harmless the victims are still dead.
Maybe the Alari can’t choose to be “good” because that would cost them too much in the short perhaps even the eradication of a house choosing to do so, but that justifies their behavior, it doesn’t undo the harm that behavior caused.
Maybe some people who make an argument for cultural relativism believe that there is no universal basis for morality, and that it’s simply a function of culture, or that the measure of a person’s morality is simply their obedience to cultural rules. But my understanding is that you need to take a person’s culture, or life experiences, into account to understand why they act the way they do. When they do something evil, is it because they know it’s evil, and choose to do it anyway? Or is it because their culture deemed it good, and they’re trying to be a good person, given the information available to them? Given different information, would they change their behavior?
Most people have not studied morality or philosophy, have not done enough introspection to cultivate moral reasoning. They simply mimic the behavior of those around them. People may act “good”, and yet not be “good” people, because their behavior is totally dependent on their environment and incentives. How many “good” people might suddenly become evil in a different environment, under a different set of incentives? How many people are only held back by the threat of punishment?
Typo: “is could still be”
Yeah, but a typo that works. Have another gummy, just don’t eat the third gummy.
I saw that too. “out of his mouth is could still be” should just be “out of his mouth could still be”.
Something tells me that if you actually designed a house then the next person to look at it would be like “It’s good except for this is one stupid architectural choice, which is the walk-in closet.” ;-)
Dave, I hate to break it to you, but I think “Deus being 6’4″” is a ship that has long since sailed. Isn’t Maxima 6’2″ or thereabouts? He should probably have his hairline even with the top of Max’s head for a two inch difference. Last page, we had a nice head on shot, and Max came up to his eye line. I also think that Max was a full head taller than Sci (assuming Sci isn’t wearing heals), where here we see Sci come up to Max’s eye line. You may need to make a full mugshot setup, and then a short one that shows their comparative head heights when standing next to each other, possibly in their normal heals or equivalents.
Max is 6’1″ that info has been cannon for years now, so Sciona would be 5’9″ to 5’10” and from panel one, that would put Deus at 6’7-8″ apx. That’s not taking in account the perspective of course.
Sciona is probably shorter, she’s just in stiletto heels to go with the rest of her attire.
While Max is wearing combat boots, those won’t give you as much of a lift. I suppose she could fly, but that’s usually what short flier capes do.
If anything, Max probably feels social pressure to look shorter. She may compensate, but likely mostly by standing up straight. Which being military likely trains you to do anyway.
Deus could be standing on a step on the other side of the portal, but he’s leaning the wrong way for that. Yeah, I think he’s probably drawn a bit too tall there.
For houses, you can have a room without a closet or window. Or you can add a tiny window and a 5′ wide, 15″ deep “closet” (good luck fitting standard hangars inside) and make it a “5 bedroom house” instead of a “4 bedroom house”. My house hunt was 5 years ago, and I remember…
This depends on where you are. Where I live, to be officially defined and listed as a “bedroom” under current code it has to have at least two ways to exit the room in the case of a fire. Most of the time the other exit is a window with a minimum size. We recently renovated our basement and one of the changes was to make the “bedroom” down there meet the actual code definition of “bedroom” by enlarging the window.
Closets are not technically required, as you said.
For both my bedrooms there’s a door and a set of windows. The windows doesn’t open (at least the large ones) because I’m on the 14th floor. I suppose I could smash the window and jump, but I don’t know if the fire department has those airbags they use for movies.
“Bedroom” in local listings does mean “room with a closet”. I think it also has to have a window; I’m not sure.
“Den” is a favorite one to play games with though. I saw one place where the “den” was basically an alcove off the entrance with room for one of those little tables you put your keys on when you come home. Possibly there isn’t a legal definition for that though.
Max might be pressured to look shorter, but she also strikes me as being absolutely willing to tell the social pressure to fuck off. IIRC, Dave has mentioned that Max isn’t naturally that buff, and she actively works to maintain a higher degree of muscle than most men (at the time and were willing to admit) found attractive. I would assume that if she didn’t work out, she’d be roughly as built as someone like Daphne, as I don’t think Maxes powerset scales with muscle mass.
Sciona being roughly 5-4 makes sense to me, as average for Mexican women is 5 ft 2 1⁄2 in (per Wikipedia) and supers trend taller (I think? *idealized* can mean a lot of things), and then add a few inches for heals, meaning that Max probably has a good six inches on her, which would put her at Max’s nose? So this page would be accurate, and the previous one where Max had a full head on Sciona would be off? Like I said, a full height / just head chart, possibly including ‘heeled’ heights would probably serve Dave well. Probably with head scales as well.
We should also keep in mind that they’re standing around, or slowly walking, outside. So the ground isn’t necessarily level.
This is a construction sight, There is high ground and Deus is likely to walk on a ridge toward a portal. There should be low spots, and if Maxima really wanted, could dig her feet deeper in, like typical human could push into the sand at a beach.
Extremely unlikely Maxima also has the potential could choose to fly low with her legs in knees bent position in front of Deus, which seems very unlike her character.
Fair, I forgot there was a cast page, I was going off memory from one of the linked comics where disguised Max was talking about herself in the third person. I would say that a 6-1 Max and 6-4 Deus would have the top of Max’s hat at the top of Deus’ X-scar. Him being 6-6 to 6-8 (where we seem his comparison here) makes more sense to me, and also puts him in Darth Vader height range even if he is twice as wide.
The best house I ever lived in was a 1916 Arts and Crafts style American 4 square. It was basically a large box (nice looking box though) compartmentalized into smaller boxes. There were a few rooms that had obvious function (kitchen, bathrooms, sleeping porch), a few that were logical places for other functions living and dining room), but the rest were just … rooms. Big empty spaces that could be anything.
The house I grew up in was build in 1891 and was a train station/residence that we converted into a 2 story home. Before we did that it was an over-under duplex. Plus the upstairs was completely unfinished and had NO heat or insulation. My father had stripped all the walls and had to insulate each room, I had to sleep in the windowed off-set from the living room for the first couple of years with just a curtain for privacy (I was 4 y/o). As a “what I did over the summer” report included hauling out bags of scrap from taking a hammer and knocking off the old “lath and plaster” off the walls. It was wild living in the old house, we found so many things in that house that dated back to the time frame that the house was built, including the old block-n-tackle that they used to pull crates off of train cars. I found out years later that the huge garage (it was also 2 story) was actually one of the ice houses for the area, it was crazy, so much history to that house.
I think that was still the age where you had a “wardrobe” which was a piece of furniture for your clothes, rather than a closet which was a part of the house.
My wife and I spent 20 years remodeling a large house built in 1916. It was historical enough that it was named after one of the original ranch families and was their “in town” house as opposed to actually living out on the ranch. Eight bedrooms and not a single original closet. It had been modified a lot in the intervening years so some of the rooms had a box built into the corner including a couple of shallow closets to used by hanging clothes front to back on either side. People didn’t hang up clothes as much back then. So yes, we picked up several wardrobes at the local antique auction. Unless you have cubic money to throw at it living in an old house is a lifestyle. Fast forward about 30 years and a downsizing and we are in a house roughly one fourth the size. We have a couple of those bifold door closets. If you remove the doors those closets make a nice computer desk area for a home office. Even when you design the layout of your house as we did, six months later you will ask you self, “Why did we make that dumb architectural choice?”.
I think people either had a lot fewer clothes or they had people, e.g. a valet, to put the clothes away, probably in trunks or something less susceptible to e.g. insects. Closets are great for viewing and picking clothes, not so much for preserving them.
By “fewer clothes” I mean a lot fewer. I read an article written about the period of Maria Medici i.e. late 17th c. where the author said a man’s shirt, relatively plain, cost the rough equivalent of about $5,000. At least as far as you can equate things anyway – there was a lot less you could buy with that money, but every thing was handmade.
My suggestion is to clean everything thoroughly when you get into the house, then unpack as soon as possible. Pull out the refrigerator, stove, washer and dryer to clean. Get the A/C ducts and the dryer vent cleaned out. Remove and clean the grease filters above the stove. Clean the bottoms of your kitchen cabinets.
I thought the Senator was a reanimated human body with an Alari mind in it? https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-1180-the-scent-of-a-femalien/
so? still has to do senator work to keep appearance and keep a position of power, and despite being the one actually in charge, Sciona has to keep a “secretary of the senator” charade going, so her comment here are perfectly in character
Eh, just seemed like an odd phrasing to us: “Sciona definitely controls the senator” makes it perhaps seem like the Senator is solely human? I absolutely read too much into everything so it’s probably me just getting the wrong thing from it.
Rereading that comic and the comment at the bottom. Presumably Sciona really wasn’t eating the Alari equivalent of kimchi or else it likely would have been Lorlara detecting her and not Deus.
Though maybe she would be too busy doing what she thinks is “Amplifying the glory of the inimitable and most excellent House Deus”…
Re: wanting to design houses: have you ever played Minecraft?
Minecraft is for babies. Vintage Story is the way to go.
hmm
hmm
“There are three ways to tell a lie. The whole and half lies of course; and the third is the whole truth, told in such a way they know you have to be lying …
‘There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.’
attributed to Disraeli by Mark Twain.
BASHIR: What I want to know is of all the stories you told me, which ones were true and which ones weren’t?
GARAK: My dear doctor, they’re all true.
BASHIR: Even the lies?
GARAK: Especially the lies.
She feels like she is way to thin right there
“…you category five windbag.” is my new favourite insult. Seriously, that is a world class line right there.
Yeah, I like Cthillia better every time she shows up.
Not sure if Sciona and Max are getting along or getting ready to see the other as a major threat.
Especially with how Sciona is not happy with how casually Dues acts with stating the open truth openly out loud with the possibility of the truth being a distraction to take notice of another action he is preparing to take by stating the truth to trick them into acting exactly as he had planned.
Sciona works for a ‘senator’ in Congress who oversees ARCHON’s budget (Appropriations Committee? Intelligence Committee? Some special new committee specifically for ARCHON?). That’s automatically an adversarial relationship. :)
“He never gave me my gift.” <– Are you sure?
I’m sure she checked for diseases by now.
The back and forth ‘hmm’s’ reminds me of when Deus and Sydney first met and did that about Deus’s “replica….” sword collection.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-408-oranges-golds-and-purples/
(panel 4)
What happened to the art since about 6 weeks ago?
read the author’s comments over the last six weeks and find out.
Basically, the creator’s father died sometime back around October last year, and their life has been a bit disrupted since as a result of needing to take care of their mother and move both them and their mother into a new house. It’s a lot of work to wrap up someone else’s loose ends, and rearrange your own life. According to the post attached to this very comic, he’s sort of “moved in”, but it’s still going to take a bit to get back to devoting the same amount of time to the comic he did before his life got turned upside-down.
The artwork style is about back to when this web comic started. It is time to loop this story line back to the first chapter. There Sydney told the audience she was doing a flashback to her initial days as a superhero. Then Dave can pick up with new comics and everything is stylistically meshed together.
Nah, the artwork is still a LOT better than when the webcomic first started. The ONLY thing like in the beginning is the lack of shading. Honestly if you look at the actual artwork itself and ignore the lack of shading, it’s incredibly well done.
My pet peeve is the paucity of electrical outlets. MAYBE it has changed – do tell me, if some reader has a recently constructed house – but one double socket per wall simply doesn’t meet the needs of a modern house in the
Before we moved to our current home, I had a studio built for my Lady’s arts and crafts. We lay the floor plan out with attention to all her equipment and where we would need electrical outlets. We were required by local law to have the plans done officially by a licensed architect, so we gave him our layout and told him ‘don’t change anything’. Dim bulb went ahead and moved all the outlets. My lady was furious, and I told the little dweeb; ‘do it again, the way we had it, or you haven’t done the job we hired you to do and you don’t get paid.’. He actually had the nerve to act surprised.
If I remember right, the code in the late 80’s was an outlet every ten feet, but they could not be under a sink or window. I agree, too often they put WAY too many outlets on a circuit, or too few outlets per room. That old house I grew up in had issues like that, at one point a main fuse block arced and blew out of the fuse box, we had to completely re-wire all the trunk lines. only 2 main fuses and only 8 fuses for a house that had 9 rooms, 2 bathrooms, and both a large front and rear porches. By time we were done there was a large breaker panel with 27 breakers. Scary to think the wiring was from the late 40’s and was dry-rotted. The insulation just flaked off at a touch in some cases (little wonder why my father got it for 10k in ’64).
In my current home, built in the 1980’s, there’s an electrical outlet at the end of the bar.
After we’d lived here about 20 years, we had to buy a new dishwasher.
Come to find out the previous owner installed that electrical outlet himself and hotwired it running through the dishwasher rather than hiring an electrician to do it properly. Damnedest thing you ever saw. A miracle the house hadn’t burned down.
What worries me is my father’s current place is a double-wide modular home that was built in ’85, before they forced the building codes to match stick homes. I’ve had to replace 7 outlets so far, and I’m looking at having to rewire the whole damned place since the entire house’s outlets and lights are on just 2 15 amp breakers. Each outlet runs off of just one wire that spans each side of the house. The flooring was pressed board, they had a water leak in the kitchen and we had to replace the entire floor in the kitchen and dinning room.
Just to put this out there because of the cut by 15% comment. In government that means cut the rate of increase of the budget by 15%. Not actually decrease the budget. Google “Baseline budgeting”. It’s how government agencies calculate their finances.
If you ever want to get more serious about designing houses, you owe yourself the experience of at least leafing through Christopher Alexander’s classic “A Pattern Language”. It doesn’t really teach you to design houses, but it teaches you how to think about designing houses.
I can’t help but wonder if Maxima is more curious as to what Deus had for her than actually wanting it
“My mom is a fall risk, and no way am I putting her in an uncarpeted bedroom.”
All i can manage anymore is an old man shuffle. It was a real joy to get rid of the carpets since dragging either foot on carpet can send me tumbling.
And area rugs are worse than either smooth floors or carpeting. They give you the drag risk of carpet plus the problem of transitioning from one surface to another.
Man, I feel you about houses. I was looking at rental houses with sibling, and of the only 3 even REMOTELY in the area we worked in, two LITERALLY had only the main room with not only more then one outlet, but a grounded outlet at that. Yes, all the bedrooms had a singular, two prong outlet in each one.
I feel you about houses. I was looking at rental houses with sibling
Maxima: …Then he should read the reports I submit. (doesn’t even blink at implied threat)
Bonding over a shared distrust of SmugD :)
Life-long friendships have started from worse :P
It’s not uncommon for people to bond over shared jealousy over someone far greater than both of them, I agree.
I too like walk in closets. I use mine for storing boardgames.
I’m damned impressed that you have managed to get any comics out at all for the last few months. You must be exhausted! Thanks so much!