Grrl Power #166 – Dabbler will take her high tech ball and go home!
Taking a break from all the explosions for a second, this page establishes one important fact, which is that Dabbler doesn’t share her tech – not even with her teammates. Basically she has a prime directive kind of thing going on. Polluting an economy with tech that can be likened to magic has far reaching consequences.
In some ways, Dabbler represents the biggest threat to global stability of any character in the story, good or bad. After all, if you wanted to topple the world economy, find a way to power every automobile that doesn’t use established fuel sources and start selling it (along with conversion kits.) If it was tech that would take humans 20 years to reverse engineer, all the oil companies would go out of business (or be reduced to a handful of much smaller businesses – oil is useful for a lot more than just fuel after all.) Unemployment would skyrocket and the global economy would be turned on its ear. That’s one reason of many that Dabbler was under surveillance from Arc-DARK, but she has no interest in that sort of thing. She’s essentially here on a working vacation. That isn’t to say she’s the first alien to discover Earth of course…
Dabbler does actually have tech that she can release without it immediately disappearing. Live grenades for instance. :)
Edit: Fixed Pinkie’s hair in the first panel and played with Dabbler’s breasts a bit (hur hur) since people were finding the water balloon breasts distracting. Nothing too drastic, just making them look a bit more squooshier and attached.
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Oh, no! Sydney has an attention-span long enough to actually try making up tactics!? The world is doomed!!
Oh, good, I’m not the only one who thought that.
Like. This ain’t Facebook, but Like. :-)
Given the “Wedd-verin” diagram (https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/456) I was already pretty sure both she has and the world is doomed.
Anyone can try to make up tactics, it’s the follow-through that counts.
Is that tactics? Looks like doodling.
Tactics? Her tactic is to shoot it, that isn’t usually considered strategy.
Not true. Her tactic is usually to swear prolifically, and then launch herself at the offender and let fly with tiny fists of fury and a few rage induced bites. Shooting so far in this comic would be a new thing…and I dread her recalibrating her reflexes to go for the PPO ( have my references, leave me alone!!) first.
Actually, if the start of the story is any indication, she’s actually pretty good at tactics.
Remember how she “outsmarted” the forcefield defense by using a laser, which is just visible light, which passes through the forcefield?
I’m betting tactics and finding clever solutions to tough problems is going to be one of her strong points.
Thats future Sydney though. After all this training.
Training is years worth of tabletop roleplaying. This is just the practical.
DOOMED AH TELLS YA!!!! DOOMED(QUES THUNDER!!)
Got the remote to work did ya?
It makes sense, quickest way to bring on the end of the world is for Dabbler to be nice. :)
And I still think it should be DArc.
Would the head of DArc be a girl (or guy) named Jeanne?
No, she’s over in Times Like This teaching sword handling and personal defence. Today’s episode is particularly apt at this as she is the one in the Xena costume.
Links, those tricksy things: https://timeslikethis.com/
nah its a guy named ace
Female Journalist #1’s hairstyle confuses me.
Specifically, it seems to alternate between tight and loose in the back. Is that because she’s moving?
Nah, she has a super hair growing power. There is no hair beneath her ears in panel 1. However, in panel 3, she has hair below her ears.
Preeeeetty sure Dave’s gonna fix that ……
Yeah, DaveB is going to retcon her look to resemble Sinaed O`Connor :P
Pinkey has always been giving DaveB problems with her hair :D
Hah, whoops, I forgot to draw it down past her ears in panel 1. I’ll have to fix that tonight.
I sorta feel sorry for Pinky. Her breasts get an even tighter close-up than Dabbler’s, but all anyone wants to discuss in regards to her is her hair.
She just needs to hit it hard and fast, with what I have no idea.
Looks like she is going to use PewPews (and is that Les in/on the tank when she blows it up? o_O)
can she put up the shield through the tank and lift it with flying?
then switch to pew pew to drop tank and speed up its decent by repeated blasting :)
Possibly. But she would need to experiment and try it. With failure as an option, doing so in front of the world’s press is probably not the best of times.
Love the badass pose on panel 5. Can’t wait to see some other girls strike their own :)
Word.
Ahhhhhh! Now that I have a better look at Dabbler’s railgun … I’m going to assume that the small cylinders encircling the barrel are inertial dampers. That’s how she could fire a weapon that HAD to have several thousand newtons of recoil thrust and just stand there as if it were a .22 rimfire.
Heck, if she can control and re-direct inertia (and I have no reason to believe otherwise) she could effectively double the muzzle velocity of the projectile.
(And I still say that said projectile does not have time to get hot enough to convert even a small portion of its surface to plasma in the roughly-one-hundredth-of-a-second it took to reach its target. Heat transfer through matter has strict and well-defined limits, and it would have simply been pushing most of the air in front of it anyway, after the micro-sonic-boom that occurred as as soon as it left the barrel.)
nope, take a look at the various Navy railgun tests… they clearly show the plasma that is coming off of the projectile. and that one is A) going slower than hers, and B) traveling what seems to be about the same distance… therefore there should be even MORE plasma … now that is of course using Terran materials, she’s using Alien tech so that could put a “slight” skew to it. either way, the plasma isn’t so much as the projectile itself “melting away” but the AIR being heated up to inconceivably hot temps from the bullet pushing all the air in front of it out of the way so fast it doesn’t really have time to gracefully slide out of the way like it does for an “ordinary”, sub-sonic bullets… super-sonic bullets are the ones that just have that “crack” sound as they cause a sonic boom…
Dabbler cheats by firing a laser the instant before the projectile is sent. The laser creates a vacuum for the projectile to travel along, like a lightning strike. Of course once the projectile penetrates an object that the laser didn’t, then things get loud.
Lasers don’t create vacuum – they transmit through the air, which is why lasers are harder to use in an atmosphere than in space.
Lightning strikes and lasers aren’t really much alike. At all.
Suspension of disbelief! Artistic License? Things could work completely different in this fictional universe where there’s super heroes running around and what not. There’s no point putting our logic into it trying to disprove it. I mean really there’s people firing energy beams and moving at super speed but you question a Railgun which isn’t even a real weapon to begin with.
Google a little. Hint? Plasma.
Was about to mentioned Ionization but someone beat me to it.
Please allow me to join you in confirming that a laser exerts a pressure instead of creating a vacuum. I’m not sure about creating an ionized path for the solid projectile, though, as the mass of said projectile would be way more affected by gravity than the laser. Projectiles drop way more than laser light, but the laser would still be good for aiming.
Huh. I’m having trouble googling something that talks about what’s left in a laser’s wake. I would be interested in reading up on that.
I found some articles that might explain, but they wanted me to join for a fee. Harumph! I’ll give it a shot, and I’ll try to keep it short. Laser beams lose power in atmosphere because some of the photons generate heat when they hit stuff in the way. That heat lingers after the shot and radiates away from the axis of the shot. I do know that one can have up to 100% loss of power due to atmospheric conditions. I’ve never seen a photo of visible effects, but maybe it happens too fast.
I once considered the possibility of using a pair of lasers to ionize a path through the air to use to guide what would basically be a anti-material scale lightning cannon. If I recall correctly, I later heard some mention of something similar being actively worked on, closer to large scale taser though.
And here we go, a wikipedia link to something along those lines: Electrolaser
Nice! Thanks for providing the link. Turns out mister B was right about lasers making a noise like lightning. High powered ones, anyway. Thanks again. :)
It’s a laser tuned to the vibrational frequency of N2, so it superheats and skedaddles? I dunno, just tossing out ideas here.
Incorrect. Sufficiently energetic lasers (Most weapons grade pulse weapons) spill enough energy into the athmosphere to turn the air into superheated plasma, especially at longer, more inefficient wavelengths, making long-range lasers impractical in athmosphere. And by long range I mean anything much over 50 kilometers. So, weapons-grade lasers really should go KRAKOOM! when fired at ground level, and the mechanics for the plasmatunnel created is not at all unlike that of a lightningstrike.
If it is a powerfull enough laser then it could burn the air it passes through.
At the very least heat up the air and make it expand to something aproaching a vacume long enough for the shot to pass through.
Actually lightning doesn’t pass through vaccum.
Instead it passes through a trail of ionized air (that is indeed ionized for a short period by invisible electricity just ahead of the lightning)
But thunder is a combination of the air suddenly expanding from the lightning, as well at is collapsing back into the partial vacuum created by it. I assumed lasers basically did the same thing since they’re superheating the air.
The “thunder from vacuum” theory is way back from the XIX century. A more modern point of view is that the sudden thermal expansion of plasma in the lightning channel causes the shock wave… so it’s basically the same thing as explosions. And laser rays don’t ionise the air, though they definitely disperse while traveling through it.
Yeah I’m starting to realize my science is a little out of date on that one. :/
“And laser rays don’t ionise the air, though they definitely disperse while traveling through it.”
Except for the lasers that do, right? :P
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrolaser
https://venturebeat.com/2012/06/28/us-army-laser-lightning-gun/
https://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-03/lightning-can-strike-twice-if-you-have-some-lasers
and bleh, guess i shoulda read a few more posts before posting my own, heh.
Most bullets (even the bitsy old .22 and .17 shells) travel in the supersonic speed range with some sniper rounds hitting the bottom of the hypersonic speed range. The only rounds that I know of that are subsonic are some black powder rounds, and a special .22 short hollowpoint round used in sound-suppressed sniper rifles to control rabbits in Australia.
Many pistol rounds are sub-sonic.
No, almost all handgun rounds move at supersonic speeds. There are a few .45 apc rounds that don’t (in addition to the rounds that Opus has already mentioned), but subsonic rounds are the exception, not the rule.
You forgot the .380 auto, the .32 ACP, and a few others. Hell, even regular .22 LR is barely supersonic.
Inertial dampeners?
How about Magnets? It is a magnetic accelerator, after all.
As for recoil: There is no such thing.
There is not always a opposite reaction. That formula only works with charcoal and Pidgeondroppings.
Welcome to the modern world. Science is the momentary measure of error.
If you use Magnetic fields to propel something that said fields hold steady without the need for an actual barrel, there is no recoil.
The bullet isn´t even touching the gun for crying out loud.
And are you really asking why she didn´t fly away because of the recoil, but glance over her biometric teleportation safety altogeter?
Yeah. Right.
You do realize that even with magnets there is recoil, right? I mean, if something produces a magnetic field, and that magnetic field is pushing on something, that something is also pushing back on the magnetic field, which is also pushing back on the object creating the magnetic field.
So yes, even with magnets, there is recoil. There are several theories about how she would deal with the recoil, and “there is no recoil for her to deal with” fits right into the “magic made the recoil disappear” theory, which still deals with recoil.
Then explain counter EMF in an electric motor. The rotor does not touch the stator or the motor would burn up. Yet one repulses the other or else the rotor would not turn. Unbolt the stator of a motor. Unbelt the rotor pulley. Start the motor. The stator will jump due to the torque.
Back EMF on a motor is created when a coil is moved through a magnetic field which creates a counter current to the applied current, when the motor reaches a speed that the Back EMF equals the applied EMF the motor can no longer increase speed. This has nothing to do with the rotational forces created by the motor, no cancelling of inertia or other pseudo-scientific claptrap. it’s just the movement of the motor creating an electric current exactly the same as it would as a generator being turned by an outside force.
Ever heard of conservation of momentum?
Or maybe you heard this one: To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction. (That one’s Newton.)
The only way to keep recoil from happening is to put the force generator on the projectile (a rocket, which moves because of the recoil).
Of course, if you manage to couple that recoil to a sufficiently large mass (such as the planet you’re standing on), you can essentially ignore it. Force is mass times acceleration, so if you make the mass larger, the acceleration shrinks.
Oh, and a short note on plasma that’s actually related here:
If you manage to convert 100% of the projectile to plasma, that doesn’t do a lot to the momentum of the projectile … which is what makes the bang and the hole. Again, conservation of momentum.
Maybe the force on Dabbler- through the MAC/ Railgun- is so small, compared against her alien physiology, that recoil is nonexistant for her? If you are going to use Physics you have to remember she’s not human so she doesn’t have to adhere to human Laws of Physics.
I’m thinking on the lines of “The 1st (insert alien race/ nth dimension here) Law of Physics” states: When a force is applied to a Mass, due to magnetic acceleration, an equal and opposite reaction force is not created.
Or maybe she’s just freakishly strong for an alien. Whatever floats your boat there
Curse of the Bad Tags strikes again! Foiled by computers! Foiled by Skynet!
How advanced is her robotic arm? can that have some antikickback tech ?
I know sniper rifles, compound bows etc have some basic tech for that.
There’s an idea! 10 Points to you, Sir I totally forgot about her mechanical arm
Ok, I once had a friend who claimed that the railgun in Eraser was realistic because as the projectile didn’t touch the barrel, there was no recoil. Very wrong. If a projectile is propelled out of a system of mass, regardless of means of propulsion, it will impart impulse on said system, just in the same way as the rocket exhaust imparts impulse to a rocket, propelling it forward as the exhaust is propelled out of the rocket backwards. Barrels have NOTHING to do with recoil except that their mass dampens recoil.
So, either Dabbler is superstrong and has incredible resistance to knockback, or the gun has some kind of exotic mechanism for negating the recoil, perhaps by momentarily locking it into place using the magnetic field of the earth, some kind of inertial dampening or another today undiscovered mechanism. She does use superscience. Superscience have the same rules as ordinary science, but also a set of extra rules that ordinary science have not yet discovered, allowing it to negate some or all of the ordinary drawbacks of normal science.
Ooh, that would be cool. Dabbler could somehow have locked the gun temporarily to the mass of the earth. Then most of the recoil force would be dissipated into the ground around her feet, with only a small amount of recoil being transmitted to the mass of the gun itself.
Yeah, the other option has it’s advantages too, but is a bit more dangerous…
Human evil scientist: Haha! I have defeated your teleport safety feature… *aims the gun at something and fires it, to make his point*
Dabbler, looking at the red mist where a scientist was: The teleport safety feature… it is for YOUR safety.
Reading through the thread, I see that you had a similar thought to one I had. Although the way I was thinking of it, following on from other comments about how magnetic fields still create an equal and opposite force, which has to be applied somewhere.
My thought was that she ‘anchored’ the railgun’s magnetic field to the Earth’s. Similar to how any weapon can be braced against the ground. So although it appears that the gun is hand-held, it is ‘invisibly’ braced against the Earth’s magnetic field. Rather than there being no recoil, it is simply being directed against the Earth rather than against her. Sensitive seismic equipment, near a test-firing, might be able to detect a tremor, if that is the case.
Thinking on the recoil…
The earths magnetic field might not be strong enough for the task, but I suppse if she did magic to the earths field to use the earths field to fire the shot, recoil belongs to the planet and not the gun.
A) Dabbler does magic. Why conserve anything?
B) The momentum is stalled. Dabbler will eventually need to fire a shot at roughly the opposite direction of the first shot.
C) the momentum is disposed of. Perhaps a ‘recoil’ shot is fired in the opposite direction, into hyperspace so it doesn’t interact with ordinary matter for a few light seconds of distance.
D) tinker with the reference frame, applying an opposite force using alternate physics. (Warp drives tend to fit here)
Want to know what’s actually going on? Ask Dabbler. I’m sure she’ll be happy to…. Um… Not answer questions.
A) Because even magic needs to have limits. If it does not, then Dabbler should be described as a god, not as a hybrid succubus. DaveB has some idea of what her magic is capable of. The more he keeps to that, the less temptation there is to slip into attributing anything he can’t think of an easy explanation for as magic.
Of course, however, you are perfectly right to suggest it could be magic, as that may be exactly what Dave has in mind. But, it is just fun, in keeping with one of the tenants of this comic, to try and explain it with real world physics. Given the number of professional scientists who read this, breaking conservation of momentum gives rise to howls of outrage. As witnessed elsewhere in the comments.
Admittedly my suggestion, if it did not use magic, would require some advanced scientific technique that we have not developed yet. But it does not require alternate physics. Magnetic fields do affect each other. Your point about the plausibility due to the amount of force involved is well taken though. I just figured “big planet, big magnetic field, so she simply needs to harness a large part of it for the job”.
B) More howls of outrage. Do that often enough and it ends up sounding like a jungle full of howler monkeys. And, trust me, that is noisy!
C) & D) If it is presented, and able to pass reasonable informed scrutiny, as an aspect of physics that we have yet to uncover and exploit, then fine. If however it does rely on ‘alternative physics’ then that is not really in keeping with the setting. Using the principle that everything should be as per the real world, unless attributable to the introduction of super heroes.
Seriously, dude, did you never play with magnets when you were a child?
Push two bar magnets’ same poles together and you feel a push back on both sides. This is no different than what’s happening in the railgun.
There is always an equal an opposite reaction. That’s literally a law of nature. I don’t know why you think otherwise.
And “Science is the momentary measure of error”? What does that even mean? “Science” is a method for approaching the truth of reality as closely as we’re able to. I’m not even sure what you were trying to handwave away there, but reality begs to differ with your main claims.
Disagree? Show me a magnetic field pushing something away where the thing producing the magnetic field doesn’t get an equal amount of pushback in the opposite direction.
And good luck trying to violate the laws of physics there.
That was the case once, before science became a religion.
Once there were people saying: Maybe it works like that.
Today they say: It can´t work like that because Einstein/Newton/Ramses said otherwise.
We can´t make any progress with idiots like this as “Thinkers”
Well, yeah i should have said “less recoil”, but one thing is for damn certain: If you´d use gunpowder to acieve the same level of power that a railgun can provide, the recoil lands you on Saturn, the recoil of the railgun doesn´t, so don´t tell me about “Always”. There is an opposite reaction, but there are ways around equal.
Don’t give me that “science is religion” baloney. Scientists love nothing more than overturning old ideas and thus opening up whole new areas of study. Disproving old ideas is the way scientists make their names famous.
Besides, Einstein made corrections to Newton’s laws in special circumstances. And Einstein was wrong about quantum physics. Scientists don’t make appeals to authority to say something can’t work, they point at all of the data and decades of testing that show something likely won’t work. And if there’s still any question, they can test it!
If you want to “make progress” despite what the current scientific consensus is, all you have to do is scientifically demonstrate that you’re right! You think a perpetual motion machine is possible? Well, then don’t sit on your butt whining about “the establishment”; put your money where your mouth is and build one! All that it takes to change a good scientist’s mind is sufficient high quality evidence. And if you’re making the claim, sorry, but the burden of proof lies upon you to demonstrate your claim, not upon everyone else to prove you wrong.
And If you think we can’t make any progress as things are now, then you must be blind, since the evidence is all around us that science continues to progress at an astounding rate. Just take a look at Moore’s law, if you need proof of that.
That said, nice you see you backtrack on your claim about “no recoil”, but still, no, there isn’t “less recoil” either. It’s an exactly equal and opposite amount of force. And the amount of recoil is exactly the same whether you use magnets or gunpowder to propel the same amount of mass the same speed. In fact, with a railgun you have to be careful that the recoil isn’t directed at the tracks or the breach closure too much, or the recoil can destroy them when firing.
That being said, it looks like Dabbler might be using a coilgun, rather than a railgun, though it’s hard to tell without a better look at it.
In any case, if you think that there are “ways around equal”, prove it and I’ll show up for your Nobel prize. (Hint: Check the “Materials” section of the railgun Wikipedia article I linked to above. It has four citations shooting your claim down, if you’ll pardon the pun.)
Anyone can say a scientifically supported claim is wrong, but doing so doesn’t mean jack if you don’t have any evidence to back you up. So, got any actual evidence, or just more empty words?
Two words: Explodey beams.
Actually, I wonder what the destruction would be with her energy-beam sphere activated at full power? Would it be like a wave motion gun impact (city for reference https://i.imgur.com/Qj9N7Gc.jpg ) or some sort of penetrating/cutting lazor?
Or like this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7TG9KKweQM
Well, at the beginning we saw Anvil calling Sydney “Big Guns”(https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/60) could be that a hint?
Yaaay! PPO! Finally we`re gonna actually SEE what kind of destructive power does Syd possess.
oooh, I`m so exited!
we already know what kind of destructive power she possesses.
you mean we are about to see the destructive power of her beam cannon orb in action.
Wave Motion Gun [Five points to anyone who gets the reference]
Wave Motion Gun, thats the gun from Space Battleship Yamato right?
Really?
I only know the WMG from Space Empires V.
I only know it from this song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzvMcy0scm0
I remember it form Space Empires 3. It was one of my favorite weapons.
I keep thinking about the weapon from the Original Metroid
Space Battleship Yamato or the North American version – Star Blazers. That is what got me hooked on Japanese Anime.
mwhahaha beat you by a minute :P
Even though someone already indirectly referenced it higher up on the forum list. I should check time stamps – nah too lazy.
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/yamato_wave_motion_gun.jpg
For when you absolutely positively need to erase something from this universe. Accept no substitutes.
There is also the ultimate terror that goes beyond Wave Motion Guns. When you combine the destructive power of a WMG with Beam Spam.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WaveMotionGun
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BeamSpam
It’s been done before, and it’s scary. Prime example, Nanoha, if you know the series, had the magical girl equivalent of it in the movie. Let’s just say she levelled a virtual city before she was done.
Please, that attack is nothing compared to her Starlight Breaker in A’s or StrikerS. There’s also the Arc-en-ciel which makes her attacks in all three look wimpy by comparison. In a series where universe shattering objects are shown in season 1, a single city isn’t that impressive.
I think the largest beam gun I ever heard of (and I think I saw that one in several different stories) was the star gun (I don’t remember what it was called, but this fits).
Take the whole power of a star and make it into one beam. Hit enemy with said beam. (These operations usually take a big amount of space-based tech.)
And no, you don’t want to use this fusion-powered weapon anywhere near an inhabited world.
I think the oldest incarnation I remember is somewhere in the original Lensmen cycle.
I remember weapons with more destructive power, but not with more energy in a beam. Such as the Hyperimnestron in Perry Rhodan: a weapon capable of turning a significant amount of a star into anti-matter. If said star is close to lots of other stars (such as in the inner parts of a galaxy), this may cause a chain reaction, making lots of stars blow up one after the other. (Our heroes just barely escaped that one.)
The Solar Beam, from E.E. “Doc” Smith’s Lensman Saga.
That series also included hurling weaponized anti-matter planets through hyperspace.
Yep, that is the one that sprang to my mind on reading the above comment too.
Personally I like the idea of tossing around super-massive black holes as weapons. Just to show real power, rather than for any other practical purpose.
Kos-Mos’s hand gun from Xenosaga
More the cannon in her belly.
Ooh! Looks like next week is finally PPO time! Anyone wanna make a last-minute addition to my unofficial battle cry poll?
You forgot she runs a comic book shop. It could be “it’s clobbering time” or other comic hero shout.
I’m kinda partial towards “For Pony,” but then again, I’m just a single guy Looking For Group.
I’m keeping you away from Orphanages.
I also know why she yawned over the idea of making millions and billions of “dollars”…because they’re of no use in the rest of the galaxy, and the vast majority of anything they have on earth that’s a novelty for her would be food, entertainment, or fashion, not “high” tech…and while fashion can be scanned and fabricated or illusion-copied by her…that least food and entertainment, and food and entertainment are usually not very expensive commodities. Her ARC paycheques probably cover all the DVDs and munchies she wants.
that probably depends on how expensive edible underwear is in this world :P
And toys to come with her porno sense
Oh, please. Dabbler’s kind of toys are the walking-talking type. Like every (fe)male in Arc and beyond.
Agreed: what need has she for Terran currency (when they can’t even decide on a single currency)? As you said, about the only things she can’t reproduce/manufacture herself is the food and entertainment
I have to assume she either has a salary or is provided things by Arc, but who’s to say she doesn’t have a trove of treasure built up over the years. A few diamonds or gold, etc from another planet and she’s set.
Regarding entertainment, I get the idea that Dabbler usually prefers to make her own.
*that leaves food and…not least, lol.
with her tech which of our curriencies could she not “conterfit”
Especially given that she just casually revealed she has control of practical teleportation. Which would be worth quadrillions or godzilions.
Anyhow, who needs money? Depending on which of her backgrounds she chooses to favour, she might:
1. have difficulty understanding the obsession humans have with acquiring a medium of exchange, when her society has a much more efficient way of handling the exchange of goods and services.
2. only value souls.
3. prefer to use kittens.
I like the little man jumping out of the destroyd tank in Sydney’s drawing. Like there is anything left in there
No, that’s her destroying the tank. Note the halo of Orbz.
Look again: Halo is flying/hovering above the tank, Les is ‘whee’-ing away again just above the gun
Looks like the little man is pointing something, or reaching for something.
I asumed it was arms streched out in panic
I would make the grenades with a variable timer, and if possible of a nature that leaves little if any residue for someone to analyze later. Or, instead of exploding, they would teleport themselves and a (variable or fixed) radius around them (a variation on Weber’s “warp grenades” from Empire From the Ashes) into a secure storage closet in her lab and then just themselves into a different secure storage area, just in case some survived the trip ^_^
Probably a variety of different grenades.
Warp grenades, as you mentioned, were also in the Time Wars seires. Basically nuclear explosives that warped away the excess explosion and radiation (supposedly to the Andromeda galaxy).
Implosion grenades would compact all the matter within the defined area into a small, incredibly dense, object.
Sonic Grenades could have a variety of different effects, from making it hard to think to liquefying matter around them or shaking objects apart by hitting their resonate frequency. Then teleport themselves back to the lab after so she can recharge them.
Flash Effect could actually have many variations, not just a burst of light. Perhaps a burst of light in counterphase to the frequencies around it creating a Blackout Bomb or even one that floods an area with directionless white light creating conditions similar to a Whiteout that can happen in arctic conditions.
EMP Grenade to fry electronics.
Illusion Grenade that she could program to create various Illusions, similar to her Illusion field. The possibilities there would only start with being used as a distraction.
Smart Bombs Again a variety of possibilities. One could be a microcomputer that would hack other computers where it is thrown. Another might break apart into a swarm of smaller robots that could intelligently seek their own targets. A self directing bomb of any of the types listed above. Etc. etc. etc.
Force bombs Again different possibilities from encasing the target in a force field to concussive shock to literally hurling the target in one direction (that might be better as an impact beam cannon)
Gravity Grenade increasing or decreasing the effect of gravity around it.
Tanglefoot field creating an area it’s hard to move through. That could also be glue, web of strands, even tentacles.
Alpha Wave Grenades That could trigger mental effects from sleep to depression, etc. in most beings.
I could keep going but you get the idea. With the right technology Dabbler is potentially the most powerful person on Earth. That’s the limit, her technology. Plus the fact that someone all powerful would actually be a very boring character
In a Role-Playing Game long long ago, my best friend and I took the whole grenade thing to ….. interesting heights.
It all started with the ‘Thirty Second Grenade’ described in Robert Heinlein’s ‘Starship Troopers’. Basically, when activated, it would loudly announce “I AM A THIRTY SECOND GRENADE …. 29 …. 28 …. ” and so on before (presumably) exploding at zero. Obviously of limited utility in a purely military situation, but it is easy (and entertaining) to imagine the effect this would have on a crowded room.
Anyhow, we thought this was awesome, and went so far as to work out an entire family of bizarre grenades, which the Referee allowed us to have.
There was the ‘Sucker Grenade; which would seem to act like the Thirty Second Grenade UNTIL it was picked up or tampered with – whereupon it would yell “SUCKER!!!!” and immediately explode. There was the ‘Flea Bomb’, which would dance around the battlefield in a semi-random pattern before exploding (just the thing for disrupting formations and prepared positions). We had various kinds of Sticky Bomb (would either stick to the target or spray superglue when detonated), Sonic Grenades (wide range of preset tunes), and various others too horrible to mention.
The funny thing was that most of our arsenal ended up being used on the rest of the party (mostly unintentionally, I must emphasize). The scenario was a treasure hunt thing, with all Players being members of various subgroups. We kind of got in the lead for a while, and they kept ‘finding’ our surprises.
Great days. :)
One of the worst bombs I’ve heard of was a large obvious bomb that had a loud count-down timer, that when it hit zero… cut off. Everyone but the activator runs, leaving him clear to do whatever he wants.
There is a story from WWII of 2 squads clearing a street of German soldiers, they had built sand-bag bunkers inside the buildings, and were hard to clear. One squad was stuck clearing their first building and ran out of grenades, because as soon as they threw one the Germans would drop into the nest until it went off, the shot as they tried to follow. The second squad came back and said they had already cleared their side of the street, would they like a little help. The leader of the 2nd squad then yelled “GRENADE” and threw one, waited 2 seconds then charged the nest, by the time the Germans looked to see what happened they were under the guns of the squad and surrendered. The squad leader then walked over picked up the grenade with the pin still in it and tossed it to the other leader, and said “that’s how you do it!”
Twenty stories on how to embarrass an enemy soldier!
The 30 second Bomb was terror weapon for breaking the morale of the Skinnies. Having a heavily armored jet pack trooper crashing through your church ceiling then dumping a bomb that starts shouting “I’m a 30 second bomb” as he jets away is a fairly heavy terror inducing action.
The irony of course was that the trooper who dropped the bomb didn’t even know what it was saying, since it was screaming it in an alien language…he found out later what it was saying and reflected that it had been the perfect thing to use at that moment to clear the room.
there’s also another variation on the 30-second grenade…The LYING 30-second grenade. It performs as you stated, except that the countdown goes “30…29…28…I lied.” BOOM!
My favourite terror bomb was from, if my memory serves me correctly from childhood, a 2000AD story. Robotic flying anti-personnel bombs. With arms. That could talk. They would patrol until they spotted an authorised target, grapple him, and then inform him that it was a bomb and would explode shortly. Swarms of these would cause massive loss of morale amongst enemy troops who survived.
The funny twist being that a mix-up on the production line meant that one was equipped with a top-end robot brain, rather than the normal cheap dedicated one. So whereas all of his robotic comrades were doing their duty and blowing up the enemy, after speaking to him long enough to spread terror, this robot was more interested in discussing the philosophy of the action and, well, just wanting to have a chat. There was no fixed time that he had to explode by. He really could not understand why people that he hugged were so unwilling to talk and kept trying to run away screaming!
That’s … interestingly ethical for the demon princess. Although high-density batteries would be trivially disruptive to the world compared to teleportation tech. That would … well … we’re not quite ready for Niven’s flatland. Sadly.
Or the Puppeteers or the Kazin.
My question: How do the higher-ups in the US military feel about Dabbler’s tech? She’s not willing to share (which is actually a good thing) but I’m sure they want what she knows.
I’m sure they do.
I’m also sure that Dabbler told them to kiss her ass
They probably feel rather ambiguous about it.
She’s not giving any tech to them, but she’s not giving anything to anyone else either. So, it’s a bit of a wash.
Governments tends to have a “if we can’t have it, no one will!” view of tech
Or, they could take the realistic, pragmatic viewpoint, and realize that while they’re not getting it, and apparently nobody else will, they’re still getting benefit from it due to Dabbler being on the Archon team.
Goverment and realistic? You know the comic is set in America right?
You need to read the latest Spinnerette
Or just look at History.
Then there is the threat assesment issue. What happens if we successfully force her to surrender her tech to us, and her family shows up with an interstellar strike-force? Them allowing her to serve in Archon probably has some of the higher-ups slightly nervous, and the tail probably has secret orders to protect her life if need be too.
Can Sydney “Externalize” a force field bubble?
Have her cast one around the tank then dial down the diameter.
PS: Dial it back up to original size before deactivating,
otherwise explosive decompression of compressed air.
(Has the Fantastic Four’s Invisible Woman ever done that? If so, Sydney would know.)
Nah, she doesn’t have enough control yet
The Invisible Woman once threatened to take Dr Doom apart by expanding her invisible force field in all the cracks of his armor, but as for creating an explosive compression, no. She has compressed things before but there is a limit to the pressure she can achieve. I know it makes little sense given the pressure she’s deflected before, but it’s comic book science, not real life. =)
Sue’s Evil Self actually used the compression trick to try and kill Reed sometime back in the 90’s. Also she has trashed some robots by doing the inverse, creating a field inside them then making it bigger.
PS: You may have noticed a spate (is that a word) of wrong clocks.
It’s because the ruLe of when clocks should be set back has changed,
and some of them don’t know.
It’ll be because some of us are in the UK and the clocks went back last weekend here.
As far as I know, the comments are all time-stamped according to the server’s time, rather than the user’s time. The only other discrepancy is when posts are referred for moderation (if there are multiple links). In which case it will be stamped for the time the comment was written, rather than when it was released from moderation. But will appear in the correct place, even if others might have posted subsequent comments in the thread, whilst it was unseen in limbo.
So, without checking, if there are comments appearing out of time sequence in threads, then there may be a bug.
Ummmm. What is going on with Dabbler’s boobs in that pose panel?
Their bouncy trouncy bouncy trouncy fun fun fun fun fun. But the most wonderful thing about Dabbler is she’s the only one.
More like they’re sticking out like some kind of boob-spears in a way no boobs have ever stuck out before!
Meh, they look like poorly-done implants in that one, nothing more.
Remember, it is all an illusion, but yeah, her breasts should actually hang from attachment zones high on her chest.
Not bad, for a glamour.
Actually it’s not entirly realistic
Like silicone looks realistic? They do look better now that they’ve been adjusted.
She’s gonna win with strategery!
Well we haven’t really seen the upper limit of the PPO, if that one is able to be demonstrated here. Should prove explodey. More interesting is Who does she have in the tank in that diagram?
Wow that reporter is an idiot. “You could make lots of money selling a weapon that could do lots of damage” we aren’t talking about someone who made a Matrix level VR system we are talking about a weapon system that could kill thousands and you’re upset she isn’t getting rich by selling it to psychopathic despots?
Any tech has that problem, it is a matter of choice. Saturn V or ICBM?
Note that Dabbler did not build it as a weapon.
Yes she did. She build it as a tool to shoot satalites out of orbit
“Derelict” satellites, that is more like garbage cleaner.
Good thing she didn’t use it for that. When the Chinese blew up one of their old satellites a few years ago, they increased the orbital debris by 10% in that single event.
Which is why you nudge them out of orbit, rather than blowing them to smithereens. And with all the impossible things the railgun does, knocking a satellite down without disintegrating it shouldn’t be too tough.
Remember sticky air? There you go. Sticky bullets.
+1
Hmmm, if Dabbler did go into the automotive business, I wonder if the U. S. Government would let Big Oil do to her what the Big Three did to Tucker back in the late ’40s.
I don’t think the government would be able to find Big Oil after Dabbler got through with them if they were stupid enough to go after her.
I wonder if shrapnel will be an issue with Halo’s pew pew orb? the demonstrations so far haven’t created much shrapnel. could a sufficiently powerful explosion on the tank potentially blast shrapnel into the press?
one would assume, given that there demonstrating Max’s particle beams as well, that they’ve prepared for such a possibility, a force field or other protections for the press, but what about the super attacking the tank. It wouldn’t be a problem for Max, but I could see shrapnel being a problem for Sydney. could be an opportunity to see if one of the unknown orbs can heal, or prevent their owners death.
I think what one of the unknown balls do is create an instant replacement copy of the owner every time that she/he become destroyed misusing the balls. Actually that we see is Sydney 9.
I bet one of them is power-nullify or power-copy, no idea how it works though.
That could be a clever guess, in the game at the beginning Sydney gave the GM a lecture about seethrough forcefields (https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/55) and later we found that she actually had one. At the same time she argued about the copy power ability also, so maybe that was first hand knowledge too.
Or, even better, it creates two Sydney’s. This one is 9 of 17.
After firing the Pew-Pew-Orb, Sydney quickly drops it and grabs the force-field orb, while still flying. Notice that she is holding two orbs in her diagram. I guess she could stand on the ground and hold the PPO and the force-field orb prior to firing.
Or she is just standing on the ground, beyond the tank, and not flying at all.
does she have a aonic screwdriver ? Ot failing that some mobile device that can likewise manipulate objects in five million different ways in response to her thoughts!
I probably should have asked this before, but in the last comic Dabbler said she built the gun to shoot down satellites. I’m willing to believe that she has a magic power source that she can stuff into her gun to do that, but how does she shoot down satellites with IRON SIGHTS?
High tech contact lenses?
DaveB already said that she has stuff built in that tells her weapons where she’s looking.
That’s what she designed it for. She didn’t say anything about being able to hit them. :) But as it has been pointed out, she has a cybernetic eye and a smartlink in her guns. Which still doesn’t mean she could hit a satellite but still.
I feel like there’s a blog or something where you posted this that I’m missing. Do you know where I might find it? Thanks.
I just tossed it out there in a comment on the last page: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1070/comment-page-1#comment-47648
Well she does have a spaceship doesn’t she?
He he. Good point. Everyone going on about how hard it is to shoot up into orbit. Whereas all she was envisaging doing was leaning out of the airlock and taking pot-shots at it. Much more fun than hauling it inside. Which would just be boring garbage disposal. No where near as enjoyable as a big boom.
Economics doesn’t work like that, the position you take was that of the Luddites, the Luddites were wrong. For example a power source that rendered the current oil industry obsolete would vastly reduce costs for those businesses that currently use oil, transport for example would become a lot cheaper. If you cut the cost of something the amount consumed normally increases as it becomes cost effective to do other things. e.g. vast amounts of cheap electricity would make Aluminium far cheaper as the main cost is the gargantuan amount used to smelt Aluminium from the plentiful ore. You would then be able to use Aluminium for various purposes for which it currently too expensive. Basically similar things have happened, such as the introduction of mass production, the lowered prices increase demand.
Making the same point a different way, In the early middle ages about 90% of the population of Britain were farmers, today agriculture employs about about 2% of the population, this does not mean 88% of the population are unemployed.
Yay! Thank you, I was coming to make that point.
A nigh-infinite power source would be mildly disruptive (oil companies are big, and, in the extreme case, there are a lot people employed by power companies, as well), but it would be NOTHING compared to all the ways it would make things SO SO SO much better in such short order.
Heck, if Superman ever wanted to make the world a better place in a more substantive way, he could just spend time generating power for the whole planet – that would make the lives of almost every person on the planet significantly better in short order. Well, except for Putin, the Saudi royal family, and the Iranian mulluhs, but I’d call that a feature. Oil has been called a curse for the regular people of many countries, and with good reason.
https://www.smbc-comics.com/?id=2305
SMBC did that. He also did one where he suggested that Batman’s money could be better spent on after-school programs, if decreasing crime was his goal.
Well, of course you’re right, but when I’m writing those posts I’m torn between writing a dissertation, and just something that expands on the comic and gets discussion going. I was even torn over including the line (or be reduced to a handful of much smaller businesses – oil is useful for a lot more than just fuel after all.) but I’m not trying to throw crap out there just to get a lot of argument, so some things I’ll clarify and some I’ll let hang.
To the point about the economy. When Japan started selling better cars than America, it had an effect on the US economy. Sure most people let go from closed auto plants got work elsewhere but Detroit is still feeling the effects. I guess my point is that there is SO MUCH infrastructure built around the oil industry – thousands of oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico alone. All the industries that create and supply those parts would be affected. Pipelines, tankers, refineries. There would be massive shifts in all those industries and economies that are nearly wholly dependent on oil trade would be severely impacted. Heck you could write a whole series of alt-history novels about how something like that would affect the world. Where would Saudi Arabia be without the economic and political support of the US? Support that exists mostly because of their oil resources.
I’m just saying introducing a new source of power to the world would have far reaching socio-political and economic impact, not that unemployment would jump to 80%. Who would buy the new power source then?
The problems in Detroit go FAR FAR FAR beyond the auto industry. I have a friend who used to work for the auto industry up there, back in the “good old days”, and his description of the waste, overpayment, and underworking is OBSCENE (and he recalls it fondly, as it was easy money).
As cliche as it is, go read “Who Moved My Cheese” and realize that Detroit did all the bad stuff in there and a lot more. THAT is what happened to Detroit.
It’s like saying refugees are ruined forever and giving the example of the Palestinians – every other refugee group after WWII has been gone (as in “they are no longer refugees”) for generations. So it is with Detroit as an example here.
But to your larger point, yes, there would be disruption, but you are TREMENDOUSLY underestimating the positive side, as energy is one of the primary cost prohibitors for lots of really great stuff, not to mention that it adds cost to essentially every-freaking-thing there is. The benefit to the global economy would be enormous and nigh-instantaneous. The unemployment drag on the economy (yes, there would be indeed be some) wouldn’t even REGISTER in comparison.
Heck, the increase in unemployment would be smaller than the current economic mess we’re in. Further political commentary voluntarily withheld.
But when tech breakthrouighs come, the transition is almost never tidy nor predictable. For the really major stuff, even worse.
Very easy to say, “Well, we don’t need all those (Insert Industry Here) workers now. They can do other stuff instead.” But the aforementioned workers, with families to feed and now facing a completely unknown future, would tend to be rather less casual about the situation.
This year saw humanity transition to being an urban species. Worldwide, there are now more of us living in towns and cities than in the countryside.
Wow, do people really think Dabbler is sexy? I’m sorry, but she looks horrible! She looks like what aliens might think is sexy after doing a casual glance at hentai… BAD HENTAI. And considering her backstory, I might not be too surprised if that’s exactly what happened.
I came up with a character once that had teleporting knives. He’s a Rasta who swallowed a gem that connects him to the Greek god of Hephaestus, giving him access to exactly 1,000 swords, knives, and pretty much anything with a sharp edge. This “Rasta of a Thousand Blades” can summon any blade to himself instantly, and can dismiss them without a thought. One of his favorite things to do is to throw the same throwing knife at his opponent over and over again. Another strategy he employs is getting over someone and summoning all his blades at once ^_^
This dabbler is only an illusion. The real dabbler is pritty sexy
Technically, Dabbler currently looks like what Sydney thinks is sexy. It’s an illusion based on Sydney’s ideal, remember? So think more “comic book geek” than “hentai”, but you’re in the right ballpark.
I guess Dabbler liked it enough to stick with it as her public persona.
Still, I think she looks pretty hot like this.
Actually I believe it was what Sydney thought was a ‘sexy battle chick’
Small difference
Dabbler’s ‘hero’ form is a sexied-up image of a female human superhero, so blame her. But Dabbler got the idea based on Sydney’s mental image of a comic book heroine. So blame Sydney. But Dave is then taking the idea of a Sydney’s comic female stereotype and putting it into his own comic, further distorting it. So blame Dave. But Dave was originally created by his parents, so blame them. Well then Mr an Mrs Barrack, you made Mr Phantom upset. I hope you’re happy.
Pffft *gigglesnort*! And while we’re at it, let’s blame the president! Because his policies made the economy all hibbity-gibbity, thus forcing Dave’s parents to neglect raising their child on proper anatomy by having to focus their attention on money instead!
Wouldn’t it be funny if Sydney was hovering over the tank, shot it, and made a small hole.
2 minutes later, lava comes shooting out from the Earth’s mantle.
Wouldn’t that be funny? Huh? Huh?
*sulking* (well I would think it was funny)
Knowing some of the geology of Texas, more likely, one minute from impact a torrent of fire starts shooting out, as she hit a natural gas pocket, which when it combines with the oxygen in the air and the heat from the blasted tank, generates fire!
Throwing knives would work if they would teleport back with a 10 second delay. They would fly, they would hit, tjey would hurt and cut, but they would dissappear soon if someone would want to wield them.
Also how did you make dabler’s background? Hand drawn or premade?
Hand drawn. I googled around trying to find a way to do that with fancy brushes that capped themselves with a little circle, but eventually it was less work to just draw it from scratch.
Alien rail guns operate on tambourine power.
Dave, let me first restate from prior posts: I’m a HUGE fan of your artwork :) One of the biggest draws to your comic.
And you usually make Dabbler look quite attractive.
In today’s comic, however, her… assets… look somewhat akin to balloons stuck on :(
Maybe you need to take a study break with a copy of SI swimsuit edition or something? :-D
(specifically, I think it’s the hard lines *above*, that give the impression of unreal roundness)
Yeah I have trouble with her breasts. I try and blame the push up power of her corset, but maybe I’ll try and fix that tonight when I’m fixing Pinkie’s hair. That will of course involve long hours of research large breasts in corsets on Tumblr. The sacrifices I make for you guys.
I imagine there would be better research sites for such a topic…
But either way, we all apriciate your sacrifices greatly, and wish you good luck
Everyone else’s (including Dabbler’s when she’s in her normal form) look normal so we can just blame Dabbler’s lack of artistic skill with her illusion ;)
OR you could just take the most sensible route, and blame it on Sydney’s imagination. Dabbler may just want to tweak that later.
Wow, way well done the edit on Dabbler’s boobs (er.. a GREAT edit?) Pretty simple and far effective. Now I really can fall for them, yum.
(sorry posting this twice, I forgot hitting Reply)
At the risk of being ban-hammered, you could just research your wife in a corset. =P
Thanks for keeping us ‘abreast’ of any new developments.
Hmm, wonder if you fi….
mbuuhhhhh….
(brain falls out of head)
Um… Dave, you let her go above 10 again !!!
well done, sir. well done.
this makes me wonder about Were-World for some reason. did/will she tell the government that one of its people were abducted and used as a living weapon by an alien race, or perhaps any of his family members what happened to their great uncle. or is this totally not connected to Were-World in cannon
Not connected as far as I know. Just a copy of the character.
It’s canon that Dabbler is the same character appearing in both comics, but I’m not sure that it’s ever been officially established which set of events happen first relative to her subjective timeline. She may not be aware of the abduction at this point, if it has even happened at all yet.
The character of Dabbler was designed several years before DaveB got round to starting this comic, and in that time Rann asked if he could borrow her for Wereworld. She’s canon in both contexts, but there isn’t any cross-referencing that I’m aware of between them.
My worry is that hovering over the blasted tank with hands full of PPO and Fly Girl, Halo will be a sitting duck re: shrapnel and molten tank flying up at her. Newton’s third and all.
That’s easy, have the shield orb hover right next to hear PPO hand, and switch after shooting.
Or fly out of range. Remember she is fast
Switch BEFORE shooting – MUCH safer. Drop the fly ball for the Pew-Pew, then switch back after the shot.
Actually as it is she is sorta thinking tactically about taking out a tank. Directly over a tank is usually a dead zone as far as weapons fire and top armor is usually thinner than the front.
That is a very good point. That’s tactics. Yay, Sydney!
Now that you mention it, maybe the little guy is getting blasted out of his hatch. For illustration purposes only, of course. Hey, is that Achilles? He just went through a lot of the suggestions we made for ways to show off his power, like being thrown like a ball, making a swan dive from altitude, and getting shot by a Big Ass Gun, so I can’t blame Syd for thinking of him as a crash test dummy.
He probably thinks of himself as a crash test dummy
Well, when you KNOW that you’re invulnerable & use it to your advantage & the personal “wheeee factor,” I’d say you’re not a dummy.
Fair enough :P
This gets me thinking about Achilles’ previous job.
Ten years ago, a little special effects house in San Francisco is filming some pilots for an experimental science show where they test the veracity of urban legends and other myths. Jamie is wrapped up foam padding for when he sits on a toilet that might explode, when he realizes that the potential explosion might set his foam suit on fire. His co-host, Adam, explains that he has a solution to that problem downstairs in the shop.
Jamie: It feels way too dangerous to be wrapped in flammable foam padding and then drop a cigarette into a toilet filled with explosive vapours while I am sitting on it.
Adam: Don’t worry. I have found an alternative. He’s downstairs.
In our universe, this is where they reveal Buster, the first of many crash test dummies that will be abused beyond any design specs over the course of the series. In the GrrlPower universe, they meet Achilles.
Achilles: You see, I am pretty much indestructible; nothing has ever been able to really hurt me. Anything that would be too dangerous for most people, I can do. So what is my first job?
Achilles gets “hired” by the government just after performing the exploding train station myth, which does not result in a large miss by the hapless (and unnecessary) Ted, the ballistics dummy.
Doubt the tech itself would cause those problems. The Internet and computer had similar advances, but there wasn’t a widespread collapse of the economy. The knock-on benefits of such a thing would more than overwhelm any loss of the oil industry. Besides, the oil industry wouldn’t collapse, only 30% of it is used as fuel – the rest is for medicines, plastics, roads, etc.
The real threat is giving it to us, having us forget how to use oil tech, then taking it away before figuring out how it works.
There are also the unpredictable knock-on effects. For example, who could have predicted that cyber-crime could become so varied or so incredibly lucrative?
The thing that worries me most about Dabbler is this:
Everything we’ve seen so far suggests that Maxima is the most powerful human in the world. Ominous hints about someone who can beat her notwithstanding, you’d have to search through billions of people to find Maxima’s equal.
Everything we’ve seen so far suggests that Dabbler is only mildly exceptional by the standards of her kind. She’s a diplomat and a soldier, not The Greatest Hero Ever Known. There are other aliens/succubi who can do most or all of what she does. And what she does is shoot satellites out of orbit with a handgun and fight Maxima to a standstill.
If anyone actually pisses off Dabbler’s homeworld, we might as well blow up the Earth now and save them the time.
Okay, now I’m worried too.
WHICH Homeworld? she has like 3.
She’s a mixed breed though.
As an alien, she has the tech to fly to earth. Ofcourse other tech comes with that. What we concider rocket science, could be basic school stuf over there.
And than she gets the magic from being a Succubus. It’s probably not a common breed
I still don’t understand this press conference. Why in the world would you tell people that you have a technologist on the team whose tech is lightyears ahead of current tech and that she keeps the stuff in a secret lab? That is need-to-know data and not even people on her team need to know it.
My only hope here is that there is a payoff to this and some villain comes along whose abilities allowed him to teleport to the secret lab and steal stuff.
Next week’s comic is the same thing. Sid has to stop a tank. She doesn’t know how she can do it but presumably she figures it out. Great. Now every supervillain with a tank will put into place contingency plans so that if their supertank/robot/whatever is facing Sid, they know what Sid might attempt. Why give the enemy an intelligence about how you operate? It makes no sense.
She’s just ganna shoot it with her PPO. Nothing to figure out, she knows that the orb lets her shoot powerfull explody beams.
Just like all other Arc members who used it as target practice, just show of a basic attack
All this is just like any military showing of theyr what theyr new tank can do on the shooting range. Only in this case, the ‘new tank’ are superhumans.
It’s called propoganda.
I think you’ll find that Sydney is a little more creative than that. >:-D
You don’t need to draw up plans to just shoot at something, ya’ know?
And I’m sure she wants to make an impression too, considering what’s been done already.
I’ll address the lab thing eventually. :)
She says her items get sent back to her ‘lab’. Somewhere there is a dog who is thinking “Where do all these things keep coming from?”
So if Dabbler had a dog, would it be a laboratory retriever?
This has been discussed before. Although defense against differently-powered-americans™ is one of their responsibilities, ARC’s main purpose now is PR. Given that there are very few supers and that most supers are sane, law abiding people; most of ARCSWAT’s field work will not involve combat. Stack that on top of Americans’ general distrust of government, and it’s probably easier to get anything you can’t completely hide out in the open.
What if her lab isn’t even on this world? Or even this dimension?
Her “lab” is on her ship, which is on the Moon’s Darkside.
First, I think she already knows plenty of ways to stop a tank. However, considering the small rivalry of oneupmanship that the ARC members have amongst themselves, she’s probably trying to figure out the most impressive way to accomplish that task rather than the way (probably whatever is quickest and easiest) she would normally do so. Second, I’m not sure there’s not really all that much one could do to Sydney-proof a tank or robot.
Very good points. Of course a good counter-argument is that a deterrent is much better if people know that it exists. Knowing that America fields a team of massively powerful heroes with a very wide range of capabilities may well stop the vast majority of potential threats from materialising in the first place.
And the ones that are not deterred by that knowledge are either too dumb for it to bother them or so capable themselves that such basic information is easily within their espionage capability.
https://ragingtofu.deviantart.com/art/How-to-Draw-Boobs-159067363
Looks like Dabbler missed the armpit bit.
I wonder how much of her tech/magic she simply doesn’t ever show off. I mean, if you’re talking about ‘Prime Directive’ type things, simply knowing something is POSSIBLE can be hugely disruptive because those who are working towards (and, of equal import, funding) such technologies can work with certainty.
Especially to technology-based researchers who do not realise that none of hers is possible unless incorporating magic as well.
Re: Arc-DARK
I know you’ve mentioned it in comic how the characters hate the term Arc-Dark but couldn’t think up a better one.
May I suggest Arc-night. it sounds better than arc dark (the two k sounds sound awkward), ryhmes with Arc-Light, and still has the same sneaky connotations as dark.
Yea, but Arc-Dark sounds much better when you know about the canine unit Arc-Bark.