Grrl Power #277 – Aura you having chowdah at the cah pahk?
Sydney confirms her suspicious on this page as well as discovering a new power in a rather nonchalant manner. Presumably she’ll get excited about this later. Does this vision mode detect all magic or just auras? She’ll need to experiment with that at another time. I wanted to have her cycling through other visions modes as I had some other jokes lined up but at this point I’m cutting everything that doesn’t move the fight forward. Still, ideally I would have liked to have her fumble around a bit before she happened on exactly the thing she needed.
I would have liked to 3D map the aura onto the battlefield, make it contour to the ground, but that’s not really a tech I posses in my drawing programs. Also the aura itself took much longer to draw than I would have guessed. The fight in the middle panel has a few bits I especially like, I’ll probably post it in an enlarged format on the DA page later today. Edit: Here it is. Lots easier to see the detail in this version. Edit 2: I’ve also posted the raw aura here, which makes it way easier to see all the stuff I hid in it, if that’s a thing you like.
Thursday is Xmas, but I’ll be posting a page anyway. I expect people will be otherwise occupied for most of the day, and honestly a day or two off wouldn’t kill me either, but I don’t want to hold up the fight at all, so check in when you get a chance. Also, thanks to everyone who used the Amazon referral link to do your shopping, it definitely helps to defray my own Xmas shopping costs.
Speaking of moving the fight along, of the next 4 pages, three are doubles and the single has 14 panels on it, which is why I haven’t been able to update the vote incentive. I appreciate everyone who keeps clicking on it even though it’s well beyond stale by now.
Here’s the link to the new comments highlighter for chrome which I can’t live without anymore, and the GitHub link which you can use to install on FireFox via Greasemonkey.
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
Meatspace ComicSeriously these are awesome. Check 'em out!
Not UpdatingNo longer updating or only updates sporadically, but definitely worth reading.
SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
I’m hoping at least one of her plans involves light-hooking Death Toll and beating Vehemence with him like a pinata.
While it would be humorous. His power would counter hers instead of Vehemence. Since using him to attack Vehemence would be an attack on him by her
Assuming Vehemence’s powers are active while unconscious. From what we’re seeing in that last panel, his powers might be INACTIVE until he’s conscious (which would explain why Vehemence did not wake him like all the others were)
Or they just “forgot” to get him medical attention after causing him to squirt blood from an artery in his ass…
Heat wave is still there too! WHAT THE HELL??!! The fastest flyer/speedster of the group couldn’t have gotten her to the parking lot with Arianna (be funny if she’s beating the hell out of the reporters right now! LOL ) or at least beyond this parking lot……. somewhere safe indeed.
Maxima… *shakes head*
Behold the most greivous injury a human can sustain. A butt wound!
Move aside, stomach wound and head wound. Butt wound is here!
Seriously though… I think it’s just more plausible that Vehemence is able to tailor who gets violent-insane and who doesn’t, and the fact that the only person who doesnt seem to have been affected, aside from Sydney because of her shield, is Death Toll? Well that seems to imply that there was some strategy employed, not ‘he was too injured to wake up when everyone else did, even the ones who were electrocuted or flame broiled.’
I’m confused about Heatwave as well, since I thought Maxima took her off battlesite when Amorphous handed her over after the fight with that speedster where she took a knife to the foot.
This is just another thing to go into the “Maxima is weird” file…
Everybody else was being kept under by a chemical injecting bracer. Many of them had only been fully knocked out by it or had it slapped on the moment they were temporarily stunned by some attack. Death Tolls seems to be exactly where they left him so I’m not even sure he even got a bracer in the first place. Its like they just forgot him there while rounding up everybody else.
Anyway, back on target, he got multiple attacks of many different sorts. One got blocked the rest got through. I tend to mention the knife because it was actively spurting blood at the last I knew. So over time he would be a little low on juice. The ice to the back of the upper spine, the fire ball to the back of the head, the smash to the face or whatever Maxima or the doom clone with the gun did might all be giving him a rough time coming back online.
Or his power might have countered even when he was unconscious and that’s why they left him for later. In which case he countered the wave and remains naturally unconscious.
Is it just me or is she getting scary here?
It’s her.
You know, I think that this is the first time I have seen someone use other Fastball Special using themselves, and with Harem’s “one less me” extra muscle, it might hurt that guy pretty bad :3
Specially while he’s distracted by the other 2 Harems
Looks a bit like the hand holding dance 2 person roundhouse kick.
Somebody cue up the music. “These boots are made for walking”
Damn you! I have this song now stuck in my head!
The Jane Fonda or Billy Ray Cyrus version?
Edit: Nancy Sinatra
My most heartfelt apologies for the error…I shall set repeat Billy Ray 100 times :(
If it makes anyone feel better, I got Walking ‘Round in Women’s Underwear stuck in my head. >>;
Let me help with that…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGLmiWfoJx8
Ooh, so does this mean that her shield also protects her from aura effects?
She hasn’t been knocked out. So I’d say that when she opens the shield temporarily to bring in fresh oxygen before she closes back up, that she won’t be affected. Only the ones knocked out are now on an outside source controlled rampage.
Dabbler is fighting someone and she wasn’t knocked out.
Then again that may just be because someone is fighting her.
Dabbler *was* going to put a railgun round through V’s head, probably because of V’s aggro aura…A little “dark” for a sex-loving succubus, I’d say. Dabbs just got distracted.
“So I’d say that when she opens the shield temporarily to bring in fresh oxygen”
Which she totally shouldn’t have had to do more than ONCE this entire multistage fight. *grumble*
We’ve never had an indication that she was dropping the shield for more air. She put it down to put both hands on one orb. And who knows, maybe it was making her hand itchy, or she forgot about it while thinking.
“She put it down to put both hands on one orb.” That only covers one of the more recent shield drops.
“We’ve never had an indication that she was dropping the shield for more air.” That actually makes her in even MORE desperate need of a talking to in training. Which is fine I guess. It could be pretty funny in training. Its just kind of annoying in combat. Greenie or no you would think having so many ways to die walking around (mostly in the form of the multitasking all powerful mildly speedy V) would inspire her to keep it up a BIT more than she has. I guess that is part of her “shiney” disorder or something. I’d have a death grip on that shield orb by now! lol
Actually, everyone within the aura, knocked out or otherwise, is under its influence. Dave straightened it out for us in the last page after someone asked in the comments. Dabbler isn’t quite as affected due to her ability to mitigate such charms to an extent, but she is still influenced by the aura. Sydney opening the shield even briefly is not a good idea. The only one we don’t know for certain is Death Troll.
So, Halo is too. But her adhd is wreaking havoc with the effect allowing her to think up tactics?
I asked actually. In addition to DaveB saying it affected almost everyone, including Dabbler (who is better at handling it than others, but still is affected), he also specifically spelled out that the reason Halo is not affected is because she’s ‘snug in her shield’ – so I don’t think it’s because of ADHD.
It seems like the shield blocks everything harmfull. It’s transparent, so not light, though it blocked Budget Halo’s lasers, so it even blocks harmfull light.
It also blocked teleportation. At the same time, it doens’t block wifi or phone signals (she can still use her pip boy)
So, can she navigate to potentially harmful websites? :P
That comment deserves a medal!
It’s been shown to have a pattern which can be compared to a transitory shield able to switch between opaque and transparent
It does seem pretty selective, though we don’t actually know if it blocks real lasers; there’s a
good argument that Hex’s ‘lasers’ are actually particle beams like Max’s.
It does help with ultra-high frequencies of light though.
It appears so – In panel 5 the pattern is interrupted on the spot of pavement where she’s standing.
I so called this a few pages ago, if she can embiggen her shield and incase as many as possible in it they will be cut off from his influence and maybe even stop him from feeding off of their negative energy.
It would be awesome if she could open up only part of the shield, making it an actual shield shape instead of the dome. That way she could widen on raise the height to shield larger areas without cutting off her oxygen supply.
Even though I also suggested the embiggenized shield around them (couple times too) I don’t think it is really protecting folks in the spell shadow. That may easily be the effect of her own blind spot as she looks around with the magic-sight power she just figured out. After all it doesn’t grant 360 degree vision yes?
The thing that makes me hella nervous is that her last panel seems to have her looking up at the orbs -specifically the PewPew …. (DUCK AND COVER!)
It being her blind spot could be easily tested, but probably won’t be as it would likely wast a panel.
You guys are missing a fact, that she DOESN’T SEE, that her shield blocks the aura. It’s BEHIND her.
It’s the yellow truesight orb. It allows for telepresence also, doesnt it?
Sure, but there’s no need to waste panels showing characters looking around them all the time. In order to be consistent it would have to be almost constant, or people would point out that the character “hadn’t looked around as has always been shown and so shouldn’t know” whatever was behind them. There are far better ways to represent someone knowing or not knowing what is behind them. The assumption is that people, especially those in a combat situation or where they are specifically trying to observe things, do check their blind spots from time to time.
So, did anyone else see the fact that her shield is casting a shadow in his aura but nothing else is?
An important find…. But can it be leveraged? Oh yes, by getting really close to the source’ and casting a big shadow. First catch the escapee villan in the shadow so that the hostile half get ported out, then catch the allies in it, who absent aura an absent foes, stop fighting.
Yup. Shows us that the aura is radiating outward, and blocked by the shield
Hmm, so Sydney’s forcefield not only blocks teleportation but other magical effects. It’s even casting a magical shadow – nice touch. And very interesting.
Sydney’s “Better Plan” face… everyone is very very lucky she is a cop, because otherwise she would probably be a supervillain.
Also Stargate gleeheehee.
I actually know what she’s POSSIBLY going to do… and I agree it is DEVIOUSLY EVIL… hence the evil grin on her face.
Remember THIS PANEL: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/194
Five bucks she runs to the kitchen and just whips together something SOOOO HELLISHLY SPICY that it LITERALLY makes everyone stop fighting as … well… THAT!
Either that…. or she just does something SOOO stupid that NO ONE can help but laugh their asses off INSTEAD OF fighting..
And since you can’t be aggressive while ROFLMAFO…. as it’s pretty much the OPPOSITE, Vehemence looses his powers and everyone just laughs him to unconsciousness…
My money is on having Sydney just start to SWEAR… NO ONE can not laugh at that.
Spice attack would be violence. But what about Garlic?
or, gasp, fiber?
Fingernails on chalkboard?
That’s omega level evil…
It may NOT count… as Sydney is just eatting … not HER FAULT she can create a Mustard-Gas level spicy food event.
Did any one else notice that one of the rings of his aura pattern are all the symbols from the Stargate.
Stargate is the best!
I also see some symbols from the Mayan calender and maybe a few Cutie Marks from My Little Pony thrown in just for good maser. All in all love the page.
Also there is Pac-Man, a ghost, a trail of power pills, and a bunch of what looks like hiragana but probably isn’t.
.
Anybody else think that “you guys give me all the feels” in that sidebar add is, in the wrong context, vaguely disturBing?
I love the look on her face in that last panel.
Dave, I suggest having the team ask Sydney how she figured out how to stop Vehemence’s aura (if she does stop it this way) and then have her fail to replicate the magical view and flounder about as she gets mad at herself for not being able to do it again.
Or rather, getting mad at the true sight ball.
That’s a pritty nice way to sneak in the fumbling that had to be skipped now, later.
It would not even be unlikely. As an ADD guy myself, in a situation like this, I’d probably be in hyperfocus. Would make perfect sense for Sydney to also be in hyperfocus.
Hyperfocus is exactly what it says on the tin. Instead of being all wacky and unable to concentrate, she’s fully focussing on a single problem, not even noticing anything else
Wait, is that how she selects different powers? It depends on where her thumb is on the sphere?
Normally she can more or less control what the orbs are doing mentally, but the runes let her manually control stuff, which is good cause it’s a good way for her to discover all the effects.
So it’s a mental aid. She’s still mentally controlling the orbs, but the runes give her thoughts something to grab onto and focus on, instead of having to fumble around randomly
Well she can mentally command it to do stuff. She may not necessarily know what stuff it can do. The buttons, err symbols, let her experiment. Maybe one ball can make chocolate pudding taste like vanilla. She finds out by pressing a symbol and after that point she can use mental commands.
Yea that’s kinda what I meant
Never even occurred to me that other orbs would have ‘different’ controls to adjust their effects like the shield does.
Now I wonder what other effects the PPO (I’m hip enough and can provide cred) or the lighthook orb can do.
DEATH BLOSSOM!
I really liked the way The Last Starfighter movie showed the Death Blossom attack…Dangerous maneuver for anyone that can use it.
Maybe it will be one of those upgrades that combines two orbs in the future? Shorts out both shield and PPO orbs temporarily after use but anything susceptible to explody beams is no longer an issue after that. :)
If I had to venture a far fetched guess, I would say Sydney would use her shield. She’s demonstrated that she can control it by a marginal degree so far e.g. protecting the camera crew from Maximas blast radius as well not having to be in the center of the shield. In her shoes I would attempt to make a cone from my shield orb that could encase vehemance. It should contain his aggro aura awhile being a non-violent act. Plus shes show air can’t pass through so i would leave him in there for a bit. Additionally I would be confident it would keep him contained. Again, it would be the perfect solution if she could control the shape.
She still has to be INSIDE the shield, even though she’s not in the center. So all Vehemence would have to do to stop it is knock her out. Without her shield for protection, that’s ganna be really easy (he could probably do it with a spell, no need to even lift his eyes from Maxima
Here’s your sign .
Is that?…Yes, it is!
I can see the topmost spires of Atlantean buildings poking out of the ocean!
I’m trying so hard not to make a SG:A reference here…
Interesting. Halo’s shield is creating a shadow in the aura effect. That would explain why she is not affected. When enlarging the shield a bit she could shield any part of the fight from the effect.
One commenter had asked in a previous page how the rookie could possibly contribute significant combat plans in a team full of supers, many of whom had military experience and training and some of whom had super combat experience (or some similar comment). Well, here’s the explanation: virtually everyone else is affected by the violence aura and those who aren’t are fighting those who are. So only the rookie, who wasn’t affected and can ignore virtually all of the affected people, has time to think in this situation.
Also, yes, she can use her shield, and yes, I read ALL the comments on that. What she does is quickly expand it as large as possible and then contract it. Unless V can react faster than she can switch shield states, that cuts his aura off for people she shields. Hopefully people who have been cut off of the violence aura can fight it when they are no longer shielded – note that already conscious people may not have been affected by the violence aura. However V is smart, so this trick will work only once.
I can see how Sydney can come up with strategies etc… Its less about her and more about Maxima NOT getting any wins in against actual threats either strategically (she made the plan) or action wise (she helped execute the plan in part or whole). But this is old hat at this point.
I see a Halo energy blade, stargate Atlantis symbol and triple X XD
That’s actually the ENTIRE ring of symbols of the Stargate from the movie and SG-1
Indeed.
I would’ve thought the triple X would be over near Dabbler, instead of near Heatwave…Then I thought, “Naw, Dabbler’s Comm Collar has a *quadruple* X…
:P
GAH, why don’t these orbs come with tooltips
The interactive and user friendly A.I. Alien Jeeve’s is in one of the unknown orbs. ;)
How do you think she’d react if she found out she had ‘Clippy’ stuck in there with her?
Ahhh you got to it first.
Or maybe “Hey listen!”
Do not name the unmaker. That which walks behind the files. The devastation that thought brings about would be far too horrifying…
“I see you’re trying to fire an explosive cutting beam. Would you like to shout a memetic phrase?”
I mentioned this before, but this is the Greatest American Hero plot. Guy gets a super-suit, and the first thing he does is lose the manual. And of course there’s no built-in help function.
Considering how Sydney never mentioned any kind of User Manual when describing how she found the orbs, I guess she can only learn by trial-n-error, or maybe finding an “online help function” in one of the mystery orbs.
Only Dave knows for sure…
Hmm, maybe there is a wiki for the orbs.
Or maybe route the PPO thru the shield for a short range? omnidirectional AoE attack.
Sydney tried looking at the other orbs through the true sight orb back at the restaurant, but she did not have the ‘diagnostic mode’ turned on at the time. It might be worth another look to check if she can see anything new. I wonder if there is a ‘right click’ glyph on the orbs to bring up a help menu?
(good luck reading it if it does show up)
With the aura overlay my brain keeps translating the parking spaces into squares on a turn-based strategy map.
Note that confirmation of the use of mind control by Vehemence means that any other participant in this fight has a sound legal defense whether they’re a supervillain or just a confused hairdresser. “I wuz whammied yer honour!”
Good point! I think that’s how the supervillain population will still be active down the road. Legally speaking, I’m pretty sure that’s an ironclad defense. Not that they’re likely to get away without consequences, but sentence reduction for sure.
Is it still if there is no mention of mind control in the law?
Not being responsible for one’s own actions IS already in the law…Tough part is *proving* that you were being manipulated or forced into doing something criminal in the first place. Now that the specter of mind control is likely to be addressed by the courts, you can count on some kind of legislation to specify it as a defense, perhaps under the aegis of “coercion.”
MidnightDStroyer’s comment is more along the lines of what I meant. There are definite precedents for defenses along those lines. They have pretty terrible attempt/success ratios, but they have worked in some cases. In a world with wizards (see Harry Potter) or superheroes (like this one), I think courts would have to be a bit more generous.
On the other hand, there’s no concrete evidence demonstrating how MUCH the aura impairs your judgment. I think – correct me if I’m wrong – that the onus of proof would be on the defense as far as that’s concerned.
‘…where the team mate was heard to be saying, and this is a direct quote: “I’m space shuttling your ribs!”. The defense rests.’
So we got ourselves a grayed out control projection that represents the orphaned node.
Separate power involving perception or something that becomes active only when she uses Telepresence?
It looks like two triangles one mirroring the other whilst overlapping.
Guesses? Seems like an illusion control with the two triangles mirroring each other indicating some kind of image manipulation?
I really like the art design used in the last panel here, both the pattern for his aura and the subtle touch of there being a gap in it directly behind Sydney as her shield cuts it off.
senses are the most dangerous things in game play for tabletop RPGs
Wait, is Jiggawatt taking down the exact same people she took down before?
Also, Sticking with the “Vehemence is new team trainer” theory.
Yup. Except Gauntlet, who’s on the other side trying to punch Dabbler
Because setting off a potentially fatal brawl is a wonderful training technique.
Not that I disagree with you on how ridiculous a super powered brawl would be as a training technique, and especially when the villain side doesn’t seem to have been at all clued in on the “training exercise” portion of their fight (Shadow Boxer flat out stated he was going to be famous for killing Sydney, Bomb Shell tried her best to kill Maxima, Mach the Knife stuck a knife in a couple of the team, etc.). But you have to keep in mind that this is the same author who tried to justify Maxima staying out of the fight when she could have mopped the floor with almost the entire villain team and saved us from about 2/3 of the comics this fight has lasted through by claiming that Maxima was “seeing how they performed.”
Any police Captain who let his rookies face down heavily armed criminals and held back reinforcements while he “saw how they performed” would be fired faster than Mach the Knife can run.
And sure, sure, there was an incentive to demonstrate the powers of the team to the readers. But that’s known as Holding the Idiot Ball, when a character is forced to do things which are outright stupid on the face of it just to satisfy some plot point.
Easily justifiable as a “team building exercise/seeing how they performed” as none of them came even close to being killed and Maxima has the speed to respond to any such threat immediately. and learning every members responses/skills/cooperative ability would be essential for their line of work. Also this force is not police and more than likely operates under vastly different rules than any similar real world agency.
I’d say that Sydney came within one very lucky block of being killed by Shadowpunch and Dabbler could very well have been killed by Heavenly Sword at least twice.
Easily justify it to Heatwave after her toe is amputated.
Why can’t people let villains be villains?
How often she needs to not withstanding she did drop it recently to try to use the light hook with two hands to get Vehemence off of Maxima.
Hmmm. I wanna see Math Vs Match. That’d be an interesting matchup.
Who’s Match?
Speedster “Mach the Knife” aka Silent Shadow (but nobody seems to like his original name).
Ok. People who know that Mach the knife’s real name is Match or Silent Shadow, stop being more OCD than me to know stuff like that! It’s wierding me out.
Well you gotta ask yourself; what does the name “Silent Shadow” have to do with being a knife wielding superspeedster in a green trench coat?
Not much.
Match the Knife is semi-unique sounding, fits the character as presented, and has a little more pizzazz to it.
Silent Shadow sounds like a ninja. Mach the Knife sounds cool.
typo
Hang on, I see the stargate symbol for earth there, is she going to hopscotch-teleport him to another dimension?
Okay, Top right corner of the rune rings anel. Is that an Apokolips face next to an Eye of Sauron?
Under Anvil’s foot is that a fist with a face then a fist –as in an angry tiki god?
On that subject: bottom left corner, in the leftmost parking space. There’s an orange arm there clutching what looks like half a barbell. At its 7’o’clock is something that looks like a manhole cover with a biohazard symbol.
Does anyone know what those two items are? Whose arm is it, for starters? It’s too orange to be V’s, and also too far away.
I think that’s a simple rendering of the remains of Shawn’s car: two wheels and the rear axle. Though it must all have been very rusty.
How did Sydney discover the power of each of the known orbs? She might as well experiment with random ideas and hope at least one of the unknown orbs can help in some way.
The only way to stop him is to drain all the anger away. Literally from everyone including him or he will be empowered for a very long time.
The shield. Blocks. Berserk aura.
And there is a hole behind her of where it should be.
Maxima, don’t bother trying to break that shield again. I’m guessing it’ll take nothing short of a nuke to scratch it. (And then, it’ll probably block the radiation too….)
Well based on the cast page we know it’s a 5 star shield. 5 star being the absolute maximum in this universe.
It also seems to be smart, blocking lasers dispite being transperent. And letting sound through, but blocking dangerous sound levels (which explains why noone went deaf dispite standing right next to Maxima’s explosion at the press event).
So basicly it can ‘sense’ when something reaches dangerous levels, and selectively filter that out.
The only problem is that it’s aperently airtight, and so she can’t keep it up forever (without some diving equipement. So not even that big a problem)
Not quite maximum! After all, Achilles has a 6.
DaveB said the 6th star was sortof a joke, and to indicate that he’s above the classification
Is Dabbler also able to see V’s “aggro-aura” ?
She might decipher it, another step forward.
*Sidney: gentle nudge to Dabbler…*
First, this is NOT a “put a shield around Vehemence and cut off his air” comment.
But I DO think Halo needs to put a shield around Vehemence and Maxima. Then she can lighthook herself to Vehemence to keep herself away from him — if she has a lighthook holding her beyond arm’s reach, he can’t even jump or something to hit her. And if she puts a shield around the three of them in teh center of the aggro rune, it will shield everyone ELSE from its effects. That’ll reduce Vehemence’s source of vehemic energy, which he is using up very rapidly in order to regenerate and pummel Maxima.
Maybe it’d reduce his strength enough for Max to get free. Then they just need to play keep-away until Vehemence runs out of juice and reverts to his weaker condition (relatively). Once he’s less powerful, Max could once again threaten to remove his brain by way of the back of his skull, and he must either stand down or die.
Problem is, that’d open Sydney up to the effects of the Agro Aura. And she has acces to some VERY violent powers.
Unles she’d actually manage to kill Vehemence with the PPO, that’d only make things worse.
I’m with Quarktime, actually. Once I saw the “shadow” of the aura, it seemed obvious to me that she’s going to cover him with the shield. That will cut off his source of Vehemic energy, with nobody else being at risk but Sydney herself. And given that he has explicitly stated that he doesn’t want to kill anyone (other than Maxima, which he feels he needs to to keep HER from killing HIM), he’ll have a hard time stopping Sydney from stopping him. At his power level now, it’s probably rather difficult for him to hit someone who is essentially non-powered as just hard enough to knock them out, without a serious risk of killing her. So it will be a Mexican stand-off, of sorts… either he surrenders, since she’s outsmarting him in some fashion, or he turns to attack her and opens himself up to an attack by Maxima.
I’m fairly certain that Dave has something even more creative than this, but I’m betting that quarktime and I are more in the ballpark than most of the other guesses so far. ;)
Er… No, it’s suicide for all the reasons RobK stated. The v-aura itself will affect her the moment she drops the shield. That by itself will negate the chance of putting that plan into action, as the aggression will cause her to pick a fight against the first person she sees as opposed to trying to stop the fighting and save Max. Should she somehow get said shield around him, hentacle does nothing on him now, and V even with the rest of the supers cut off can still knock her out. And don’t think he will not kill if necessary; he’s trying to kill Max for that reason, so if Sydney proves that much annoying, he will kill her. And then there’s this assumption he is losing power too fast to do all of this…
If she’s to going to use the shield, more likely it will be to get some people behind and embiggen it. Somehow, though, I expect something a little more clever than that.
He never said he doesn’t WANT to kill anyone. He simply stated he was not INTERESTED in killing anyone. Do you honestly think he’ll hesitate to squash Sydney like an annoying fly if she gets in the way of him eliminating the only person that can really threaten him?
You’re both missing the point. He’s already got his hands full (so to speak) trying to kill Maxima. In order to attack Sydney, he’d have to let go of Maxima, which would not be the wisest of decisions, and he knows that. Further, with Sydney having him in the force field, he would not be gaining any more power – or, at least, only a trickle from Sydney herself, instead of the entire field of people.
And if Sydney went berserk from the aura, that’s not necessarily a lose-lose for her. Remember her going berserk in the bank? Not that I think she’d be able to hurt Vehemence, but she’d be one hell of a distraction, and might make it hard for him to focus on Maxima.
But we shall see. It’s possible that none of us are right. ;)
Since when must he let go of Max to stop her? V has shown he could force push Anvil and anyone else away while still clamping on Max. The hentacle is weak against him. Sydney uses hentacle to ‘keep away’, V yanks on Sydney towards him and then hits her. Or, if somehow he needs to approach her instead, V can simply hold Max with one hand, dash/leap towards Sydney in a blink, then hit her. Shield goes down, V resumes his rage royale. And, no, I seriously doubt the shield cutting off his power would drain him enough, not even a fraction, to weaken him to the point of a standstill.
And, no, Sydney even in her randomness only attacked the ‘robbers’ and Dabbler, using none of her orbs, and it only lasted for a moment. This is sustained blood list in which Sydney would attack the first person she sees, and use anything at her disposal (like the PPO), collateral damage be damned. Just no.
At this point, I don’t think he even needs to focus on Maxima. He just needs to squeze really hard.
IF she can even still hurt her, she’d have to put power into her explosions, and thus away from protection. And she’d need time to blow him up (like she needed time, and him distracted, the blow his arm off). She doesn’t have this time if he’d be able to break her neck the second she drops her protection a little
Vehemence wouldnt need to let go of Maxima in order to kill Sydney if not for the shield.
She’s a normal squishy human. He could flick her in the head and make her head explode. He does have two hands, and he’s only needing to use one on Maxima.
Also I doubt Maxima is going to threaten any more. If she gets a chance, Vehemence is dead
People forget that also traps her with Maxima, who is also under the effects of the aggro aura.
Anyone else catch the separate symbol under heatwave? Seems isolated from the rest of the aura over the area. Ideas? Could it be because heatwave can levitate and the aura is ground following?
Yup. Dabbler has some similar symbols under her. Seems Heatwave’s powers are a little different than everyone else’s
It is starting to look like the explanation behind a lot of super powers in this universe is ‘magic’, or else the orb in ‘display mode’ shows the use of any powerful energy source in a diagnostic chart that is readable to whoever created the orbs. Too bad Sydney can’t let Dabbler see this. She might get some of it. Her sword has her name ‘XURIEL’ written on it in Atlantean.
unfortunately Achilles in buried in rubble. His invulnerability breaks several laws of physics and might also be read as magic. I would really like to see what his energy signature looks like.
Except there aren’t similar symbols under the other supers. The Harems don’t have one, and neither does Anvil. None of the other supers, good or bad have them either. Dabblers powers may very well be magic based, but I’m not sure heatwave’s are.
What I don’t get is why no one has tried to attack Sydney yet, don’t get me wrong, it helps to have no one bothering you when you’re trying to figure something out but…. yeah. It’s kind of weird having one person being un-attacked for so long.
She was attacked right at the beginning, since then she’s been inside a shield the whole time, and not directly attacking anyone, which makes her a very low-priority target.
(I actually think I remember something about her playing aggro and attracting attention because she was safe in her shield, but that might have only been discussed by never done.)
Can I just say that I’m loving this fight? Lots of awesome scenes, cool powers, cool uses of normal powers… exactly the kind of thing I adore. I can’t wait for the inevitable “Testing the orbs” comics that will come with Halo’s training, the discoveries of her powers over time has got me so hyped to find out more :D
So long as Vehemence is not involved in any shape, manner, fashion or form, I’m down with that.
Heh.
Seconded.
I’m really looking forward to them testing just how powerfull the PPO is. Combined with her trying to learn to control it is going to make for some massive carnage
Okay, looking at the potential Chekhov’s Guns, there are two obvious cases where Vehemence has removed or arranged the removal of threats: Death Toll (who lots of people have mentioned), and preventing Opal from teleporting everyone away. Either one could be just seeking more violence, but presumably Vehemence knows his own weaknesses. So, I wonder if removing the victims of violence from the field would weaken him? I can’t see the scene well enough to tell who other than Death Toll is still down.
There’s a link in the comic discription to a bigger version of the central panel.
Aside from Death Toll, there are 2 bodys from Concretia (but without her in it, those are just statues). We also don’t see Vector and Jabberwoky anywhere.
What if the new power is “Switch place with Clone” for the Tele orb?
She’s using the new power right now. It’s magesight.
Nope, she found the new power, but it was greyed out, whatever conditions it’s used under haven’t been met. The mage sight is one of the standard options on the orb.
Reminded of the self coined paci-fist fighting style of king Phillip and princess Amelia from the Slayers series. That may work here.
Alternatively they find out Vehemence is a die hard Brony.