Grrl Power #323 – She’s got the touch… she’s got the powah!
Naturally Sydney has questions. Some of them will be answered on the very next page! I want to discuss her abilities here but it would be premature before the next page. Also I would make a Who’s Who for Vance since he spoke and was named, but all it would say is “blond and pretty” which… I guess is about as helpful as the one Ren got.
Telford Porter is actually a real Marvel villain. Guess what his power is? People with powers that match their given name is… it’s one of those things that seems cool when you’re making up your own heroes when you’re 10, but it really requires some strained logic when you try and carry those characters through into other work. The easiest way to explain it is that super powers are at least partially psychic/psionic/etc in nature and a person’s identity can shape them. Dr. Doom is fine. His powers have nothing to do with his name, and his villain moniker is literally just his name plus his level of education. Doctor Octopus slash Otto Octavious is a little more of a stretch. I’ll admit Maxima is arguably skirting the edge as she can “max out” her powers. I’ve mentioned it before, but in her original incarnation she was named Ultima, but I changed her name to Maxima because of her her powers work – also it immediately helped start to form her personality. It would be pretty inexcusable if her name was Max Powers, but come on, Telford Porter? That has to take the cake.
I realize after I drew it that Xochitl’s power key flowchart looks a bit like Sydney’s Orb Grid, that’s not intentional. I probably should have gone with something that looked more like a DNA strand, but too late now.
Holy crap you guys, A-kon is this weekend! It totally snuck up on me this year. As such I wasn’t able to sign up to do a panel, but I’ll be attending several of the webcomic ones myself. This year, instead of just saying “hey let’s try and get together” and hoping it all works out, I’m going to propose a time and a place right now. There’s a bar and grill in the Atrium II (the big main one) called Media, if you’re there and interested, we can meet up there at 8pm Friday. It might be too busy to actually eat there, but it’s easy to find, so we can at least coordinate from there. The easiest way to keep track of and communicate with me during the con will be via Twitter. I may try and wear my one Grrl Power t-shirt I have for easy identification, beyond that, my headshot is on the Patreon page.
Here’s some Maxima fan art for you. Max is kind of… I’m not sure if cute is the right word, but it’s close. It’s by the creator of Magical Girl Neil. I’ve only read a little of it, but the premise is a guy gets magic girl powers a la Sailor Moon. The transformation sequence includes magical gender reassignment, and the requisite hilarity ensues.
Today’s page colored by Keith.
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Please oh PLEASE tell me that Varia will unlock differntly based on what orbs halo is touching.
That would be SO amazing.
My theory is that she would be able to act as a third hand allowing her to use one of the orbs while Halo already has one in each hand…
Ooh, that is a clever idea. Which is the first time I have approved of such a suggestion, since readers started coming up with ways that Sydney could overcome her limit.
Mainly because it does not overpower Sydney at all. Whilst it does add character to her relationship with Varia.
And, finally, it also dovetails nicely with the way that Varia’s demonstrated power with Harem allows the latter to overcome her own power limitation. Namely that she cannot normally teleport with someone else. So it plays nicely on the theme that her gestalt could overcome power limitations in the partner, by granting her a complimentary power to go with it.
Mind you, enhancing somebody else’s power by eliminating a weakness might not always be what you want. For instance if facing a super villain! In that case you would hope that the power granted was actually one that exploited their weakness.
So possibly Varia’s power will be the ability to create mittens?
the big problem i see is the potential for it to tern in to Varia ex machina were Varia gains the perfect power to deal with a problem to esaly and to often.
i would much rather see a few comic’s were she is trapped with only one person in reach. but the power gained from that one is compleatly useless in the fight.
powers like spontaneous daisy growing from her fingers or summon toilet roll.
then watch as she has to use outer ways to get things done
“Summon Toilet Roll” sounds like a garbage power until you’re sitting in a public bathroom with nary a TP in sight…
How often would you be sitting in a public bathroom stall without TP and happen to have another person in there with you who happens to be the one that triggers your “Summon Toilet Roll” power?
Well, in Varia’s case she does not have to be in a situation where her gestalt can be used. When she forms a gestalt with someone she usually has a feeling what the power she gains can do.
So if she does ever happen to be caught short, she get her phone out and dial her summon toilet roll partner.
Or just ask the person in the next stall to pass one over.
But, the fun thing comes is if she happens to be caught in a death trap with the summon TP guy. Then they have to summon loads, so they can climb high, on the pile created. Or use them to clog up mechanisms, in the trap.
Then twine the paper together, to make a rope to climb down from the window. And finally make a disguise, out of toilet paper, so they can sneak past the guards.
Although, getting across a desert, with just that edge will be problematic. A giant SOS would help rescuers find them, which the paper could do. Likewise, if they can get a spark going, they can have a signal fire. That would also keep them warm at nights (deserts get very cold) or to wrap them up warm, if on the move.
They could even build a shelter out of them, to shield themselves from sand storms. If they can get a height advantage, over any enemies, they can rain down flaming loo rolls on them. Lighting up the buried mass of paper, under their feet, concealed with only a thin layer of sand over it.
And the villains would die in shame if they lost to a hero who’s only power was ‘summon toilet paper’!
I would expect that Varia’s power comes with some kind of inherent limitations, like the gestalt only lasting for a limited amount of time, or something like that. Or maybe it’s like that whole CopyKraut thing at the beginning–she has the power, but doesn’t really know how to use it effectively. Like Jiggawatt could give Varia all kinds of powers over electricity, but she wouldn’t be able to any of the really cool stuff that Jiggs can do, because she hasn’t had the chance to learn how to use it.
That said, if I was Max, I’d be deploying Varia in much the same way as you’d deploy Sydney–both are characters that you’d reserve for situations where a high degree of flexibility is critical, and both would almost have to be well-supported in some way or another. Neither is a person whom you would want to put in a position that would leave them vulnerable, as it would be a lot easier to replace most of their team-mates than it would be to replace them.
thre thoughts…
first, i wonder if the powers varia (love that name btw) will get to keep her powers that are unlocked permanently, or not.
second, ive noticed the most characters in various midums that have a power that grants ability duplicity usually go to the dark side, at least temporarally
third, i doubt that varia will unlock any useful powers from syd, mostly cause she gets he powers from the orbs. however, if she does, it would fll into issue one turf, cause you know that she would be linked with them also, leading to a lot of entertaining scenarios where the two try and walk in two different directions and get denied.
I could work with that, even if it were even my only super power. Obviously choosing to avoid any combat capable supers if only having it at the zero to one star power rating. But it would be of considerable utility in daily life or opposed by non-supers. And with a bit of work on power stunts.
• Survival: the obvious usage, plus if in a dry spot being able to provide fuel for a fire. It burns fast, but not as fast as a super could replenish it. Even if having to do so one roll at a time. If no means of starting a fire is available you can still make a nest. Paper insulates very well.
• Income. Face it, not going to get on Arc-SWAT with this power, but can earn some cash in hand. Notably you can easily undercut even super market suppliers prices. But at low quantity levels you are only going to be supplying local and regional shops, not national chains.
• Combat – power-stunt to create the paper as a screen, rather than in a roll, using the cardboard to provide a rigid frame, so it can remain upright unsupported. You can use the screens to provide concealment.
• Combat – power stunt to create the toilet roll wrapped around an enemy’s eyes (/limbs /equipment). If they can’t put their finger in the trigger, then you don’t have to worry about your vulnerability to bullets.
But if you gain the five star version then you can really go to town.
• Super absorbency. Create paper which can soak up all liquid it encounters.
• Shelter. Just make it really tough. Toilet paper is made out of wood, so anything up to that strength is reasonable. And keeping it’s original look stops you from being too embarrassed to use your log shelter.
• Combat. Encase opponents in meter thick toughened material.
And so on. Mind you, I can see uses for the enhanced versions of the other power too.
• Combat Growing really big daisies, or in vast quantity, can be used for concealment as above.
• Using Daisy to create milk.
• Combat command and control, intelligence analysis, army creation, super outfit design and manufacture, science and technology research and development and more through advanced spontaneous Daisy growing.
Like most matter-creation powers, toilet-paper creation is trivially weaponized if you can create the stuff inside someone’s body.
Yea, most super role playing games ban that outright as a result. It is simply too easy, and lacking in any flair or story interest, as a result.
Practically any power, with a real world effect, can be deadly if able to directly act upon an enemies grey matter. Even otherwise trivial amounts of energy or matter will do the trick.
That reminds me of the Inheritance series. In that series, magic obeys conservation of energy, which limits what you can do with it, as you have to use the energy available in your own body.
But it takes trivial amounts of energy to sever a couple of nerves and cause instant death. Kind of an OP ability, really.
Never underestimate the power of utility spells, though. In a GURPS Fantasy game, one character used Summon Plant to summon Cnidoscolus stimulosus (bull nettle) inside a knight’s plate armor… let’s just say the knight was highly distracted long enough for the party to get away.
(Cnidosculus is native to my corner of the world. I absolutely loathe the stuff, having had the dubious pleasure of contact with it on several occasions. For those who don’t know, it’s a perennial herb covered with stinging hairs, and is not actually a true nettle. The urticating hairs on this plant contain a caustic irritant that can cause a very painful rash, or worse.)
Or she gains the ability to shapeshift other ppl and gives halo a few more arms.
And the most obvious counter to any such tricks is that, although Halo’s hands serve as her point of contact, it is her mind which is actually the fundamental limit for orb control. She is having to command and activate those powers with her mind.
Having a third or fourth arm is just creating extra flesh, and has no more use, for orb control, than being able to wedge an orb in her butt cleavage. She tried that, and it does not work.
The one real advantage she would gain is that it would be harder to incapacitate her. Lop off one arm, and she can carry on using the surviving ones for orb control. Plus it would free up hands for other activities. Which is a problem she is going to face sooner or later.
Actually, what would really be interesting and cool would be if touching Sydney didnt react in Varia getting ANY powers at all – not because Sydney doesnt have powers (since she already implied that she gets powers when touching anyone), but because Sydney is tied to the orbs, and the orbs are indistinct to this reality and don’t seem to be affected by this reality, even though they can affect this reality.
So… Varia touches Sydney to show her another power she has…. and nothing happens, leading to confusion by Varia, and another ‘Sydney’s orbs are even more unusual than people thought’ by everyone :)
IS Sydney “tied to the orbs”? Perhaps I have forgotten something which established that point, because I’ve been wondering about it again since she put her tube down while visiting the haberdashery. She found them and she uses them – but is it clear that no-one else could use them? Shouldn’t she be more careful about hanging on to them?
She is at the very least tethered to them, as they refuse to allow themselves to be too far away from her. How strong the bond is has yet to be established.
Strong enough to infuriate Max, who is herself uber strong.
Yeah, but Max is pretty easy to infuriate. Just about everybody has managed it so far.
And it’s been shown multiple times that the orbs are simply not affected by stuff from this reality. They arent affected by Maxima’s insane levels of strength (and also apparently the shield isnt as well, which seems to be an emanation OF the orb). It’s not affected by magic, neither human nor succubus magic. It’s not affected by even Dabbler-level super science. Cameras do not pick up the orb’s skill tree. The shield is one of the only things that Harem has found she can’t teleport through. It’s not affected by Vehemic energy(or at least the shield, which is a direct emanation OF an orb, is not affected by vehemic energy). Also now that I think of it, while Vehemence was affected by the ‘bouncing boobies’ …. Sydney was not, even though everyone else was. Even Maxima was a bit.
It just seems… since the orbs are not affected by anything (but can themselves affect other things), and Sydney is tethered/tied to the orbs, and Sydney’s powers come from the orbs, then Varia touching Sydney and getting…. nothing from it… would be both a unique difference of Sydney compared to everyone else, and also be unexpected and NOT cliche.
The skill tree is obviously a psychic proyection, as demonstrated by the fact that dabbler’s bionic eye didn’t catch it. In short, the skill tree isn’t really there, but it’s just a proyection on the mind of those observing it.
About the orbs: their way or working is superimposing reality on a region. They don’t “fight” the existing reality. They directly replace it. That explains why the orbs themselves are unaffected by teh world at large, and why the effects are straight up unbreakable.
You are mixing up two incidents here. Dabbler had no problems seeing the skill tree at all. And specifically was commenting on the succubus and human visual ranges. So was clearly paying very close attention to such things.
Had she been getting different feedback from her cybernetic eye she doubtless would have mentioned it at that point. Likewise she refers to the cameras witnessing this all, and there has been no feedback (such as questions on the business cards to Sydney, or comments by Archon personnel seeing the feed from HQ) that there were problems seeing it.
Every time we see footage of the orbs, and their effects, on TV, they see what we see.*
The incident where Dabbler failed to detect things, was when she did a scan. Her dialogue refers to technical scientific tests. Plus psychic ones. And the graphics are those which we associate with spells. And the overall impression was that she had tried all her techniques.
So am happy to accept that comparing her cybernetic eye input, to her normal vision, is a given. One assumes that she gets her technological feed that way too.
But NOTHING she did allowed her to see runes, inlays, or even detect the light coming from the glowing. Despite the fact that we can clearly see such in close-ups. And that we later know Sydney can too. Because she specifically commented on pushing the embiggener. Likewise pushing things to detect Vehemence’s aura.
I seem to recall Gwen trying to detect things too, and failing. However I could not find that, to link it.
So everyone, in including devices, can see the skill tree. But only Sydney (and possibly Varia now) can see, and presumably use, the controls.
* Although the stuff that we see from Halo’s perspective, when using True Sight, such as Vehemence’s aggro aura, will not be visible to them. Presumably the inlays fall into the same category, if they are “Sydney’s eyes only”.
Yes. she’s tied (tethered) to the orbs. And she’s the only one able to use them, and she can’t go far from them. It would be nice if that means as far as powers go, others trying to touch her to access some sort of power might find it … just doesnt work. It makes it more mysterious, not to mention less fanboy-cliche :)
“And she’s the only one able to use them”
That we don’t know yet.
If others can use them, could she give 3 other teammates a ball or two each, so that all 7 are in use at all times? They’d all need to stand close together, but that’s fine.
“My precious!!!”
+1
I don’t know if it’s been mentioned yet, but I’m curious on what’s gonna happen when she touches Sydney.
My guess would be nothing would happen unless Sydney was also touching an orb. Then again, since the ords seem to be linked to Sydney, maybe nothing would happen no matter what.
Or it causes one of the “Mystery Orbs” make it’s debut! Just throwing that out there.
The ‘mystery orbs’ have been driving me insane, I wanna know!
Congratulations! You are the first person to correctly guess the power of the green mystery orb.
Want to know the power of the brown one?
I will tell you next week.
Psst, actually it is to create cliffhangers, that was just a very short teaser example.
That is so evil…. eeeeeeeeevil :P
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/508906826617119491/
Normals are capable of unlocking her powers.
Right, I don’t understand why people are confused about that, she outright said she potentially has 7 billion powers, aka the current world population, and it has already been made clear that superpowers aren’t remotely that common, certainly not 100% of the population.
Beats me. Must of thought she reeeaaally likes to exaggerate for effect when talking to her buds.
Power of spontaneous swearing sound waves and firebreathing.
I’m wondering if the orbs would start orbiting the both of them.
I’d hope nothing happens if she touches Sydney. Not because Sydney doesnt have powers, since that ‘7 billion’ quote implies that she can touch ANYONE and get powers…but because Sydney is tied to the orbs, which almost don’t seem to exist according to every power so far used to try to detect or affect them. And Sydney is tied to those orbs, so maybe when Varia touches Sydney (regardless of whether she has an orb or not, as long as the orbs aren’t ‘asleep’), her powers don’t activate like they would with ANY other person.
Now there’s a thought. Neither Gwen nor Dabbler could get any kind of read on the orbs when using their powers so it is possible that Xochitl’s power wouldn’t work on them either. Dave could really play off on the anti-climax.
i would say better to have a lame letdown power from Sydney than no power. that could reinforce that Sydney is a regler person but the orbs are what is “super” about her
I am with Pander on this one actually. Although I am good with whatever Dave has planned, which is usually comedy related, so beats any of our ideas.
But this angle would deepen the mystery of the orbs. Varia can use everybody on the planet, except Halo. Plus, story balance wise they are two of the most unbalancing individuals on the team. Yet would get no synergy together. So would only partner up when there was a real need for it. Which would explain why Varia is a minor character in the cast, rather than one of the protagonists. If that is Dave’s intent, mind.
And, of course just because she can’t create a gestalt at the moment, there is no reason why it cannot be unlocked later. Both heroes have evolving powers that will be gaining new capabilities. So it is easy to work in. And then can be a dramatic story point.
Especially if they are in a real cliff-hanger situation, where none of their other capabilities are any use. Knowing they have only seconds before total defeat, but figure out a way to make Sydney visible to Varia’s power.
But what will it be?… dun dun dun.
Varia gains the ability to eat infinitely spicy food once she touches Sydney.
Possibly by touching Sydney with one hand, she can use an orb with the other hand. Which, as long as she isn’t touching Sydney on the hand, would allow them to use a total of three orbs between the two of them.
super Scoville breath! XD
Or maybe super-biohazard projectile vomiting, like in Maxima’s new boot polish incident.
Gotta admit, I’m guilty of the whole name-related-to-powers thing with a few of my old City of Heroes characters. Most grievous was Dr. December, whose real name was…Dr. Henry December. Three guesses what his powers were. Though, to be fair, it’s his own dorky fault for getting into cryobiology with a name like that. Another close contender was Maxine Valencia, AKA Max Violence. Coincidentally, she falls into the “hulk-like” category along with Ren here. And finally there was my one cosmic-level superhero, Adam Kairos AKA Galaxy Mage, who had reality-altering magic. Kairos is a Greek word meaning “the opportune moment” which fits nicely for a man who can bend the flow of time.
I once created a character who could manipulate time. His real name had nothing to do with time or reality but his alias was sort of linked to his powers. He came from an alternate timeline and had visited several others before ending up in the one where our game took place, so he called himself Traveler.
I created a character once on a mush who’s power was being a gravitokinetic. She didnt bother using a codename … because according to her, codenames were for wankers. So she just called herself Tanya, since that’s her name and, as she stated, ‘if someone starts yelling for me as some codename, I probably wouldnt know they were talking to me for a couple of seconds, then boom, you’re dead.’
I would absolutely go for that. If I ever had to go on the run, or operate undercover, I would keep my Christian name. Total give-away if someone speaks to you, by name, and you do not respond! And I have (clinically) serious trouble with names. So it is not a possibility, but a certainty, that I would be caught out otherwise.
Not familiar with that turn of phrase?
MUSH means Multi-User-Shared-Hallucination.
It’s basically a text-based role playing game online that’s largely a shared storyline between different people in different locations. Sort of like an MMORPG, but with only text, no graphics.
Ahh, interesting. Thanks.
Keeping your regularly used name would work well provided it’s reasonably common, if it’s unusual there could be a problem. I know a guy who has sufficiently common first _and_ last names that he could possibly get away with keeping both.
I like the codename used by Monet St. Croix. It’s like she said ‘Look my name is Monet Yvette Clarisse Maria Therese St. Croix’
Then she gets a series of blank stares from people wanting a codename.
Then she says ‘If that’s too much to remember for your pea-brains, just call me Monet’
More blank stares from the peanut gallery
Then Monet would say, ‘Okay, since I’m apparently on a team with people with ADD who can’t even remember MONET…. call me M.’
And so Monet St. Croix’s codename is ‘M’
:)
heh, that’s a funny one. The best part is I could totally see a conversation like that in real life.
Pretty common, yea. I had one lesson with a kid to the right of me, another to the left and one behind us, all with the same name. Bad enough, but our teacher was also cross-eyed! He would turn to us, ask a tough question and then say our name. And we would all look at each other “who is he talking to?”
Not a fun lesson. Especially as he was also the deputy head master. Not to mention also being the guy who wielded the cane, if any pupil, in the school, made a severe infraction. The last teacher you would want to piss off!
Admit it…The four of you sat close together deliberately for the sole purpose of driving your teacher bonkers. ADMIT IT!
In high school (that’d be “secondary school” for some of you), there were two identical twins that would attend the same classes, and sit on opposite sides of the room for the sole purpose of playing ping-pong with the teacher’s head.
They really did seem to share some sort of psychic connection, and instead of simply ending each other’s sentences (as some twins are known to do),
they would…
… actively switch …
… after every…
… two or three …
… words.
… On purpose.
Needless to say, most teachers would quickly rearrange the seating chart to put them right next to each other, thus minimizing the neck strain caused by repeated head swiveling.
So far, I don’t think Syd has *any powers* at all. It think it is 100% the orbs, and they are the ones allowing her to command them at the moment. So far it appears she is the bearer of an item, but has no innate powers of her own at all, no different that Dab’s cyberarm isn’t a “power”, or Peggy’s Barret isn’t a power.
Is this an orphaned reply by the system or…? Otherwise you are simply stating truth that the comic, and most of us, agrees with?
Slight correction, Russell: Sydney’s power is “able to use the orbs”. They seem to be attuned to her in a way that most ‘gear’ isn’t.
If he is using Dab’s cyberarm as an example of “not a power” then that prosthetic is probably somewhat designed specifically for her and attuned to her brains signals. Not to the extent of the orbs but if he doesn’t allow for specially made and bonded/set up prosthetic devices to be seen as any different than a gun or tool then he’s not gonna see Sydney’s orbs as “her” powers. In fact they may be less hers than Dabs arm since Dab made that arm and knows what it can do and all of its safety features while Sydney knows virtually nothing about how the orbs work, what new powers they might posses, and if they will suddenly decide to leave her for some preprogrammed reason or maybe even a decision made by their advanced artificial intelligence. They could be alive and or self willed. She may know more if the true discovery story comes out but right now we can’t assume that.
In Champions terms, Sydney’s orbs are an OIF (Obvious Inaccessible Focus). That is to say that it’s Obvious where her powers originate, they are Inaccessible for trying to take them away from her & the orbs themselves are the Focus through which she uses her powers.
Lets see. Sydney’s orbs cannot be used by anyone else, can’t leave her vicinity and do not scan as having power by an means. My thought is that the power is in Sydney and that the orbs themselves are just imaginary. She does not know what two of them do, but maybe she hasn’t _decided_ what they do.
In Champions terms: obvious inaccessible foci.
She hasn’t undergone testing so some of that is not confirmed in comic and in some cases even out of it.
We really don’t know if no one else can use them.
Perhaps she will decide they make more orbs.
So many questions:
Is it a coincidence that all the powers Varia has so far displayed are copies of other characters we’ve seen? First Harem, then Max, then Dabbler (I think)…
Would it matter which iteration of Harem she touched?
Would touching a non-super give her powers? What if it was a superhero who was only super due to fancy gadgets (e.g. Batman, Iron Man) or magical artifacts (e.g. Halo)?
Can she control this or does it happen no matter what when she touches someone? What if her boyfriend (or girlfriend, I don’t know how she swings) causes her to develop Human Torch-like powers?
Are the powers one-to-one with the person? I.e. if she touches the same person more than once, will it always produce the same powers or is it random every time?
If she touches 2+ people at once, does she get multiple powers? (Group hug!)
She did say and I quote “Each person I touch acts like a key and unlocks my powah in a different way” so I assume she gets a power from norms.
If she touches He-Man, she can shout “I Have The Powah!”
Actually, I think the second manifestation of power looked more akin to “Body of Steel”, than a duplicate of Maxima and the 3rd manifestation looked like she would be able to meld with electronics more than anything else..
And I agree with Average Joe… “7 billion powers” would mean a different manifestation for each person she touched, regardless of any inate power.
Those weren’t electronics – that’s her powerkey skill-chart, it says so in the text below. Point on the 7 billion thing. Though that makes me think maybe it’s genetic in nature? In which case – what about identical twins?
Ooh, interesting. And highly workable. If we are to run with your idea, forget Dabbler, that is clearly Jiggawatt, in her lightning form. The way I see it is that Varia is permanently copying other supers power sets (yes, yes, I know she says “nope” but bear with me).
These then form a pool of possible powers that Varia has at her disposal. The trick being that she cannot pick and choose which ones to access. The only way she can manifest one of her powers (or sets) is to touch and activate her power. If that person is a super, she gains their power, into her pool. And then spontaneously manifests one of the powers from her pool.
If that person does not have a power then it simply does the latter part. So it looks like Varia is gaining a power from them, even though it is just manifesting one she already has. She might not realise this though, because it is only picking and choosing part of a set, and it also changes the appearance of the power too.
So touching Vance unlocks Maxima’s super tough skin (but tinted silvery blue, rather than her normal gold). But, because it does that every time, it has the appearance of being a consistently granted gestalt power. Touching Sydney might grant the ability to stretch limbs, like Mr Amorphous. However the slight morphing of the original power might flavour it strongly enough that it is not immediately recognisable.
Or possibly the modification could be significant. The variable body changing of Mr Amorphous becoming a very specific shapechange into a Velociraptor, as an example. Which would explain why she does not properly understand how it works.
Further concealed by the fact that, even though supers are rare, she might have shaken hands with a few in the years before her powers manifested in adolescence. Her parents, for example, if they are supers too. Which would have allowed her to build up her pool, and helping to disguise what was actually happening.
On one paw Harem granting teleportation could just be luck. Teleportation got added to the pool and then picked. But, on the other paw, if she is not teleporting, then it could just be an earlier power manifesting. Possibly using one of Dabbler’s powers. There are many options for her, but let us just go with illusion.
Here’s another fun (though probably wrong) theory – she adopts the powers of the person who last had – um, relations with the person she touches. With Harem, she got, well, Harem’s power, but then Harem’s one of the only one who could do it with herselves (and not in the normal way…) With Ren, well if that’s Dabbler’s power, nobody would be surprised, given her promiscuous nature (she’d probably end up getting Dabbler a lot, just statistically speaking). Though there’s nothing saying Jiggawatt couldn’t have a little fun on the side. The most shocking implication if this were the case would be that something’s going on between Vance and Max. We know admittedly very little about him, but it wouldn’t surprise me that any person in a relationship with someone like Max would clearly not be the dominant member of the pair, which fits his sort of sheepishness somewhat. So if the person she touches is a virgin, it might do nothing at all. (Do we know if Sydney is? She seems kind of shy and adorably awkward around the boys, so it would make sense…)
So she would be like an inverse dragon? Instead of arriving in a remote village, and demanding:
Varia would be all:
By natural disaster, or super villain activity, of course.
You just had to remind me of a “filk” song, didn’t you, Yorp?
A dragon has come to our village today.
We’ve asked him to leave, but he won’t go away.
Now he’s talked to our king and they worked out a deal.
No homes will he burn and no crops will he steal.
Now there is but one catch, we dislike it a bunch.
Twice a year he invites him a virgin to lunch.
Well, we’ve no other choice, so the deal we’ll respect.
But we can’t help but wonder and pause to reflect.
Chorus
Do virgins taste better than those who are not?
Are they salty, or sweeter, more juicy or what?
Do you savor them slowly? Gulp them down on the spot?
Do virgins taste better than those who are not?
Now we’d like to be shed you, and many have tried.
But no one can get through your thick scaly hide.
We hope that some day, some brave knight will come by.
‘Cause we can’t wait around ’til you’re too fat to fly.
Now you have such good taste in your women for sure,
They always are pretty, they always are pure.
But your notion of dining, it makes us all flinch,
For your favorite entree is barbecued wench.
(Chorus)
Now we’ve found a solution, it works out so neat,
If you insist on nothing but virgins to eat.
No more will our number ever grow small,
We’ll simply make sure we’ve no virgins at all!
(Chorus)
*licks lips*
Well hopefully I’ll run into you Saturday at AKon.
Watch out when you are crossing the car park DaveB! If you hear a revving engine and see a speeding car, it could be a black op vehicle!
That would be “cah pahk”.
So… when is someone going to mention to Varia there is an extremely high likelihood that she will “unlock” a set of powers without the necessary safety features (like and internal solar furnace and not the heat resistance) and drop dead on the spot? Or just turn into an iron/rock/gaseous form AND DIE. That kind of massive physiological flexibility can and should go off the rails pretty badly in any slightly realistic treatment of powers…
Shortly after that someone should point out she might be able to unlock enough “Sydney-ness” on contact to seize control of the orbs.
You’re speaking in definites about something that cannot be spoken about in definites. Maybe part of her power is the creation of those safe guards. The nature of a gestalt power is that it is very likely the power grows as a natural extension of her base strength, meaning her body would evolve to match.
Any slightly realistic treatment of a fantasy comic would require a drastically open minded approach, and pretty much zero assumptions.
That it’s automatically safe is the gross assumption :). Its basically as absurd as calling the X-men Angel’s powers a “mutation” when he gets wings AND a full suite of physiological adaptations to breath at high speed. There’s NOTHING random about that – its clearly an engineered package.
If you’re unlocking a bunch of engineered packages instead of (semi-)random mimicry, you’d better start asking where that intelligent design comes from… So far her abilities look like intelligent design – that should be scarier than “I touch a new person, I might die…” if you really think about it :).
Checking out power combinations for safety and either reducing the power of a nodes input or eliminating it from the chain (debugging mode?) sounds like a “required secondary power” feature we’ve seen before like Harem having just enough of some kind of psychic ability to tell if her teleports “landing site” is safe and make adjustments/abort.
Kind of explains why she got Harem’s teleport but not her clone ability. Varia probably didn’t have enough “nodes” (powerset components, super gene structures whatever) to do both safely. (if she has enough nodes to do both powers but not some required secondary powers for them then maybe that power is abandoned or altered to something similar but safe… )
Much like Syd- So. Many. Questions.
I hope this is not perceived as rude, but since DaveB often mentions leaving people out of Who’s Who, either to explain it, or wondering if he should…. I’m rather wondering if the Cast page may be updated soonish? I’ve been reading this for awhile, and seen plenty of additions, including the spoiler section of Sydney, with some good descriptions of characters that have had little screen time, or speaking time.
I feel it is a little unfair to some of the more recently introduced people that are getting a lot of exposition in the comic but not being added to the cast.
And on a somewhat related note (though with that ridiculous brawl that just happened and the vastly underestimated number of supers around, this would be a chore), will there be any Villians added to the cast?
P.S. I do realize comicing is a lot of work and I do love the comic and pacing he goes at. It is also very impressive and appreciated of always being on schedule, which must take a large amount of time, in addition to the votey incentives.
The more shiny monies he gets from the comic the more he can do things like hire colorists for more and more days to help save time. He got the colorist to free up a few days a month? so he could catch up on some things though I no longer know what he mentioned.
There is a wiki that people started but then everybody lost interest apparently.
https://grrl-power.wikia.com/wiki/Grrl_Power_Wiki
Folks who care could update said wiki and beg DaveB to put a big flashy link somewhere near the comment section for it so people would be encouraged to start dumping info into it. But you would probably want to get the cast page in it updated a bit so that Dave would take you seriously.
If successful it would take some pressure off Dave and he could concentrate on only updating things pertaining to the main cast.
Anyway, just some suggestions since you seem to care.
Oh wow, now there is a coincidence!
Did anyone else think Vance was a girl? Cause I thought he was a girl this whole time.
He was topless in his first strip, so it’s pretty clear he’s a dude. He does admittedly look pretty effeminate though.
I totally forgot he has shown up before. I was with KC, I assumed he was a girl from his face the last couple strips.
Though with his shirt and having shrunk a bit in the art a ways back in the shooting range arc I wasn’t entirely sure he/she was the same character till it was confirmed.
Yes, everybody thought he was a girl. Until they read comments to the contrary, or the author’s blog linking back to his topless shirt first appearance. If anybody thought to the contrary, I did not spot them speaking up about it.
Hence his upgraded macho appearance, this comic, to dispel any false impressions.
I was on the fence and then I read the authors blog. (it helps that I am sent back to the archives all the time for various kinds of “proof” for my statements.) He was drawn so differently this time round only his hair and the fact the first one was a pretty boy linked them all that well.
I was not certain if he was the same person but i didn’t think he was a girl at first and was even thinking ‘is this the guy that was on the shirtless picture’ I didn’t felt need to state it out though and I guess those who were thinking like me didn’t felt to mention it either since it was confirmed by author later in comments.
Vance is a dude, who’s powerset is: Anime Magic Girl
If you like magical Girl Neil, you might want to try Kittyhawk’s Sparkling Generation Valkyrie Yuuki. It’s somewhat Norse themed.
Does she have to remain in contact with them for it to work?
Does it work with anyone or just other supers?
Possibly. I suspect not. Simply because that would be awkward to draw, for the rest of her career. Even if it is a strong balance for having access to so many powers. The most obvious alternative being that she retains the one power set until she touches someone else.
We deduce everyone, from the seven billion figure. Possibly the power level might be proportionate to the person granting it. So her Maxima gestalt could be of penumbrate strength. But a normal person might only grant from one to three star powers. Peggy would grant three star power. Whereas a traffic cop might just grant the one.
A toddler or geriatric pensioner might not grant a power sufficiently strong to rate as combat worthy. But, if you are entertaining in the nursery, being able to conjure up butterflies would be a useful power, nonetheless. And, if you had to evacuate it, from a gunman, a cloud of butterflies can provide useful cover!
Sydney could keep her star rating. Her ability to command the orbs is a significant power in itself. But, even without that, she is capable of defeating super heroes with her tongue fu, has super ADHD thinking and eats pure capsaicin like it was candy!
From a gameplay-perspective, Varia seems like a really cool concept. But from a literary perspective it seems like she could be a nightmare- it effectively doubles the number of interesting and unique variations on special powers that you need to come up with.
Not necessarily, as she is only a minor cast member, as opposed to one of the protagonists. So she only need appear whilst she is useful to the story. And her powers will be only those available from the people in the vicinity.
Further Dave need only grant her such powers as he feels will not cause story problems. He has plenty of tanks, flyers, blasters, scrappers and so has a whole bunch of powers like that he can give her, without it being too intrusive.
Every unique or very useful one she has though does compound the problems you are talking about though. But those can be limited by those being unlocked from various people outside of Archon. With the really problematic ones being villain gestalts.
One thing has leapt out to me as providing a long term problem though. If she can truly teleport (even if only with Harem’s assistance), then Archon now has two characters who can provide instant reserve capability, to anybody who has a smart phone to call for help.
Harem can only bring her extra bodies, slight super strength and provide equipment (over and above her teleporting). But Varia does have a lot of more powerful abilities at her fingertips. Which means, minor character or not, you are correct in saying she is a potential story problem. Anywhere with phone reception.
This is bob.
He has no special powers.
No useful abilities or skills.
Touching him let’s Varia turn into an omniscient super being.
Welcome to the team, Bob.
who, once she becomes that omniscient super-being becomes a non-functional member of the team because she’s simply TOO godlike that our “petty” and “simple” problems don’t manifest as anything for her to worry about much less react to anymore, she instead sits on the floor and contemplates the whichness of the whatness, and how many angels can dance on the head of a pin…
Sorry Bob, but YOU’RE the Weakest Link, collect your last week’s paycheck in HR, and don’t bother to report to Archon tomorrow…
Bob: I’m so sorry…
HR: Hey, totally not your fault. Just one of those things. We didn’t blame Jonathan when she grew into a giant with a glowing blue penis, which we only knew about because she stopped “caring” about things like clothes… , so we certainly aren’t going to blame you for this. Good luck out there.
*door closes*
HR: Seriously, why do all the amazing god-like powers seem to come with crazy complexes? India managed to get that blue guy with the multiple arms. He seems pretty normal… well, he does after all we’ve been through…………
So that’s why Dabbler was grinning all weekend… more than usual.
Ofcourse, once she lets go of his hand, or otherwise stops touching him, she loses that power. Sorry Bob, you aint going anywhere.
So… Like a female Dr. Manhattan? Though if you’re going to have her be just obliviously nude all the time, this comic might go in a very different direction…
And I shall not complain.
Varia, Dabbler and Bob would then be like God, the Devil, and Bob.
Dave, you named the “adrenaline surge” guy Adrian, Ren for short. I thought you were using that trope.
I think the shadows worked well on this page. I think part of what was throwing us last time was the way the orbs light up Halo’s and interplay with the indoor light.
Light up Halo’s head, I mean.
So, DaveB, the part many moons ago where Zephan said Sydney has more powers than anyone else on the team except Dabbler, are you going to be retconning that, or is there some explanation as to why this girl doesn’t count? Because something like this has just rendered Sydney’s suite of powers completely insignificant.
At any given moment Varia only has one power. And even with planning its looking like she may only have one power maybe with required secondary powers at a time.
Sydney has access to 5-7 powers (with greatly adjustable toggle controls) at any give moment and can use two of those choices simultaneously. And just for the fun of it lets throw in she can use the extra’s as glow lights and bonk stuff with them. (really need to test that for telekinetic strength) So that’s 2 more minor powers right there! ;D
In a practical sense Sydney has more powers the team can use available whenever and where ever she is asked to produce them. (barring mittens… )
Its kind of a point of view thing and since it was Zephan saying it I guess it can be his point of view not Dave’s. As Zephan sees Varia in action and gaining experience at switching powers handily maybe he will change his mind.
In addition to the points Observer makes, do bear in mind that Veria is not on the team yet. She did not even qualify to go to the team dinner. And is still an untested recruit. So she may simply not have sprung to mind, when Zephan was talking.
Plus his mind always goes to dark places. He is probably expecting Varia’s next power, that she manifests, to be the ability to summon the Great Old Ones, and bring on the next apocalypse. So his thought may have been framed in terms of ‘Sydney could help to counter the Varia problem.’ Without spelling it out loud, as he clearly keeps his darkest fears to himself.
I’d be nervous about her in combat ops. Let’s say she touches foo, gets the flying brick package, yoinks a villain into the air, and the villain punches her, replacing her powers with pyrokenesis, handy but not something to keep you flying.
Or she gets the basic Achilles package and winds up wrestling with a hyper-strong villain who replaces that indestructability with flight…
I would keep her out of risky situations with dynamic, unknown variables.
Yeah, if she can’t chose when touches activate her or not then she would have to do the ninja-rogue thing and sneak attack while others block and distract them, recalibrate for the new power (or tag a team mate), sneak back in.
Alternatively she could wear a touch blocking suit and do mostly back-up, shielder or blaster if she can snag one. (suit would have to be darn tough to stay intact if she is in basic “tank” mode if the power doesn’t prevent skin contact) Say she could get Harem’s teleport, put her gloves back on and start ferrying things for the group while Harem is now free to bring more of her selves to bear in the fight or help a squad in a completely different part of the country.
Dave has an eye for practical details. And Varia has grown up with this powah. If she knew that it flipped anyone touched her, she would already be wearing polo-kneck jumpers and the like. Assuming that blocking bare skin made any difference one way or the other.
Best guess, it works when Varha touches someone else, but not vice versa. Either that or she does have conscious control over who to pick.
But, the complications if those are not the case are interesting. It would definitely relegate her to the ranks of support. Which could also explain why Halo is considered more useful than her, when assessing roles for the front line.
Her powah may be working just her touching not being touched by others and since she mentioned her powah before she wants to shake Sydneys hand it means she can2t control it but there is no danger to either party either.
The simplest explanation (and easiest literary device) would be that she has conscious control over her power, meaning, she has to touch someone intentionally as well as activate her gestalt power with a mental command component.
Ineed. Although Greenstalker makes a very good point, which implies that might not be the case.
She didn’t want to touch Sydney even though she wanted to do a demonstration later. It kind of suggests that when she doesn’t already have a power she gets one from touching someone else automatically or why not touch Sydney’s hand? However, its still possible that she can dump a power immediately after getting it or can choose to “lock it” in place and then be able to touch people cause she is already actively expressing a power.
It is not quite as clear cut as you are implying (when purely restricted to our observations to date, as opposed to general speculation). The act of shaking hands requires both parties to extend their hands and grasp each other. As such Varia would be choosing to touch Sydney, so those rules would apply.
If that is the case, she might develop a ‘handshake’ that involves holding out her hand, and letting others do the grasping and shaking. But that would come across as weird, so it is understandable that she prefers just to avoid it.
With guys, of course, she can do the ‘extending her hand to allow them to kiss it’ trick. And, for those who felt comfortable with it, the girls could do the same. Although the practice might be viewed frostily in traditional military circles. At least she has saluting to fall back on.
Well having to “shake on it” is cute and is better than her having to keep holding hands with them all through trying to accomplish something.
Now that I think about it, while the only two “natural” supers (I’m assuming Max and Harem were born that way through genetics but that’s not really a given either… ) to have much info on their childhoods (both wog and in comic) indicated they manifested them in childhood sometime, it hasn’t been locked down that natural supers have a set range of years to manifest powers.
It also hasn’t been said for sure which of the team supers are some kind of genetic expression or natural human phenomenon and which are caused by interference of some kind (magic curse/spell, avatar’s, shaman’s, symbiotes, artifacts etc… ). Since you can interfere with an infant ALL human supers could be from some kind of “interference”.
So we don’t really know if she is a “natural” super and if she is we don’t know, for sure, if she could have manifested powers later on in her development than usual.
That said, mostly for the sake of argument since who’s gonna check this close to comic time, the feel from Max and Harem’s stories is that natural manifestation starts young though not necessarily at full power.
It is worth remembering the implications of this page, on incidence of supers, and this one on evolution when considering Varia’s comments about genetics.
Until evidence to the contrary I will take it as that her “activation zone” is only her palms, like Sydney.
Yea.
There is a reasonable rationale too. It is probably the mind which is the vital part. The touch is just the conduit. Humans are used to manipulating the world with their hands. As such a big proportion of the brain is devoted to analysing and controlling them. So it is understandable that various powers might require taking advantage of that evolutionary focus.
Use the dedicated brain hardware, for target designation, and the more easily re-purposed cognitive parts of the mind are then freed up, for the complex aspects of using the power.
Some powers will be too inherently difficult to be distracted by adjusting for range, elevation, target movement, the user’s movement and all the other variables that come into play when eye-balling a more distant target.
I, personally, wouldn’t want Varia’s power. The reason? You never really know what will happen when you touch somebody new, or several somebody’s. What if her next power is to explode like a multi-megaton nuclear bomb? Or to become a zombie and start the apocalypse? Or to become death by touch, so the power can never change, because people die before she can absorb a new power? No, the potential for catastrophe is written all over this power. It would make for some powerful story writing, though.
I have been told why this would be scary in real life and I guess I can agree with that. In comic though we can assume, if she is to be kept on the team past testing (it might make interesting writing if she couldn’t be), that she has some required secondary power(s) that keeps her power from being unsafe and uncontrollable just like Harem has so she doesn’t teleport into a rock or well, there are lots of crazy things about Jiggawatts teleporting so must be a butt load of RSP’s making that work out OK.
Narrator: And now for our guest commenter for this week, Forrest Gump.
Forrest: Varia is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.
Narator: Thank you Forrest. Here is a nice box of chocolates for your trouble. And by the way, do you see that little label inside the lid of the box?
Forrest: Uh, yeah?
Narrator: It tells you what all the individual pieces have inside them. So now you don’t have to worry.
Forrest: Thanks, I never noticed that before. Can I meet the nice gold lady now? She’s awful purty. Is she in the army like lieutenant Dan?
O.B. Juan always had a way of explaining things so I could understand them.
+1
Gods balls, this is not bad. I was a little resistant to reading this comic because my brother likes it, but you have some serious talent. I don’t say this often, but, not bad. You have impressed me.
Welcome to the community. Feel free to think of us as your extended family. And we all are seriously impressed with DaveB’s abilities too.
Mind you he does cheat, because he is using Halo’s diaries, and debriefing reports, to aid the writing. But a good biographer is still to be appreciated. And his art is superb too!
And … The List !
We have not seen The List in what a whole 12 hours of comic time.
But it is always there.
I guess it would be about that long. Normally I keep my eye on Tubey, rather than the list. Now that you have drawn my attention to it though, it does feel like months since we last saw it!
Thanks for joining us. Can I borrow $20?
So if she touches Halo…. does she pick up super speed or ADHD?
If she gets ADHD from touching Sydney, she officially has the suckiest power EVER.
Super ADHD and autism combined! All of the possible advantages, of both, but with the disadvantages blown away completely.
Enhanced time perception like Ren, but able to take in (understanding and remembering), everything that even slightly impinges on the senses. Such as picking out the face of the person beyond the corner at the end of the street, reflected in a shop window. Or clearly hear subvocalization.
And able to intuitively piece together the inter-relationships of everything you notice, from the subtlest of clues. A hesitant meeting of eyes, from across the street. A hint of a dialect. Accurately gauging the most likely correlations.
You have all the time to mull the implications of what you see, without the risk of appearing distracted to others. Nor any difficulty understanding emotions or social situations. The super ADHD completely reversing that aspect of autism. And the super autism allowing you to take in far more than any normal person could sense.
You would be a combination of Sherlock Holmes, with aspects of Neo from the Matrix and topped off with capabilities like Stephen Wiltshire! The latter is a guy who pretty much already has a super power, as far as I am concerned.
@ Yesterday’s comic
White people’s names can mean things, but it’s usually the last name. For example, today I remarked “Oh, ‘Vador,’ like Darth Vader.” They responded “You’re the first person who got that!” I was pretty darn surprised.
Okay – maybe not the best example, but it explains some of the frivolity in our naming conventions…
If a character was called Max Raith what would you think of any potential powers?
Ability to be a ghost in the machine?
In a real world + super powers setting, absolutely nothing. Not unless I knew the person doing the naming to have some kind of pun addiction or seriously flawed tactical understanding.
But, in a situation where public relationships and showmanship are more important than secrecy and mis-direction, then…. mmm….
My top thought would be a play on wraith too. So would be wary of insubstantiality, flight power/ life/ emotion draining and all the usual undead and necromantic associated nastiness. Powers of darkness. Plus the possibility that dying is a minor inconvenience or simply a lifestyle choice. Sense of boding and doom might auger these abilities.
Maximum rage is a possibility too though. Berserker strength, endurance, regeneration. Spiky pointy things seem to be in vogue nowadays. Physique might give clues to these powers.
Least dangerous would be a mercenary type character. Not to be underestimated, with the right technology, weapons and training mind. If equipment points to such, assume at least special opps capability, with the backup of Q from Bond. And expect that he can pull off all the usual s**t that Hollywood action heroes can get away with.
Thanks. No power reveal, but most of that fits the intention. It’s an alias he adopts.
I admit that I haven’t read every post in this thread but has anyone else thought that “Random Power Girl” could be potentially the most dangerous person on the planet. I mean think about it. Unless she immediately and innately understands the new power she’s inherited by touching somone new she’s like a living A-bomb or worse. For example she touches random guy, which gives her Black Bolts sonic powers. Not knowing the extent of her new power she says hello and blows away half the city. That’s just 1 example. It’s extreme, but with 7 billion possibilities how many would be more dangerous to have than usefull?
Yup. Several folks. But Dave does not normally swing that way. So, unless he has a specific story arc in mind, which plays on that, I would imagine that she has some kind of safety feature. Such as gaining a basic understanding of the nature of the power. Without being obliged to activate it.
That is just an example mechanism. But it would still allow her to get very dangerous powahs. So some individuals would effectively be useless as a gestalt for her. Unless she needs a doomsday option, for some reason.
Calling it now:
Varia will one day use her power to ‘out’ a shapeshifter.
Good call. She certainly has that as a bonus power!
Put me down for the other options.
Disguised ninja, someone concealed by illusion, mindswapped individual, somebody suffering from possession, robotic replacement, evil twin, alternate self from another world or dimension, clone, nanite construct, magical simulacrum or just the plain and simple lookalike. You know, the usual.
I will avoid the ‘or other impostor’ as that is just a cop-out, not a call.
Actually, if her power is not directly related to the person touched, it might not ‘out’ the touched person at all. Heck, even if she gained shapeshifting, that would just mean the person touched has some genetic code/psychic resonance that triggers shapeshifting in Varia, not that they have that power.
You missed the implication. An impostor is a threat because they can pose as someone you are familiar with. But, if Varia tries to gestalt with someone to get, say, teleportation (which she always gets from that familiar person), but instead gets anything else, then she knows it is not Harem but an impostor.
Once she can eliminate other reasons anyhow. But her suspicions would be instantly aroused. And if Archon suspected an impostor was trying to infiltrate them, she is the go to girl to check all personnel and unmask the villain.
She cannot pull that trick on anyone who’s gestalt pairing with her she does not know already though.
And, of course, if the pairings do not produce consistent predictable results then the technique would not be of any use. However I doubt that to be the case. Varia seemed to know what to expect from each of them.
Ah, yes, now I see. I was thinking, ‘generic shapeshifter in a crowd’, not ‘someone posing as Arianna’. That makes more sense.
As for consistency… I did toy around with the possibility that since powers aren’t purely genetic in origin, her ability might match as much to a person’s psyche or soul as much as their body. In that case, while the ‘match’ would be fairly consistent short-term, a sufficient change in personality over time might cause at least an alteration of the gestalt.
FREX:
Tom Jones just got out of college, where he graduated suma cum laude, has four job offers ahead of him, and is engaged to his high school sweetheart. He grew up in a happy home, has a wide body of friends, and has a gentle, confident faith in the inherent goodness of the universe. Varia touches Tom and discovers that she gains the power to heal injuries, When touching Tom, she can send out gentle, iridescent waves of light that cause bones to mend, wounds to heal, and pain to ease. They even induce a low-level euphoria in the target, simply because most of us have a number of minor aches and pains we ignore, but this power eliminates them all, causing the subject to feel better than they have in years.
Fast-forward a few years.
Tom’s wife got addicted to gambling, and when she couldn’t pay for the bets she made on the ponies, their young son was kidnapped and held hostage. Due to a tragic sequence of events, the son and wife both died. Tom, consumed by rage and grief, shot the kidnapper on the courthouse steps when the scumbag got off on a technicality. After that, he fell into a cycle of alcoholism that lost him his circle of friends and his job. In short, Tom’s seen some messed-up $#!^, and his outlook on life has changed accordingly; he is bitter, cynical and nihilistic. Varia touches him again, and instead of being able to heal others, she finds that she incredible personal healing powers. But they aren’t pleasant–injuries close up with an almost searing heat and leave a disfiguring scar, poisons and infections are driven out through the pores in an acrid, noxious sweat, and just don’t ask about tumors; it isn’t pretty.
The power would still be on the same ‘branch’–Tom’s gestalt power is healing, still, which is something set by his genetics. But it’s turned dark and inward, to better reflect his psyche.
Note: To be clear, this is all just complete speculation, with no real basis in our canon, other than not being forbidden by it at this point in time.
My favorite example of the name connecting to powers was the Marvel villain Johnny Ohnn, a.k.a. The Spot!
A thought has occurred to me, and I have to ask: how well does Ren stack up against Math in martial arts? Because it sounds like he basically has superhumanly fast reflexes–that, or he gets bullet time, so he can take the time to make decisions and think about things that would normally be split-second decisions. Either one would seem extremely useful in a hand-to-hand fight.
So who wins, and why? And how much work would the other have to do to overcome that problem?
Ren has time to come up with several possible solutions and choose the best one he can in most fights. But he only has so much fighting experience (unknown but not anywhere near Math’s martial art experience… ) and his decision could be wrong. His strength boost might increase his speed but I’m not sure actual super speed is his thing so while he can think, react MUCH faster than any norm (and faster than Math yes) and has some speed boost from extra strength he might not be a true speedster when it comes time to make use of his reaction/thought speed boost.
Math has been trained since birth by masters from a long line of masters in how to make the first fight decision THE RIGHT DECISION as close to every time as they could beat into him. Math has been trained to react as fast and then move as fast and efficiently as a base human can. Math claims, and his performance seem to back it up, to be able to think many moves ahead of his opponent. If he knows what Ren is going to do enough moves in advance he can negate much if not all of his advantage.
If Ren is smart enough to find a way to coax Math to train him this advantage will greatly erode over the years spent together. Once trained up a bit he would make the perfect sparring partner for Math. Whether or not he has a chance to beat him now really depends on how much fighting experience he already has and how long that boost power of his lasts at a time…
“Math has been trained since birth by masters from a long line of masters”
I don’t remember that being stated. He do claims to be a descendant of martial artists (in a hard to believe way). They likely must have trained him thought.
We mostly only have things Math has “claimed” are true for his back-ground but both Max’s exposition and in comic fights have so far shown he can put his kung-fu where his mouth is.
“Math claims to be the 999th in a line of martial artists, which seems ridiculous unless you assume both parents of every generation in his tree were martial artists.”
Yeah, I had to assume and extrapolate a bit. At least we have something on Math to extrapolate from… Ren is a pretty blank sheet of paper yet. It was fun to try. *shrugs*
If you ever read or watch Bleach there was a guy who was poisoned with a similar effect to Rens only it was at millions time faster and he got stuck in his own world becuase his body couldn’t keep up with his thought processing speed.
I am going to take the cop-out route on answering this. Ren would need five star reflexes to have a realistic chance of beating Math. This is because Math is rated as four star reflexes himself! On top of which his martial arts are five star.
The way the star ratings work is that anyone with a higher rating than you is out of your league. Assuming the powers can oppose one another, of course. If Ren is a four star reflexes, but still higher than Math, then he is in the running. But has to maneuver the situation to ensure that he can apply his speed in such a way that he can act without fear of a martial arts counter-move.
But that will be very hard, as a five star martial artist is way better at tactics than him.
I would advise Ren to break from combat and evade. Then use superior speed to conduct reconnaissance, as quietly as possible, whilst keeping out of sight to the best of his capability. Awaiting a moment to catch Math off guard. And assume that he will not easily fall for any manufactured diversion. And bear in mind that he can fight better than Ren even blindfolded. So picking a noisy moment would be vital too.
I would still put the money on Math. But if Ren is a higher five star reflexes than Math is at martial arts, then the odds are much more favourable. Especially using tactics like the above. Ren would be able to strike before even Math’s muscle reflex trained responses could kick in. However their powers would be in the same ball-park, so Math could use a tactic to overcome that.
So I would still advise trying to blindside him.
Throwing a car at him, at lightning speed, when he is looking the other way, has a good chance of a clean kill. If shadows, or noise, do not give it away.
If Varia gets a different power from each person, and from supers with metahuman-type powers she MAY get their power, is it based on genetics? If so, would touching identical twins (raised in the same environment, without retrovirus infections) cause the same power? What about Harem’s copies? If they’ve had different experiences they could have different DNA just from the “switches” that exist on some genes and different exposure to carcinogens and mutagens, let alone retroviral infections. If this isn’t the case, what defines it? Personality? Does she have a zero-point pseudo telepathy/empathy that decides it? In that case, would someone with multiple personalities give different powers? What about someone like Sydney off their meds v. on them, as that changes brain chemistry? Or someone pre- and post- lobotomy or brain damage?
And finally… What happens when she touches a crazy nonhuman, like dabbler? And are all her powers metahuman in nature, as opposed to knowledge-based like magic or skill-based like Math or Peggy? That’s all I’ve got. I’d love to hear other fan theories, and I hope I didn’t accidentally spoilers!
Read the comments, already lots of theories about all your questions.
All that change DNA mostly locally. One of the hard corners of Genetic Engineering is that is really hard to change the whole DNA of a grown up body.
But you made me think about what would happen if she touches a human chimera.
Agreed, that would be fascinating. But local mutations in whatever tissue she contacts could also affect things! /stands by her points
Varia also has a passive resistance to most environmental hazards, and can move through liquids easily if she touches someone with a gravity power.
If her power works by contact with a power (and in lieu of that, the person who can use said power), and that also extended to natural phenomenon and environmental hazards that were not created by super powers…
possibly. And only possibly. The problem being that she does not gain like for like. If she were a straight copycat (and assuming the above provisos apply) she could simply copy the hazard (let us say lava), as if it were a super-power, and, in the process, gain the required secondary power immunity to heat.
The fact that she can gain ‘sets’ in addition to single powers does support this (see her Who’s Who below). So I am happy to take that as a given.
Much as I love to run with interesting ideas like this though, there are real problems beyond this point.
Firstly she is not a copycat. If she is lucky she might gain lava immunity. But she is equally likely to gain ‘project lightning’ or ‘create illusionary double’. Which, when up to the waist in lava, is not very helpful!
Even worse though, what she actually gains is a gestalt power. And needs a person to do that, not a power. We believe that to be the case, because she can have seven billion powers. Ie matching the population of the planet. Which also means she can gestalt with non-powered humans.
So it is people that are important to her, not powers.
I think the joke went over your head.
*looks up*
Nope can’t see it up there. Not even a hint of it. Must be really really high!
I would assume whatever she’s wearing is a Varia suit.
Ahh, consider me enlightened.
Although not all hope is lost. Our picking over individual words and turns of phrase might not turn out to correctly reflect her power. So wait and see on the non-powered individuals situation, next comic.
And there is one strong possibility for the powers. They might be a modified version of the parter’s power. Ooh ooh, and it may be that the gestalt creates some sort of averaged out power, based on those available to the gestalt!
Possibly this is similar to someone else’s idea above, but re-phrased. If so, my apologies. But I think this is coming from a slightly different angle.
Varia (no power active) + Ren (super reflexes + super strength) = Shapechange into Velociraptor
Veria (Velociraptor) + Harem (teleport *) = Walk through walls (what every Velociraptor wants to do)
But Varia then does a headslam onto the desk to reset to no power.
Varia (no power active) + Harem (teleport*) = Teleport (there is only the one power, so the average is teleport)
Varia (teleport) + Vance (unknown) = Metal body
Varia (metal body) + Ren (lightning reflexes + super strength) = Lightning powers **
Headsmash reset to walk through lava.
Varia (no power active) + lava (fire/heat) = Fire/heat. With the customary immunity to the same, for free.
All this assuming that the seven billion figure is just a red herring of course. But Varia might just not be that good at maths (or may just have used a casual turn of phrase).
* We ignore her duplicate ability because that is not a separate power. It is a power stunt she developed with her teleport, not a separate power. And the telepathy is a side-effect of that, not a power either. Not for this purpose.
** Lightning is conducted easily through metal, it is very fast and has massive strength. I have seen chimneys blown off roofs, a number of times just from lightning (the rubble after the event, that is).
Actually per WOG is the other way around, her teleporting is a side effect of make a duplicate anywhere else than right next to her.
I just remembered the cast page:
“Harem can teleport, but unlike most teleporters, she doesn’t have to ‘destroy’ the original in order to reappear at another location, effectively creating duplicates”
What I said is DaveB’s account of the character’s creation, but it seems that the GrrlPowerverse’s canon is as what you said. Never mind.
ACTUALLY … Telford Porter is just an allias used by Vanisher… we STILL don’t know his ACTUAL name and he came out in the SECOND EVER ISSUE OF THE X-MEN COMICS! (Circa November, 1963). SO that could just be him being really cheeky and funny.
Okay, so a potential downside of Varia’s power occurs to me–environmental damage. This is a particular risk if her power shuts off as soon as she breaks contact.
Let’s assume for now that she gets the necessary immunities for a given power (so, she gets the ability to shoot flames from her hands, and is thus immune to heat/fire).
Now, she starts pumping out a nice, hot jetstream of flame–but then loses contact with her gestaltmate. The powers go away, meaning the flames stop projecting–but the air around her hand is still at several hundred degrees Fahrenheit. Can you say “air baked”?
Unless they don’t go away until she picks a new power.
Or they don’t go away for a set period of time (provided she doesnt touch someone else before then)
Or the amount of time that she has the power is inversely proportional to the difficulty of the power – ie, like Black Alice – gaining superstrength is very straightforward, so she can hold onto it for quite a while, being able to control magnetism is moderately difficult, so she can only hold onto it for a moderate period of time, being able to cast magic spells or alter probability is very complex, so she can only hold onto it for a very short period of time
I included those in my ‘if’ statement. If she retains powers, or aspects thereof for a period after letting the power go, she can evade the environmental side-effects, assuming she departs or the effects dissipate before the power wears off.
Agreed. If Varia is as she appears to be at the moment, a human,* who only has the one power ** then she is too squishy, in a super fight, if she does not have control over when she gains and looses those powers. Unless she has extra features, such as the ones Pander lists.
* A very fit one, as for any super.
** Regardless of the fact that it can manifest as a set of powers, given that they all come and go together, as one.
I’m not sure you can bring that degree of reason into super fights. I mean, Peggy contributed to the last one, and her super power is the ability to pull a trigger. No reason beyond comic convention that they don’t have hundreds of Peggy equivalents in any fight they get into. If belief can stretch far enough to cover the badass normal it can stretch far enough to cover a gestalt hero.
I mean, Cyclops is ultimately a dude with a gun strapped to his face. He still gets to be in the X men, I can buy Varia as a member of the gang despite her squishy status.
Actually I am in agreeance with you. But there is also more to it than that. And something that would support your case even more. In that this is a light-hearted comedy comic, and DaveB specifically does not want the doom and gloom anxt-ridden downers you get with many modern comics.
But, the flipside of it is that (whilst keeping a number of the tropes which he finds useful) is trying to ground the comic in as realistic a setting as he can. This is why Sydney has just been fitted with armour that is on the far side of cutting edge. Dave wants the heroes to have enough of an advantage that they can realistically survive a dangerous situation.
In particular, where possible, he likes to avoid readers feeling that characters survived only ‘because the script said so’. Cyclops is a classic glass cannon. In any vaguely realistic setting he should have died. And probably sooner rather than later. I am an X-Man fan. But it does require a lot of suspension of disbelief.
Oddly enough, your example, Peggy, is actually a human who does realistically have a better chance of survival than Cyclops. His offence is so dangerous that he makes himself a prime target. Yet he has not better capability, to either soak up or avoid damage, than she does. Except the script saying that he can block all attacks with his laser beam… yeaa… right…. moving on.
Whereas Peggy does do is behave like any sensible glass cannon should. She uses sniper protocols of concealment and evasion. Not to mention getting as far away from the action as possible, whilst still remaining effective.
Look through the cast list. Heatwave is the only combat member, other than Peggy, who can be described as being a glass cannon (but, even then, has got flight, which does have defensive uses, and her heat aura likewise). Teleporters can evade attacks. And the rest all have dedicated defensive powers.
The one hero who suffered a possibly permanent injury in the battle royale? Heatwave.
Peggy is a soldier. The military expects losses. And handles them by replacing the fallen.. But Varia is irreplaceable. Literally. If her powerset does not give her a reasonable survival prospect, in the front line, Archon they cannot afford to place her there.
I think heatwave can denature bullets before they reach her to reduce impact. They certainly won’t be armor-piercing by the time they reach her, but a headshot might still be fatal. Knives are hardier than bullets, but thinking about it, it probably shouldn’t have been as sharp as normal. Maybe it wasn’t, and that’s the reason it only went partway into her foot (he threw it pretty fast). I’m also slightly confused at how sometimes Cyclops’ beam shoves things and other times it cuts through them?
It’s a kinetic beam, rather than a laser. If it’s narrow enough, it cuts like a razor; if it’s wider, it’s blunt impact.
As a complete side-note, in Marvel Puzzle Quest (a match-three app based on the Marvel Comic Universe), Cyclops has three powers–two are variant forms of the eye-beams, while the third is rallying the troops by color-swapping some of the tiles. His pose when using this power has him looking back over his shoulder at the player. I have thus dubbed him Captain Tightpants, because seriously, you can tell he has no tush-acne.
Actually, this comment (and DaveB’s commentary below that comic) basically rule out Heatwave being able to melt bullets. She’ll still need the Kevlar + Oobtek.
My guess is the power is key-ed to the person she touches. If she touches a meta human, she keys a power. If she touches a normal human, she keys something less spectacular. For instance, she touched Vance, she became Colossus like. She touches Sydney she may gain the ability to eat chili without flatulence.
Yea, I suggested something similar, but not quite that extreme. I very much doubt Varia would have looked so smiley, when boasting about her seven billion power possibilities, if most of them we of a strength level barely above the ‘silly boy powers’ that had just irritated Halo so much.
There is good flavour reasons for there being no association between the gestalt partner’s power level and her resultant power. But story balance wise, it is a statistical nightmare. She would have a lot of potential powers AND a lot of chances to have a powerful version too.
She need just keep touching people to gradually find Magneto level magnetic control, Proffessor X level telepathy, and so on, down the lst. Given that it looks like she can summon Harem, by a smart phone call, to grant her gestalt teleportation, she could likewise contact her powerful civilian partner of choice (for any given crisis) teleport to them, and grab the power.
For low-level powers that is not a huge issue, as she would then loose the teleportation (and Harem is not powerful enough to carry her back). So she would then have to use other means to get back to the action.
But five star telepathy? She can probably use it no matter how far away the action is. Likewise a whole bunch of other capabilities. Plus she would not have the need to expose her squishy body to the risk of combat!
So, yea, some kind of limit for power from mundane people is probably wise. But taking it as far as you are suggesting pretty much equates to her having no power from normal people. For most combat situations that she is likely to find herself in, anyhow.
…I have a bunch of superhero characters.
Two of them have the last name Porter, and have powers that are somehow related to teleporting.
Most everyone else has the same sorts of puns.
Was one of them a mad scientist? Porter Potty.
I know what you’re doing, bad dog! You’re trying to get a ‘brown orb’ joke in here!
Regarding Maximas naming: With her golden skin her name makes perfect sense – If she already had it at birth, her parents might have changed their minds on naming her.
Maximilian was a popular name for (German) kings, “maximus” – latin for “the great” is usually a title for a leader, so it is a name connected to being outstanding.
And after all – nomen est omen…
And now I kind of want to see a minicomic of Maxima growing up… we already saw her teenage self once… Her brother probably did not ever pull that prank again.
So, I did the math and found out that she can have up to 3 people at once with 3478 people to choose from, 4 with 1140 people, 5 with 387 people, 6 with 195 people, 7 with 123, 8 with 89, 9 with 71, or 10 with 60. This is of course assuming I understood what was presented. There is also the possibility of 374167 people with 2 to choose from, which means that there is at least that many supers with powers on that earth thus making a police force necessary.
You might want to check out Varia’s comment in the final panel. Where she refers to having seven billion powers to choose from. If we give fullest weight to her conclusion, then it contradicts the maths.
However, it is not unreasonable to make calculations on what is actually observed, and the deductions drawn from that, rather than dialogue. What she says might be misleading, for a variety of reasons.
Hope she don’t touch the orbs, don’t wanna know what will happen.
I wanna know. I wanna know! (even though it will be absolutely nothing I still like to know stuff… )
Her power circuit board looks a lot like the sphere grid from FFX.
Doop, someone already noticed that, my bad.
Here’s something I noticed from the previous strip; Varia warns Syndey about the effects of a handshake…does that mean these transformations are involuntary? You’d kind of expect her to be like the X-Man, Rogue, and wear glove all the time to avoid accidental skin contact, especially with strangers. You never know when you’re going to transform into plasma or a pillar of plutonium.
It is a possibility.
My guess though is that it requires Varia to touch someone (as opposed to someone touching her). And probably intentionally too. Although, given the comedic potential, that is … optional.
Shaking hands would qualify as Varia touching someone. There is no difference between that and holding hands, as she is doing above. So would trigger the power.
Arc-SWAT would not employ someone with a dangerously uncontrollable power. Arianna would be miffed, at the bad publicity, if Varia accidentally irradiated, and killed, all the kids in a school, because a pupil bumped into her!
Regarding coincidental names: It’s called nominative determinism, and it does happen in real life (according to New Scientist).
For example, Doctors A. J. Splatt and D. Weedon published an article on incontinence in a journal of urology.
By the way, although folks have not been so vocal about it, congratulations and thanks for restoring the art to the familiar style. And I am particularly impressed with panel 5. I know that metallic skins can be a lot trickier to pull off than folks appreciate. Yet Varia looks superb there.