Grrl Power #433 – The bubble bus
Yes, Sydney has a rebreather now, but it was designed with one person in mind, not four. As Gwen pitches, there may be significant development in this area if the team decides they need it.
The problem with being cagey about what city they’re based in is that whenever I list a city they have to travel to get to, it’s easy to cross if off the list of potential home bases. New York would probably make for a poor location anyway, as would anything on either coast if the team has to serve the whole country. Ideally, there would be at least two active branches, one for each coast, and eventually that’s the plan. Really you’d want one near all the major population clusters, but the scarcity of supers makes that impractical at the moment.
I had trouble deciding what clothes to put Sydney in since she’ll be wearing this gear for a good number of pages in this arc. Part of me wanted her wearing some other superhero shirt as that comprises a fair bit of her wardrobe, but Arianna will get on her case about that now that she has her own personal brand to build. I decided to return her to the white and yellow scheme she was in for the first ~300 pages. Instead of a Wonder Woman-ish pattern though, she’s debuting her official logo. It’s hard to see here but you’ll get a better look at it in upcoming pages obviously. Each team member has one, but Maxima is definitely not down with Arc-SWAT wearing “costumes” so they’re hard to spot in the wild. Really the logo is mostly for marketing purposes, but it only works as branding if they’re occasionally worn by the team members. Sydney’s ideal for this as she clearly has no issue wearing a superhero logo shirt, and especially if it’s her own logo.
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Question: how long was Maxi sitting in that chair watching Sydney sleep? :eek:
the click would suggest she just entered soooo 5 seconds? how long is panel transition?
No, that’s simply when she turned on the lights, how long was she sitting there in the dark watching?
There has been a fair amount of discussion about flight characteristics and solving the air problem… but how does she actually pick people up? If the shield is air tight and rigid, then it would theoretically cut right through people and surfaces in its path when formed. Since we have not seen her flying with hunks of ground or freshly de-legged teammates this must not be the case.
It could be A: The shield does not close through objects. Others could just step up into it as it surrounds their ankles. Shield closes after the foot has left its path. This also means if Sydney is on the ground she is vulnerable to attack from below.
B: It becomes semipermeable to object in its path. Allows the shield to pass through objects without damaging them while maintaining full protection. Allies can still step up into the barrier and not lose their feet.
I’m going with ‘everyone stand as close together as you can, and jump up in 3, 2, 1, now!’
Ohh, I see what you mean, though. Trying to recall any instances of Sydney forming the bubble on the ground, and then flying or engaging in a lot of movement, as opposed to minor shifts within the bubble.
Back when they were beating up the poor tank, it does form a sphere even underground as she picked up a good bit of dirt as well. If Sydney could form her sphere around something other than herself she could easily be the best at subduing supers form the sphere wait ten min or so for air to run out zipcuff the unconscious perp.
She has suddenly put the shield up & caught 1 of the Harems inside no problems or damage. Perhaps if they’re not entirely inside the orb, it pulls them in to complete their protection…?
And with the tank going boom, her shield caught the sand being launched at her, so she still got a bit sand-blasted, but not by ALL the sand going her way, just what was inside at the time. During the demonstration & seemingly while they were testing her shield, the bubble did go underground without lifting it, tho neither time she tried flying away…
It seems more to me that if Sydney first raises the shield with someone else inside of it, then starts to fly, the shield will form itself into spherical shape as she rises up; with someone else inside, the shield automatically forms just at ground-surface level, but still under a passenger’s feet, thereby keeping them inside.
re Tank-sand-pickup: I beg to differ ;-)
Sydney was already flying when she activated her shield, so it couldn’t be a cut-out chunk of ground.
I always interpreted that pile of sand on the bottom of the bubble as whatever flying sand was trapped inside the bubble/hitting Sydney the instant shield went up.
In the close-up of Sydney’s hand switches orbs, you can already see bits of sand flying around her. Once the shield went up, that couldn’t fall back down to earth, instead puddling at the bottom much like our passengers do in this strip.
As for shields-up on ground level: I still have no idea if it continues underground or not. Has there been word-of-God on this?
Here’s a few links with data-points, but I can’t decide in which direction they point:
The first instance that comes to my mind is hyperactivity bonus vs. backstab, with Nega-Knuckles at the restaurant.
In one shot there, you can see his feet touching the ground, but there’s no shield-bottom he’s standing on. Also: he appears out of a shadow-puddle on the floor, so I think we can dismiss a flat, floor-hugging bottom under her feet.
Another instance would be the hero-move when she trapped Kevin’s aggro-aura. It seems the aura is ground-hugging but doesn’t pass under the shield.
a few pages later, Maxima’s tectonic uppercut drags up the ground, except where Sydney’s bubble “protects” it. I don’t know if it is because the (protected) ground is inside the underground-part of the bubble, or because some magic bubble-floor prevents the (unprotected) ground underneath it from moving up.
(Dave, a small compliment to you for the excellent page-titles in the archive listing. That always makes it a breeze to locate supporting comics :-) )
That is correct: the sand at the bottom of the bubble was the flying sand that got caught when she activated the bubble (remember, she was buried headfirst in it)
actually i think that the field uses kinetic energy so when someone hits it the same force is thrown back at them which fits that she can stop maxima’s force and if it is kinetic energy then it makes sense that the shield moving into people would mean a negative kinetic energy allowing them to pass right through.
Just a thought
also sorry if you see this twice i accidentally put it in the wrong thread
I suspect it’s attention dependent – if she focuses on making sure something is inside the shield, it is with no quirks. If she’s not paying full attention, accidents may happen.
Option C: When it forms, it has a leading edge that will push things out of the way as it proceeds. You jump or you get tripped. If you are really good (ala Math) you can just step up as it forms.
or simply forms under your feet as it goes becoming the floor…
We actually see the embiggened shield being lowered in the reverse of that manner, which implies the opposite is true too. Just that raising the shield needs to happen fast! If looking at it carefully, we might see individual panes in the shield appearing (each triangular section is a pane). Ren woujld probably see that even those actually appeared in a gradual fashion, starting at one end and almost instantly expanding to create the full pane.
Which would push objects out the way as you say. However I don’t think the shield does the tripping thing. Rather it will push under their feet, raisng the passengers up off the ground, without them needing to jump. Folks who are not expecting that sensation (or being lifted up if the flyball is also being used) may loose their balance and fall. But I do not think that is intrinsic to the operation of the shield.
Like other aspects of the orbs it responds to Halo’s intentions. We have seen that it forms smaller in more confined areas, for example. And becomes streamlined when Sydney wants to fly fast. Likewise with picking up passengers (unless it is funny to do it another way, but again that can be responding to Sydney’s desires, so all is good).
Finally it must do the same thing every time it forms under Sydney, when she is standing on the ground, but never see her doign a hop
Wouldnt Sydney be able to increase her air supply for multiple people by just ’embiggening’ the shield?
Bigger shield = more air that can be in the shield = longer time before CO2 buildup.
Possibly – the surface area of the sphere has two issues then. One, assuming the sphere is not frictionless, that will cause drag, slowing Sydney down. Two, she still has to displace the air in front of her as she moves, which also limits her top speed downwards.
If she makes the sphere large to begin with and then shrinks it downwards, then we run into potential problems with nitrogen narcosis. Assuming less than 3 atmospheric pressure, the risk is minimal, but we’ve no evidence the sphere can exert inward force (resisting external force implies it should, but that’s making a big assumption). And Sydney would need to add some form of very durable pressure gauge to her utility belt.
DaveB’s put some nice limitations on Sydney to keep from too Uber – besides, that’s Maxima’s shtick. Never steo on someone else’s shtick.
“Step”, not “steo”.
My point is that so far, the spheres seem to ignore physics. Why wouldn’t the fly orb also ignore physics, since it’s already ignoring a BIG thing in physics – gravity. Maybe the speed is consistent no matter what. The only reason she puts a shield up when flying fast is for HER safety, not for anything dealing with speed.
Yes.
Because they should only ignore physics for the things that they were designed to do. If the user can adapt those uses to do more then fine. But if inconvenient things, like air resistance, and shock waves (that could have devastating effects*), are hand-waved away, without providing a good reason, then it will reduce readers’ suspension of disbelief.
Take it too far and you end up with a device that perform miracles on demand. Prior to that readers would be able to try and guess what cunning solution the hero will come up with, given their known constraints and limitations. After that tipping point, it becomes “oh this will just be solved with a hand-wave”, and readership will drop off proportionate to the disappointment felt.
Now if one of the upgrades is “eliminate air resistance” then that is fair game. Which, in the meanwhile, allows Dave to entertain us with thoughts of needing a flying couch, that needs to periodically stop (say at any convenient pub) in order to “freshen the air”.
… *staggers off, with a tray of drinks balanced on head*
Ish yous shure isht ish my round? Hic. Err… feelingsh woosy we mighsht need to pusht a vomit bag on the coush.
* A shield as big as we saw enclosing the entire press corps, travelling at Mach 4 with no aerodynamics,** would be far worse than any aircraft we have ever made.
** However we have seen that when Sydney flies really fast, her shield does become more aerodynamic. It is reasonable that this could happen with the embiggened shield too. If it does, then this is a fair solution, which still keeps some limits (no going to mach speeds in urban environments or suffer the wrath of folks with broken windows), but does not require breaking any universal laws.
One other option is possible. That the shield forms a hemisphere on the ground (or a full sphere that passes through the ground, but then I fail to see how she can walk around, if it is embedded in the soil) but only forms a sphere (or ovoid) when Sydney is also using the fly ball. Possibly, when she has passengers, it actually lifts them all up, and forms the shield underneath them.
In which case it is closer to Zanack‘s proposal. Although actually starting to form under the feet is a perfectly sensible solution too.
I think that the shield still forms to the ground ( or floor ) and forms up as she flies up. Allowing her to gather people around her in the shield. After all during the fight at the restaurant she walked around fighting and covering her team she is afterall a gamer and they don’t stand still. ( campers are not gamers.)
i think it still forms up but is not substantial in the ground unless she wills it that way. that or it may be an upgrade she still has empty spots for that sphere in her skill tree..
I agree with this. The orbs seem to be very user-friendly and safety-oriented. The shield probably forms in such a way to limit collateral damage, both to allies and the environment. It’s possible that Syndey could WILL the shield to portal-cut stuff, but require extra concentration, much like accessing the higher-damage PPO.
The best option seems to be to assume the shield is a two-dimensional barrier, with no actual thickness of its own. Thus, it will pass through even the microscopic space between boots and the ground. And I do believe it forms ‘flat’ when she’s close to the ground.
Consider for a moment her initial display of what it can do:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/526
She’s not flying there–it’s the only orb she’s holding. And I refuse to believe that she has the agility needed to stand on a spherical interior while bending over and smacking her own tush for taunting effect. So she’s almost certainly standing on a flat surface–either the bubble flattens on the floor, or it passes through the floor and into the room below.
If the latter, then it would be highly likely that the floor would’ve been damaged by the sphere. I suppose it’s possible that so long as she doesn’t move, it could just pass through solid objects without effect when first forming, but it doesn’t seem likely to work that way.
So, the easiest and most straightforward solution–when she’s on the ground, it morphs flat, passing under anyone standing within the radius. (It would be interesting to see how it handles, say, a signpost sunk into the ground, especially one built to be ‘anchored’ in some way, like a cross-bar that would be difficult to just sink the field around.) Then, when she goes airborne, it reforms into a bubble. Landing presumably reverses the process, because otherwise there’s no way our author would’ve passed up the comedy opportunity of showing at least one of the passengers falling on their asses when she ‘pops’ the bubble close to the ground while they’re all still sitting on the curved bits.
Also, I suspect that the field is frictionless, given the way the folks inside are sitting (note Harem using Dabbler’s head as a support to keep herself from sliding to the center with the other two). This could have some interesting side-effects of its own, if a later skill-tree slot lets her shape the field more precisely. I’m seeing Scooby-Doo hijinks as she takes the ground out from under some baddie.
Maybe not completely frictionless, but certainly close, like wet river rocks. I thought of the flat / morphic bottom after the post, didn’t bother to edit. The thought of it morphing to blades of grass and making little spikes to sit on for someone inside makes me giggle.
i like your idea that it is a flat base when on the ground as you see it that way in several pull back scenes like the last panel here
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1311 and here
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1380 or panel 2 here
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1386
but i also figure it is still a non substantial lower orb below the ground as she flies up it forms a solid on contact with the air ( i suspect ) closing into the sphere it is. it this is the case any inside as she lifts off are picked up with her and the ground is left where it is. and yes i see the hole about their shoes stopping the shield generation. however it is not earth and not nature so it is hefted inside.
Note that in the restaurant (like in the board room), the ‘ground’ is just a floor. So ‘natural/manufactured’ wouldn’t be the deciding factor of whether or not the shield is solid. That pushes it again to a flat-bottomed dome.
Clearly,we need some scenes where these basics are tested, Dave!
Harem’s not on this page – that’s Gwen resting on Dabbler’s head.
Thanks for the correction, there–I tend to assume any character I don’t immediately recognize is a Harem clone. I should probably pay more attention to the sidebar….
Sydney now has her own official logo. It is a ‘HALOGO”. (copyright pending)
Lots of suggestions involving vehicles and harnesses… Since she’d only be doing *long distance* travel like this in a planned capacity (most panic flights would likely only require a relatively short hop–well within the 600km range she just demonstrated), why not just have all her passengers carry SCBA gear? A single tank, standard civilian setup is good for ~45 minutes, and weights less than 30kg.
That is woefully inefficient for anything but rapid unplanned relocation.
(ie: gtfo’ing)
I wonder how long Sydney was able to suppress a squeal of delight (or similar reaction) at having her own superhero logo on a t-shirt?
Each bubble ‘passenger’ could wear a small O2 tank with an air scrubber/ rebreather for travel over longer distances. Using Nitrox would extend the breathing times even further providing that Syd stayed at lower altitudes.
Altitude doesn’t matter air doesn’t permeate it so the atmosphere inside the bubble is at the same pressure as when she closed it up.
I think the point Professor Fate was alluding to was what would happen when they reached the end of the air scrubbing/rebreathing limit, whilst at high altitude. If they were at too high an altitude they might not get down to a safe height before suffering toxic effects.
So they would then have to weigh that against the risks involved in opening a sea-level pressure bubble to the cold and thin upper atmosphere. With all the nasty things, that would imply, such as sudden decompression, hypothermia and altitude sickness.
I may not have been paying attention in class but did they ever say how much weight Halo can lift and fly with in the first place?
Nothing specific that I’m aware of. But we’ve seen in this page that she can carry at least a few hundred pounds. I’m certain this is towards the low end though. I’ll wager she could handle a ton or two.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/2023
Per Maxima, 15 to 16 tons.
There may be no correlation between how much the tentacle can lift, and how much Sydney can carry in her shield. They are different powers. Notably the former is only rated at three stars, whereas the latter is a full five stars. Also bear in mind that each star is akin to a jump in order of magnitude, over the previous one. So those two powers are not even in sight of the same ball park as each other.
However the defense rating is not measuring the same thing as the telekinesis, so it is possible that the carrying capacity works out the way you suggest.
16 tons is the lift weight of the lighthook, not of how much Sydney can carry while flying with the fly+shield orbs
Well Maxima was punching it with a few tonnes of force so it could probably take at least that much constant weight.
Plus that wee nuclear-like explosion. It probably carried quite a lot of force with the shock wave.
Plus the shield withstood two Maxima blasts, one which was direct and one which was practically a nuclear annhilation. And each time, Sydney doesnt feel any actual difference to the shield. She can feel that there is ‘a’ force being hit upon it, but the most powerful force doesnt seem any different than the force of the foam that hit her shield.
assuming Syd is saying sub sonic to save everyone’s ears shes still twice as fast as osprey so assuming that the shield negates G forces and allows her to accelerate rapidly without turning herself or her friends into paste even stopping for 1 min every 7-8 shes still faster. but yes some sort of custom seating a air scrubber would be more ideal
The flight orb protects her from acceleration G forces but not necessarily the people in her shield. They may slide up the circle as she accelerates.
I doubt the G-forces will affect them. The shield seems to protect the people inside from EVERYTHING dangerous from the outside. I’m assuming that will also mean G-forces since it seems to also protect from extreme heat, extreme light, extreme sound, any and all gases, including oxygen, all kinetic force, all non-kinetic force, and magic. I’m also assuming since it protects against electromagnetism and (assuming Maxima’s energy bolt operates on one of the two nuclear forces), nuclear forces, then it should also work on gravitational forces and just have its own consistent gravity WITHIN the shield. Seems odd if someone then said it does all that ‘but it doesnt protect against G-forces.
I agree, but not for the reasons you said. G-forces are not an external thing, they are internal. If you change your path (by whatever means) it is that which is causing the force on your internal organs. They want to remain at rest (or moving in a straight line)** but you have introduced a force which is changing that. You need not even be in the vicinity of a planet, in order to experience such.
So I do not think the shield will help at all. However the Fly Ball might. Possibly only for Halo mind, as we have not seen any evidence (yet) of it affecting others, in the same way as it does Sydney. Currently passengers have to sit or stand on the bottom of the shield. Unlike Halo who hovers in the middle.
Maybe it just hasn’t occurred to Sydney yet. She has after all figured out that she can carry them the way we see, and it may not have crossed her mind, at this stage, that the orb could grant a ‘group fly’. It is certainly not something she would have been able to test in the previous months of owning the orb. And she has been rather busy of late, so that revelation may not hit her for a while.
Testing it though, may find that the Fly Ball only controls gravity and inertia** for Sydney. In which case she could use the latter (but not the former) to keep herself safe from g-forces. But it could potentially provide inertial dampening for everything in the orb. Perhaps by using one of the skill points.
By the way, I have no problem with the combined powers of the shield and Fly Ball creating a distinct pocket universe, which remains safe and comfortable for its inhabitants. Being able to observe the outside world but not be affected by it beyond that. Perhaps indeed that is precisely what it is doing. But we are just examining the clues as we find them.
* This is where gravity can come into it and compound any problems being experienced.
** The properties demonstrated so far do not clearly fall neatly in either camp. Although most of its effects seem to be gravity control. But some subtle ones would also need some influence over inertia too.
Sydney’s logo is Quake 2?
Seems appropriate. Although Syd’s FPS skills seem to be slightly subpar. More of a strategic thinker.
Sydney’s t-shirt has a custom printed version of her choker symbol.
THANK YOU! Knew that logo was familiar
If this hadn’t been mentioned before, wouldn’t the air supply last longer if they would only stop talking? Some basic advanced mathematics could have figured out how much air a sphere could hold, and how quickly that air get;s used up per person.
They could have modeled this on a computer first before taking a chance on a long distance flight.
Thats true but remember the shield isnt exactly a perfect seal. It lets in and out differing levels of light and sound, it doesnt crush her with air pressure if she alters the size of it while keeping it up, etc etc etc. They cant be sure how it reacts to multiple people going for a ride until they actually do it.
I think the reason it doesnt crush her with air pressure is because it has its own internal air pressure, gravity, temperature, etc, based on whatever it was before the shield was raised.
That is a reasonable assumption. Possibly it is creating nice fresh air all the time too, which would give us a clue as to the nature of the orb creators. If they did not expel carbon dioxide as part of their metabolic process, then the orb would not be designed to filter that out. Hence why Sydney originally became woozy and the detectors went off above.
But do note that Sydney flies in the middle of the shield, whereas everyone else is on the floor. So it is not a clean-cut separate environment, with its own rules, if that is the case. But it may be that Halo has some control over it, yet simply does not realise that at this time.
they could have also used bigger bubble, like the one used in the desert.
that could limit her max speed, but she is already limiting herself to the first gear.
A passenger to Sydney: “You’re gonna need a bigger bubble.”
She could carry several people with the Lighthook (TM) and have no worries about air (though turbulence might be a factor, heh).
Most of the people durable enough to put up with the air slapping them in the face at a few hundred mph can fly under their own power. Everyone else would likely be suffering badly in short order.
Helmets
With horns to help them cut through the air better!
Anvil, Achilles and Stalwart are all non-flyers that I expect would be able to withstand several km/h of wind speed. Everyone else is going to have a bad time at even sub-mach speeds.
Not to mention Sydney herself can’t handle mach speeds without the shield up.
How big is the shield bubble? Based on an 8 minute alarm and assuming 1000 ppm is what triggers the alarm, with 4 people breathing I calculate around 10 feet in diameter, which looks approximately correct based on the picture.
1000 ppm is very conservative though, you can go to 2000 ppm for short times with little ill effect. That would increase the time by 2.5x.
Increasing the shield radius by 1 foot increases the volume by 73%, and probably doesn’t affect flight speed all that much (the shield is still perfectly spherical and we know it deforms at high speed to be more aerodynamic).
So they should be able to get at least half an hour with a small increase in shield size. Going to a 7 ft radius would give them almost an hour.
While reading this page I was wondering: why couldn’t she embiggen the shield bubble like she did when she fit all the crowd to allow Maxima to showcase her explodey powers?
Likewise. It certainly would carry easily enough air. So would be well worth testing to see how it impacted her flight performance (if she can even fly in embiggened mode, it is possible that she may not be able to).
The big problem is that she would be displacing a vast volume of air in front of the big sphere. Far more than nice streamlined airliners. So would be pushing out a big wake in front of the speeding bubble. One far more destructive than that created by conventional aircraft.
So perhaps best to save such testing for when they are in more remote areas, and can be sure that there are no civilian, or other aircraft at risk. Nor any environmentally sensitive spots, for that matter. It could play havoc with all sorts of wildlife, for example.
In the big fight scene someone did the math there too and she shouldn’t have run low for an hour or more even if she was breathing hard.
So something in her shield uses up oxygen or produces carbon dioxide.
The people inside mostly. ;P
I’m going to vote on Dave just not doing the math right on air calculations. Stuff happens.
We can always blame it on the super-metabolisms, using more life support than normal. Ooh, which would only be Dabbler. All the others are mundane folks who have gained extra capabilities, by spells or artifacts.
Being military derived, the passengers would all have been issued CO2 re-breathers, and a emergency parachute. Because their transport is ADD and Shit Happens.
They had a CO2 alarm and Maxima flying backup very, very attentively. Plenty enough safety for a test flight.
this was only a test anyway, with no… expected, distractions anyway
pretty sure on real mission they would probably have prepared properly.
Yea, Maxima can move faster than a speeding bullet, so grabbing them would be simple.
Of course being grabbed by someone moving faster than a speeding bullet is like being shot by a big hand-shaped bullet, but hey.
But yeah as IHeartComics was saying, if she made her shield even half as big as it was for the press demo, they should have enough air to make Berlin or anywhere on earth really.
But she could move to each one, give them a gentle push, then move on to the next at least once a second and juggle the two or three needed until they are on the ground (dunno how long she can stay at max speed).
Indefinitely. Or until Maxima needs to swap her stats around for some reason. Maxima is always super fast OR super tough OR super strong etc.
Plus even her minimums are still pretty powerful, regardless of how much she has diverted out of an attribute. Only when Maxima is faced with a top tier threat, like Vehemence, does she find herself operating under restrictions which limit her ease of swapping them around.
Max could easily carry all of them with her minimum strength, for example.
To use Hero System terms…
We haven’t any evidence either way so far that Maxima’s Powers are Reduced Endurance or even Zero Endurance. They could use Endurance but her Recovery may be so high that burning through her Endurance takes a while. Prolonged use of her abilities could tire her out, but we have no evidence either way so far (at least, that I recall).
Given what have seen, I suspect Yorp is right, however.
Maxima is far more capable than that. She would only need to move as fast as was required. People perform midair maneuvering safely every day, when parachuting. Grabbing hold of each other, and getting into formations.
Maxima simply dos not have to slowly approach. She can move up faster than the eye can follow, and smoothly slow down to match their relative velocity. Then just pick them up, automatically protecting them with her forcefield in the process. At which point Max can make bullet-fast manuevers, and pull 20 G turns, and they will be as protected as she is herself.
There are reasons why Maxima is rated as the most powerful known super in the world.*
* Including Vehemence, unless he manages to find a way to build up his Vehemic energy to silly levels.
actually i think that the field uses kinetic energy so when someone hits it the same force is thrown back at them which fits that she can stop maxima’s force and if it is kinetic energy then it makes sense that the shield moving into people would mean a negative kinetic energy allowing them to pass right through.
Just a thought
Dat Panel 2 view though… damn, Max. Hope you don’t sit like that all the time in front of people. Because wow… what a view.
She’s wearing pants. It’s no more a “view” than when a guy sits like this. Get your mind out of the gutter.
Humans have such odd social conventions, dictating who can sit in what way.
So, She can travel at mach 4 and transport that number of people for 8 minutes, How far can she potentially travel in that time frame? I know she has to accelerate, but we never really covered how long it takes her to hit her fastest speed.
There is no perceptible acceleration, so she could potentially go from 0-Mach 4 in less time than it
takestook Schumacher to reach 100kphThink of the Merchandising opportunity. The Halo Transport Set. The base set is just a flat disk with a couple of chairs. The Emergency Transport could have four narrow cots set up as bunks on each side for moving injured, EMT action figure optional. The Executive Transport with the circular couch, cup holders, and central communications console.
Arianna would insist on the plan. She could market Halo, and do it in ways that would limit her need to actually talk to anybody.
You know that as soon as a member designs his/her(/its?) utility belt, Arianna will have reproductions (with varying degrees of accuracy) available for purchase. Well, also after the six-month moratorium. And Maxima will probably want to keep as many of the details about everyone’s utility belts as classified as possible.
Unrelated subject (can’t think of a better time to ask this) – when someone Maxima says something on someone’s bingo sheet, does everyone get to cross it off, or only the people who were present to hear it, or only the one who made her say it? And how much do she, Arianna, and other higher-up authority figures know about the whole thing (presumably turning a blind eye if they do)?
Bingo rules are that each player is responsible for hearing and marking off their own score sheet. I would say that if someone was present, when a phrase was called out, they could mark it off their sheet, regardless of who got her to say it. We can see that Dabbler and Halo have some overlap in their sheets for instance.
The only alternative is to risk endless arguments over who, in a conversation, managed to get Max to say something.
Unless the competition has very strict rules. Prohibiting a second member from trying to score, in a particular conversation, if someone else in the pool has already made a play. But that just feels too restrictive and formalised for Dabbler to have signed up to it.
It would not surprise me if Arianna did not have her own bingo card! If General Faulk found out though, protocol would probably dictate that he should take action. As such a competition would be undermining Maxima’s authority. And both Dabbler and Harem’s infractions may have been exasperated by the lack of respect it engenders.
However it does have its uses in bringing the team together. And Max is clearly confident in her own command and ability to keep the trouble-makers in line. So either, or both, Maxima and General Faulk may well be aware of the bingo and, as you intimate, are just keeping a blind eye. If they are not officially aware of it, they would not be obliged to act.
Why is it Gwen wearing tights only on the last panel?
I think thats more shadow from the sun setting.
Looks like fishnets when you zoom in a bit. Small mistake, should be easy for Dave to fix when he has the time.
Considering the coloring difference of the background in panels 4 + 6 would make it seem like it is quite a bit later (probably after several “jumps”), giving credence to Traab’s explanation.
Perhaps there was an “oops” incident, in between those panels? Gwen looked pretty frightened to start with.
She are also moving East which is towards the sunset.
She wore fishnets on the page #429.
Lets talk cost effectiveness here. I fully support setting up a couch system of some sort for transport, but the air scrubber thing, would it be cheaper to build one into the seating, or to just give everyone a portable rebreather instead? Both would drastically improve the time they can stay in transit. However, building one into the seating means a large piece of gear they have to keep track of, while a rebreather like sydney has isnt exactly hard to leave strapped to your back.
Though lets be fair here, she needs all of a second on land to open the shield and grab fresh air. An 8 minute hop at the speeds she can travel at isnt exactly terrible. She cant cross oceans but she could easily go coast to coast with minimal frustration. Swoop down, pop the shield, reapply, and go go go. If she was doing it every minute then yeah, that would be tedious and annoying, but 8 minutes? Thats acceptable imo. We just need that seat setup. Im sure they could design it to sit securely at the bottom of the bubble but rise up enough so there is room for everyone to sit flat instead of sloping.
Love the little touch of Pixel being on her phone the entire time!
I think it’s a 3DS, you can see Dabbler playing it in the last panel.
And the look Pixel has in the last panel, Dabbles is possibly using one of her extra arms to keep Pixel away :P
Mmm, yea, Dabbler does always have her invisible arms to play with. But, looking at Pixel’s body language (crossed arms being the most obvious), it does not seem to be the case. That is speaking that it is Pixel’s choice to keep the distance between them. It does not look to me like she is struggling to get her toy back.
Back of the Envelope (Excel Sheet) Calculation: (caveat: it’s been FOREVER since I’ve done physics in uni)
Assuming Dry Air and standard Temperatures, blah blah blah. And assuming sane numbers, a current ceiling of ~11KM (she wouldn’t have risked higher), (and a Spherical Sydney Shield Bubble)…
Her Shield would have a certain amount of Drag – that her “Thrust” would be able to Counter up until her Top speed. Basically the “Drag” or Air resistance on her Shield should approximately dictate her max speed with a given shield size.
Air Resistance is based on cross-section area. A sphere’s cross section is a circle. Increasing Volume does mean a significantly slower speed, but might mean a significantly longer flight time as the air volume grows as r^3 but the drag grows at r^2…)
Sydney’s first Run:
v(KPH) v(MPH) v(Sound) v (m/s) Shield(m) Alt(m) Drag (MN)
4959 3080 344 1378 1.5 1 -3.77
4954 3076 344 1376 1.5 100 -3.76
4905 3046 341 1362 1.5 1000 -3.69
4678 2905 325 1300 1.5 5000 -3.36
4379 2720 304 1217 1.5 10000 -2.94
Her run would probably not have been high-altitude, nor Low altitude – setting a baseline between 1km-5km with “Max Thrust” (drag) at ~3.4 MN (Mega Newtons) and a *real* top speed under 4900 kph. (Once humidity and other factors are taken into account)
Now Keeping a Constant Drag and altitude (100-1000m)
v(KPH) v(MPH) v(Sound) v (m/s) Shield(m) Drag (MN)
4680 2906 344.03 1300 1.5 -3.36
2340 1453 344.03 650 3 -3.36
1548 961 344.03 430 4.5 -3.31
1008 626 344.03 280 7 -3.39
828 514 344.03 230 8.5 -3.37
702 436 344.03 195 10 -3.36
I’d estimate that Sydney’s sphere is ~3m in radius. Growing the sphere to 7M could triple her flight time between stops by going a little under half-as-fast with a sphere twice the size… with the additional effect that she’d have to be sub-sonic. (Military regs discourage supersonic flight over populated areas).
Simple answer: Sydney is probably getting about 30-40 miles per hop (cruising around 300 mph to avoid sonic booms, plus acceleration and landing issues). It’s “Not Ideal”, but it works.
You blinded me… with Science!
Nice work.
How does the new girl get a phone signal inside the inpenibubble sheild? What’s she doing with that thing, anyway?
We’ve seen Halo using her wrist-com to send text messages to phones, which possibly uses a cellular network.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1580
Watching the in-flight movie, of course. And Dabbler is checking out the kinky highlights, at the end.
Low-intensity electromagnetic radiation is allowed through the shield, or everything would be dark in there. In this case, it is longer microwaves (different frequency than cooks your frozen dinners) that cell phone networks use, or the game she is playing is entirely self-contained.
I swear Maxima’s eyes and chin have changed shape during the last chapter.
Sydney’s facial expressions in panel’s 1 + 3? Priceless.
Is Maxima sure they’re going to get there in time?
I wonder what Pixel is showing Dabbler in the last panel. Anyway, she seems to have a very high concentration level.
That couch and parachute plan sounds silly, but could actually be fairly viable, if they kept is simple.
Make it from something fairly cheap and disposable so if she has to drop it for some reason it isn’t too much of a loss financially, shove an air scrubber in the middle and have the ‘couch’ operate as individual ejection seats, with internal parachutes?
One added benefit beyond speed is that it kind of kills any ‘ambush on the way’ plans people might have, since everything would just bounce off the bubble.
It doesnt sound silly at all. They need a single big object instead of a half dozen different chairs as that would be easier to balance in an egg shaped bubble and keep everything together, and parachutes are just good sense.
Giant Bean Bag!
The Russians developed potassium superoxide chemical cartridges these are CO² scrubbers, dehumidifiers and O² generators. Just don’t put them in water or they’ll explode.
Ahh so a double use item a bomb and a oxygen supply enhancer
But in vodka they make it all nice and fizzy.*
* Don’t try this at home. It probably explodes. Despite the nice tingly sensation in the mouth, this mouth-feel is not worth it for anyone other than Achilles.
I think Sydney may feel a bit of a double standard being applied to her after Max’s request to ‘be presentable’. The people she is traveling with are dressed as a Cosplayer, a Goth and a Glamazon.
(now if we can just get them all to walk into a bar. Ah well, the night is young.)
+5
They do sort of look like an group of young ladies at an anime convention, don’t they?
Young woman, there’s no need to fall down
I said young woman, pick yourself off the ground
I said young woman, ’cause you’re in a new town
There’s no need to be unhappy
Young woman, there’s a place you can go
I said young woman, when you’re short on your dough
You can stay there, and I’m sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time
It’s fun to stay at the Y.W.C.A.
It’s fun to stay at the Y.W.C.A.
They have everything for young women to enjoy
You can hang out with all the girls
Now that they know the air supply level can’t Max just get behind Sydney’s bubble and push it? Since she’s so much faster and stronger.
Teamwork for the win!
I suspect, however, that Maxima would wish to avoid unnecessary use of her power reserves on the trip someplace just in case she needs them on arrival.
and that point brings up an interesting point regarding (switching to Hero System speak) END use for the various characters in the comic, but I think we’ve enough on our plate for one page. Never mind.
Excluding Maxima’s blast attack (the details of which are classified), she does not have any reserves that I have seen. Her powers are always on. All she can do is reallocate how they manifest. Further, even then, she cannot take any aspect below a certain minimum.
This is profoundly sad, because since she manifested her powers, she will have been unable to trully touch anyone. Although, it is probably not that bad, in practice, as her force field manifests at a molecular level. So Maxima probaly has a full range of tactile feeling. However, it may affect how her skin feels to others. Perhaps she feels metallic, as well as looking it?
But I think it is doubtless why Varia complained that she could not form a gestalt with Maxima “because of her screwy skin”. The force field stopped them from making skin-to-skin contact. Not to mention the way it messes with her trying to use makeup.
Well… TECHNICALLY speaking we never really touch ANYTHING, there is always a microscopic distance between our fingers and what they try to touch, it is just really really really really really really really really REALLY small distances, in fact your BODY is not a single entity but just billions of singular atoms that are extremely close to one another, but never really touching
she is trying to test Sydney.
I don’t think there is a neutral gear in her flight orb to let max push her. otherwise it’s a good idea.
Soo am I the only one who noticed that Dazzler swiped Pixels game console in the last panel?
Nope. There are several such comments, either above, or on the previous page.
God, she looks good with her hair down. Like, seriously. I would so tap that. Add in her geekitude, her height and glasses, and all she’s missing is red hair and freckles to hit all my buttons. Yum.
The orbs in ‘sleep mode’ in panel one got me thinking about their previously seen distance limit to Sydney. They need to try to see if that limit also exists while she is asleep (with her permission, of course).
Secondly, since they know that the orbs deactivate when she is asleep, was having a group of people suspended by one of them at great height really a great idea while the user is severely sleep deprived?
And lastly, do they make a startup sound when they first activate in the morning?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ1mpI01evk
yes as shown here in first 2 frames
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/472
I think thats just the sound of a fingernail on a glasslike ball.
Personally I prefer Zanack‘s take on that. Tap and then the mechanical waking up noise. Dave would not be shy of instead using ‘scrape’ or ‘scrtch scricth’ as a sound-effect, if that was his intent. Plus if you verbalise the sound, it is much more akin to a machine working than a scratching noise.
Well that has been tested whilst they were in sleep mode, albeit that Sydney was up and about herself. When she had them in Tubey, we know that they were asleep ,as seen when Halo woke them up in the link Zanack provides above.
So it is very likely that they were asleep when Maxima was trying to throw Tubey across the bank car park a bit before that. Yes, the orbs appear to be so powerful that they could counter the strongest super-human on Earth, without even waking up!
thank you Yorp.
if nothing else she can tentacle them and fly with no shield at about 20-30 mph if they face back they can breath easily she would have to have her arm as a wind break to breath if they go faster.
Motocycle helmets and jackets and they could go over 100 mph comfortably as long as they aren’t too high (below 10,000 feet or so).
Sydney has admitted to attending a lot of conventions. If she goes to the Harry Potter ones I have a good entrance for her to try. Borrow a car like the one used in the movies, https://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Flying_Ford_Anglia. Then get inside it, put up the shield, and activate the flight orb. Then she can fly the car into the convention to a predetermined time and place previously set up with the organizers to meet awaiting fans.
Note: This could also be accomplished with Dabbler’s suspensor disks used on the press bus, but she may not want to share.
Heh. I like.
Sydney could also do that with her tentacle orb and fly ball. The car’s weight would be well within her capacity. She would just need to avoid going much over 100mph, without the shield. But that would be the same if she had the sheild inside the car. Too fast and bird strikes could destroy the windshield, let alone wind bufeetting ripping bits off of it.
Personally I thought you were going to go for Sydney making an appearance on a flying broomstick. Which she can easily emulate with nothing more than the fly ball. So could use her spare hand to pose holding the broomstick, whilst flying, to get the look spot on. Or can wave a ‘magic wand’ for a dramatic flair.
Any spell Halo emulated though (unless it only relied on the fly ball) would have to wait until she landed and could free up her hand from the fly ball. Given that the wand would occupy the other hand. Perhaps the green mystery orb is a polymorph other orb? Something she could not find in solo testing. Not without risking a pet, anyhow.
For the rapid-response criteria, Chicago sounds good to me.
For the rapid-response criteria, Chicago sounds good to me.
Oops, double comment, sorry.
What if she just used the size increase function of the shield orb? A bigger bubble means a larger air supply.
Alternatively, when she makes the shield bigger, does it introduce new air into the bubble from the outside? If air can be cycled by expansion and contraction that could be useful (for her at least, since other people would probably fall right out of the shield when it shrinks).
“two active branches, one for each coast” *indignant Gulf Coast muttering*
West coast base in eastern Nevada, East cost base in, I dunno, tenessee?
If something happens in montana or texas they can race to the middle.
I vote for a Louisiana branch, even if it is just a small one. Mardi Gras needs protecting from both super viallain attacks and hurricanes!
Don’t remmber names. but I enjoy pink hair and goth mage a lot
Pixel and Gwen.
The Who’s Who is there for folks like you and I. You will find it in the side-bar, to the right (or possibly down the bottom of the screen, depending on how your viewing device is configured).
No matter how cute Pixel might look, I shall not weaken. Whilst Sydney doesn’t like her, I don’t either!
And as for any Harem….
*low, menacing, growl*
Do not be confusing Gwen with Gothamer, bad puppy!
Gwen is not a Harem.
I did not say she was. I just see red whenever I read “Harem”.
When I read the comic, I saw her as Gwen. But I have real problems with names so simply did not realise that someone else had made a mistake. I am so used to having the wrong name in my head, that I assume the other party is correct, without even thinking it through or checking. So I just answered the question as written.
Oops. I see that Traab had written
My bad. As you can tell from my reply, even retaining just those two names in my memory, for the time it took to write my comment, was beyond my brain’s ability. Or to be more precise, in that case, it decided to swap them round, with other names, at random.
Even if I recall a name, during a spoken conversation, and wait until the other party has stopped speaking, I often cannot recall it when I want to say the name. Or I will say another completely incorrect name without realising it.
Or perhaps Traab did write
And I just fell through a crack into another universe where he wrote the alternative? Yea, that is more comforting than not being able to trust my own brain.
Unless… does this world have salt and vinegar crisps?
*trembling*
Wait, you know of Salt & Vinegar crisps? Mentioned that on a tour through Europe, and no one else in the group had heard of them
They are standard fare in any English shop (news agents, corner shops and supermarkets alike). But, sadly, are very hard to get in the bottom right corner of Europe (and probably much of the rest too).
This year was the first time that I saw any in a regular shop (I ignore any with expensive prices, on low volume imports, for rich foreigners). Knowing the very mild tastes of Bulgarians though, I have my doubts about how long they will remain stocked.
Oddly enough I found two different brands, within one week (having gone over ten years with none). Both were in German super markets (different chains, but the same holding company owning them). As such they must be available in Germany too. They will not have produced them just for this market.
Your best bet is to follow the time honored tradition of DC Comics: Make up a city name, and put in the “What’s that place” state. Seriously, like Gotham, Metropolis, Central City, or Coast City, just make up a name that’s sounds good in your head, throw it down somewhere that makes, and voila!
Springfield!
In East Takoma, near the five corners.
Naa, that breaks a central ethos of this comic. It is set in the real world (plus super-powers).
Unless a super created a city, so it exists in that world, but not this, of course. But that profound a difference would have had huge repercussions world-wide (even more so if living in it). Which would likely make it feel very divergant from our world.
Are you implying that The Simpsons isn’t real world?
I can see Springfield on the map. Google Earth would not lie to me.
Originally, ‘Gotham’ and ‘Metropolis’ were the DC versions of New York and Washington D.C., same as The Crimson Flasher, Bat-archer & Halitosis Jordan were in the DC versions of Los Angeles, San Francisco & San Diego