Grrl Power #520 – From distress to datstress
Maxima, as you might imagine, is quite strong willed, so even if the eyepiece wasn’t cracked, it’s anyone’s guess as to whether the Super Husk could have stunned her into sitting still for a withdrawal. There is at least one vampire who learned the hard way that unsuccessfully trying to mesmerize Max is such a bad idea.
“This looks important” is the number one thing said before shit gets broken. “Hey watch this.” is the number one thing said before someone hurts themselves, and “I wonder what this does.” falls equally in between.
Also who keeps their power supply behind an easily removable armored plate? Besides Iron Man I mean. And by easily removable I mean it requires super strength to remove. Still, seems like a design flaw considering who it was designed to fight. Really, Hiro got a lucky yanking that stuff out. After all he didn’t know how it was designed or what powered it. If I designed a big evil robot, I’d put the power supply in a well protected place, but not in the center because that’d be too obvious, and I’d hide a claymore behind the glowy plate.
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Almost missed Anvil diving behind Sydney’s shield :)
Yeah, Anvil can clearly see this isn’t going to end well.
and if the kinetic absorber is diving for cover, you know it’s going to be bad.
COL
The problem being, as I’ve watched Iron Man, in my head I read that line with a RDJ voice, which…I guess Hiro might have an RDJ voice now. We’ll see how long that sticks, though….
yeah anvil may be strong and tough but max hiro and helo’s shield can take way more beatings
In particular though Anvil’s defensive capability is purely by absorbing kinetic energy. Whatever that “VORCH” is it is not kinetic. Assuming it is a destructive energy, in the form of an explosion, that would be lethal to her. She would have no more protection against it than a normal human, which is to say none.
Explosions generally involve three things:
* Heat
* Air blast
* Shrapnel
Shrapnel is more important for small explosions, and generally unless you’re going for a nuclear explosion (which this might be doing) you’re going for the air blast. An air blast is kinetic energy. So who knows, could be survivable.
Very true. Most explosions aren’t blue though. Plus it is from a supernatural power source. Hence me putting my Yorpie snax™ on it being something other than a typical explosion.
The most obvious energy type is electrical, for example, as we see lightning-like energy in the penultimate panel, proceeding the actual VORCH. Anvil does not have any defense against electricity. Electricity does not normally explode mind. So it could be other things such as raw manna, soul energy or other more exotic things.
But, yea, if it does have a shockwave, or shrapnel, Anvil will have protection against that. Everything else though is a problem. Even radiant heat, from a normal explosion, would bypass her defenses. Let alone whatever the blue stuff is. With the supernatural involved it may even cause other effects, such as petrification or disintegration!
I can’t remember if sydney said this or if if it was said to syndey, but I thought it was said way earlier in the comic that even if you think you can withstand something, its always better to not get hit by it in the first place.
true or nah?
Maybe it was when Peggy was giving Sydney training on how to survive a gun fight? In which case it would be about making good use of available cover (like Anvil is doing here). However that particular advice would only be of use to Sydney if she were wearing mittens and thereby able to raise her shield.
Or, I guess, given the context of firearms training, if needing to use a two-handed weapon for some reason. Presumably due to it having a specialist attack form that was required to defeat a particular foe.
With the force field raised though, Halo is the one providing the cover to her teammates, as ordered in their first battle. As such she should not attempt to dodge, or dive for cover herself, as that could be exposing her allies to direct attack! Plus, in exposed circumstances like the one above, Sydney is simply not fast enough to dodge such attacks, on foot.
Halo would need the fly ball’s assistance if she suspected an attack was able to overcome her shield. Although she may opt for using her tentacle to grab something solid to block, I think the general point, you raised is right, in that not being in its path is still safer. If an attack can get through a shield that can withstand a nuke-like attack a car might not be as much of a defense as Sydney might hope.
Archon’s “tailor” said it to Miss Halo.
Have any of the current combatants remembered that we have an injured Krona and Pixel, a Harem, and a hovering osprey nearby?
They might not have a harem nearby, actually. And they almost certainly can hear the osprey’s rotors in the background. Pixel and Krona might be in the back of their minds… except Sydney, since she’s focused on the spectacle in front of her, and her ADHD is in full swing by this point.
You have blast and concussion, and depending on the type of blast, things can be bad, or really bad. I worry about Krona the most since she is on the squishy side of things…
Vorch is making me think something more like displacement than detonation. They might find themselves in some sort of holding facility for future blood draining.
Pixel and Harem were last seen in the building across the street. Nearby, yes, but not nearly in as much danger as Anvil was, before her dive for cover. As a joint operation they will have been issued with standard communications gear (or will be using compatible equipment, for the same result). We know that the Archon communications allow separate contact, to each individual, if required.
They will have purposely been avoiding using any distracting chatter on the channel Halo is using. She is in combat and is highly distractible, so they are restricting communications to things that are necessary for her to know.
I have no doubt that they will have been getting updates from Harem, as she treated the injured. Especially as she could have one or more of her other bodies placing the calls, so her first aiding body could be talking with her patients and finding out ‘where it hurts’ and so on.
Likewise the team will have been informed of the incoming attack. The exception being Halo, as they would not want to have her looking up at them, or otherwise giving things away, until the last seconds, when they needed to bring her in on the plan, to provide the distraction.
Meaning that Krona will have had plenty of warning to get clear.
Possibly there may have been a cock-up, and that has not happened. Such things do occur in battle after all. However this is a heroic organisation, so I am happy to assume their competence, unless proven otherwise.
Well, remember that Harem has limits to her teleportation abilities in terms of weight and in her were form Pixel is rather large, so maybe Harem is offscreen with some method of returning Pixel to normal(weaknesses for your teammates are best used when the enemy isn’t paying any attention to it), she could then be moving Krona and Pixel to a hospital. With that weird energy she may not be risking teleporting too close(imagine if the teleportation had a side effect of attracting the blue lightning stuff), so Max would be out, and as Anvil would be beyond her ability, no sense in going into fire if you aren’t going to change anything.
However, there are some questions remaining about Halo’s new ability. Starting off with, can something come through the aperture, or is it basically a one way shield? For example, if she had it open towards the explosion, would it come through? If Peggy was inside with a high powered sniper rifle, would Halo be able to open the aperture for a split second for the bullet to fly out? Second is can she open the aperture without firing the PPU? If so, would it combine with the first part to allow her to let air in during prolonged fights without losing much cover(sadly flights would still be currently impossible)? Or would she be able to open it to let teammates in and out to provide cover and help them move around the battlefields?
Yea Pixel is stuck where she is right now, until she has regenerated enough to move. Whether she still requires a hospital by that stage is another matter. Her regeneration was good enough to be talking a few moments after having a girder in her chest. So they might have already been able to make their way out, on foot.
However it is more likely that they are just holed up and taking shelter, for the moment. The osprey would be a safer evacuation route though, once the explosions stop, as it would not require navigating their way through an enemy complex, to get to an exit.
Either that or they are now in the hands of the enemy.
I too interpreted it as being a hole in the shield. However others took it differently and the author confirmed that it is not a hole. Rather it is a summoning portal that only allows the PPO’s energy to pass. So it is actually a circle on the outside of the force field, meaning that the shield retains its integrity.
If you look back at the tank-melting demonstration, you will see the same circle appearing. So Dave has remained consistent with this concept.
This reminds me of Atomic Robo whenever he fights Dr. Dinosaur.
“How does this work!? HOW DID YOU DO THAT?!”
“WITH CRYSTALS YOU SIMPLE MAMMAL ROBOT! USING MY TIME CRYSTALS I HYPER EVOLVED THIS T-REX INTO A FUTURESAURUS!!”
“Crystals don’t do that!”
(Then the futuresaurus destroyed the planet… and somehow crystals were involved.)
LOL!!!! I just only now realized that Anvil is anime-diving begun Sydney’s shield! OMFG that is PRICELESS!
Allright, I didn’t see it the first time, but I can’t UN-SEE it now. Panel 6: that shoulder looks like a butt. That blood sample laserclaw(?) looks like it’s coming from a d*** and that d*** even has “b***s”.
Cue rule 36. And it’s twin, rule 34.
PLZ leave it in!
MADE MY NIGHT I JUST SAW IT AND YESSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
He ha.
Now we know how Maxima gets her injections.
You don’t have to hide any words here. If it is the comic, you can too. We are all adults here. So if you mean “dick” then write it please. So what does b***s mean?
Such a flash can also blind you if you look right at it when it flashes. Nuclear explosions are that way, also not healthy to look a welding with naked eyes either. Of course it depends on what-the-hell kind of explosion that is we are seeing?
What is exploding here—-fuel? Some things just burn out without exploding much if at all. What would be combustible on that robot?
“b***s” obviously means “balls”, but don’t see what is wrong with that
my comments were removed from NEXT comic’s page. But not this one. LOL. Didn’t see that coming. I maintain that censorship is like rolling a resistance roll; you can get lucky or unlucky.
I presume you mean this one? I assume that is the correct one, given that it alludes to the same topic as this post. However it is still there. It is just a matter that there are a couple of other pages of comments covering it up. You have to click on the numbers at the top or bottom of the page to navigate between them.
Possibly you may know that, and missed the comment for some other reason (or my assumption above was wrong), but I mention it because I had not noticed that feature myself and was puzzled when some of my early comments ‘disappeared’.
Either way though Dave is very hands-off as regards censorship. It is extremely rare for him to delete anything, without extreme provocation (ignoring the usual spam advertising that anybody on the internet has to get rid of).
Mind you both these posts are fun, so no one would want to reach for the censorship button!
Look carefully. See Maxima’s hand holding the cable? The rest of it is her arm to her shoulder and part of her pectoral muscle. You really need to look at Maxima’s butt. There is a big difference.
If you showed the panel, in isolation, to folks who were unfamiliar with the comic you would get some folks who correctly identified it the way you did. Others though would say ‘there is a golden goblet on the left, and the bum of a golden statue on the right’.
And others would say ‘Oh my God, I do not want to have that thing giving me an injection in my butt!”
I hope the loop is still up could help w/the not dieing thing some
The loop, if it was still up (which it’s not), would not help Maxi, Hiro, Anvil nor Peggy, if anything, it would simply put Kronachrome, Sydney, Pixel and Bodie back on the roof (which may or may not still be there)
Anvil is the most exposed hero, and is taking cover. Max, Hiro and Halo are all tough enough that they can survive this. I imagine Krona will have been given the heads-up, over comms, to get clear before the osprey attack.
Whilst Pixel and Harem are across the street, in the Mars building. With the arch-villain. So they have different hazards to worry about.
I so wanted to say time warp
I want to too. Lets say time warp again!
Comment on ensuring a viewer (or is it reader?) knows what is going on.
Anvil looks (to me) like she is holding on to Halo’s shield with her hands and… somehow… holding herself up. The shield being transparent also adds to this effect. Some motion lines or blur like you used in panel 3 would go a long way towards making it clear she is jumping.
Even after reading she is jumping in the comments, I just don’t get that feeling of motion for a few reasons.
One: She is very high up in the air. Granted, super jump, but still.
Two: She is diving. You make a pyramid with your hands to dive into the water. Most people stretch both hands forward to catch themselves when jumping in that manner.
Three: See above blur comment.
Four: She is not looking at her jumping target, she is looking at what is about to explode. I like to keep my head facing where I am going to land when I jump.
Possible solutions:
One: Add blur to indicate movement.
Two: Move Anvil further behind the shield so it does not look like she is holding onto it.
Three: See body position comments above.
Thus concludes my (hopefully) constructive criticism.
She is doing a ‘comedic swan-dive’, because Rule of Funny, there is no motion blur-lines because, at this point, she’s not moving, if the camera caught her two seconds earlier or later then there would be motion blur-lines
I wholly agree with your comments. But the comedic effect that made so many people laugh is enhanced by the feeling of ‘hanging in the air’ cartoon-character style. So I endorse Guesticus‘s comment above.
Dave was aiming more for the laughs, from the angle stated. Forcing the reader to wonder ‘what is she doing?’, for a moment, then having the sudden realisation, leads to the belly laugh he wanted.
Come on, peeps, let’s all admit it. All of us hamfisted lunkheads have had at least one “This looks important!” ~skash~ *VORCH* moment. XD
Had an acrobat bard that did that constantly, but had a full dodge skill, so he’d trigger the trap we just found to see what it did, then dodge away.. after the first time the rest of the party started diving for cover when he said, “wonder what this does.”
Heh. I had a barbarian who used a similar technique, but with less talking. And less dodging.
The problem with Dave’s thinking is that those people who frequently exercise power (especially those of us who’ve had superpowers most – if not all – of our lives) tend to have little in the way of actual willpower. They’re used to getting their way, and react poorly when others don’t simply let them run wild. Look at any spoiled rich kid to see a good example of this. As such, those with power (social or super-) tend to have low willpower unless that power comes as a result of discipline… or includes inherent safeguards against subversion of that willpower, as Max’s clearly does.
Say that to Math, his power comes from discipline and you just need boobs to win againts him.
Which is why he has been working on his resistance (or stamina, or both) ever since the Restaurant Rubble-Party (just hope he takes time out to at least rehydrate…)
Also, Maxi wasn’t born with her powers, she was bitten by a radioactive rock
top that off with her being in the military. they teach you all kinds of things there and it develops will power in the troops. especially if she had to go through basic without using them at all.
IE you can join but you cannot use the gifts you have until we order you to. so the entire time she likely only had her shield ( so as not to get shot.) so no speed flight or strength or lazer finger.
I agree with the former. Likewise with the sentiments of the latter. However the particular example you gave is only of use when she is sparring with supers. Maxima literally cannot lower her minimums below super levels though. She always has some degree of super strength, defense and speed.
However the military has many ways of strengthening mental fortitude other than just through beatings. Maxima will have been pushed to the limits in many ways. Like having to keep making command decisions, after days without sleep. Likewise, as a special forces leader, she will have been through interrogation training, on both sides of the equation.
Plus there are the grizzly realities that those in combat have to face, which the rest of us do not. Seeing friends dying around you, but having to keep going, for example. Plus the command responsibility of knowing that some decisions you make will result in some of your troops dying. Then being the one who must break that to their family.
On top of which there are all the covert operations against supernatural beings, giving hands-on experience. Doubtless Archon and the Council will have training techniques to help resist mental attacks, where such is possible.
Maxima has had the discipline installed in her through both training and tough experiences. Ones that even the strongest physical defense does not help with.
Here’s hoping for a teleport! Remember the vote incentive a few months back?
Which one? o_O
and the glare of maxima is going all like “B***, I resist succubus aura dialed up to 50” XD
:-)
That’s a very good point, Dabbler DOES actually subject Maxima to her succubus effects fairly often, she may not do it at full power but she is almost constantly subjecting Maxima’s willpower to tests of its strength.
Small details information. Although in this case it is not that small, so it surprised me that nobody mentioned it before. But maybe it is because Dave mentioned the crack, in the lens, so did not bother. However I liked the touch that the shadow of the crack is playing over Maxima’s face.
So Dave was actually emphasising the presence of the crack, written large across her face, and trying to visually carry the clue that the mesmerizing ray was being compromised. Across three separate close-up panels, at that!
Yups, had noticed, and that it changes shape in panels one, two and four
Implying, to me, that the repair process is continuing and parts are still moving position, as they are re-assembled into their correct places.
Delaying the attack could have lost this engagement, if the mind control was given the time to regain full functionality!
For me, the best part of this is Anvil being genre savey enough to be diving for cover THAT EARLY.
She’s not sure what kind of retalation it’s going to be, but she’s not in the least willing to assume it’ll be purely kenetic, so she won’t let it touch her…. and halo is a conviently large rock to hide behind.
A conveniently large transparent rock, so Anvil can still see what happens without placing any part of herself outside the safety of the ‘LTR’ :D
OK, flying cars are on the horizon!
They’ve had hover cars since the 90s. Can these ones travel more than 10ft?
Yes, it stipulates in the piece that they spend most of their time at high altitude. Hence why the noise pollution is only an issue on takeoff and landing.
The difference between those of the 90s and now is that they are going into production and deployment for actual use.* A prototype that is impractical for day-to-day use, or is totally uneconomical, is nothing more than a curio.
Hover cars are hard to control. Plus autonomous driving systems were impractical in the last millennium, so would need a skilled driver. Even more so for the higher certification demanded for a true flying car. But if human supervision requires less skill or the systems prove good enough to make it unnecessary, then a key problem will be overcome.
It is less a matter of ‘if’ we will have them, now it is just ‘when’. And the answer is ‘soon’. Barring global thermonuclear war or some other zombie apocalypse.
* I have previously linked an article on air taxis being used in Dubai. So this is just pointing out that there are multiple companies actively competing against each other in this field. Plus that one used the quadcopter-type propulsion. Whereas this fits the 50s & 60s vision of ‘jet cars’ far better.
The only trick is making the transition from taxi to car. But that is a matter of developing the confidence that the piloting systems are reliable enough, before considering the possibility of scaling these kinds of vehicles up for household use.
But can they fold themselves up into a briefcase?
Err… no. They might be able to microwave a chicken though?
I am surprised there’s no concern for Hiro in the comments. I don’t think he’s quite as tough as Max, even if he can absorb power – he also seems to have to focus for that…. and there was what seemed to be foreshadowing with Sydney in .
Oops. I linked to page 2483, but it turned out as a dot instead.
Yea, you are right, he may be ‘Super Man Lite’ but he is in considerable danger being at ground zero in a catastrophic* ZORCH. Folks were mainly focused on Maxima. because of the mental attack on her and then on Anvil. Who has no defense against an explosion of energy, so would be as vulnerable as any normal unarmoured human.
That said though he does have super defense, in addition to the absorption power you mentioned. I had been thinking of him as being four star, so was relatively unconcerned, but I was getting that mixed up with Stalwart’s. At three stars he could (probably)** stand up to the PPO but a greater attack, such as this blast seems to be, would be a serious problem.
Hopefully the explosion damage will mostly be in the form of a shockwave. He does not have chunks of robot between him and it, to make shrapnel a risk (to him), for example. Then there is another unknown, but claws crossed that his sonic absorption will also extend to protecting him against that shockwave. They are closely connected phenomenon, so we can hope so anyhow.
That said though it may have other energies involved (like the lightning we saw arcing between the laser spikes and the power source). For these he just has to hope that they are less than his three star defense. Or he will get cooked.
One final hope he has is that he is right next to Maxima. The big problem with this is that she is still fighting off the effects of the mental attack above. We can see that she is not using her bullet-fast speed, nor even the low-level super speed that is her minimum.
With luck though she might snap out of it with the explosion cutting off power to the mental attack. In which case she could use her super speed to get them both to safety. Or interpose herself, with defenses cranked up to the max, to shield him from the worst of the blast.
If so, those amongst our community who would like to see Hiro shirtless, but healthy, will have a treat.
Alternatively there could be a gloomier outcome, as you fear.
* If felines are involved you know it can be really bad.
** The star rating just gives a ball-park strength. The PPO may be at the top end and Hiro’s defense at the bottom. But even in that event it probably would not kill him.
If the apparent foreshadowing a few pages ago wasn’t there, I wouldn’t be wondering. He would likely survive this fine.. but Sydney has seen Hiro shirtless more then once now. Her suddenly going a little nuts over him… doesn’t quite fit in.
We did see her literally drooling the first time she saw him (along with the other guys) shirtless. Plus both Maxima and Sydney got all giggly at seeing him like that, in the car park. So I think her behaviour is very much consistent.
Of course there is not much point in bumping off a major character unless he will be missed. Thus my arguments would not serve to dismiss your worries, rather they would point out that Sydney has fancied him for quite some time. For full disclosure though, I should also point out that Dave is a fellow Joss Whedon fan. Yet so far nobody
has diedother than Sydney has died (and even she may not have).So, if using Joss’s techniques, the feeling of peril, that characters may be in, would be heightened in future, if a hero was to die. Plus he would have a suitably heroic death, in saving Maxima.
OK you have talked me into it.
*reaches for hankies*
Look! Up in the sky! Is it a bird, is it a plane….
… no it’s a Steve.
VORCH … I’m trying to picture that sound, and all I can think of is a sort of blast of raw energy … In that case, Sydney’s shield might be the safest place to be. Shields tend to do a better job of blocking energy then matter does. I mean. Some form of radiation will pass right through a wall!
+1
Whenever I need a smile I come find this page and that image of Anvil diving behind Halo just cracks me up.