Grrl Power #567 – Zero sum shopping
Short bodyguards are funny. Well, Vale isn’t short, she’s like 5’8″ or 5’9″ and always wears 2 or 3 inch heels… like those wide heels? I don’t know what they’re called. Chunky heels? They’re like the width of a regular boot heel, just higher. Like what Selene wore in the Underworld movies. It’s just that Deus is 6’4″ and Sciona is 6’3″ at least with her head popped on top of that orc body.
Of course, really, a short bodyguard is probably the dangerous one, right? 90% of a bodyguard’s job is to physically block people and to look intimidating enough that no one wants to mess with the person they’re guarding. But the short person who does that is the ex-marine or the bantam weight MMA fighter that will drop anyone who the big guys can’t stop.
I finally updated the vote incentive! It’s even a finished colored piece! Check it out.
Oh, and here’s an Amazon link to Selene style boots, since I have one of those associate links, might as well stick that here. Speaking of which, I just set up an account for Amazon Canada and UK, so if you’re shopping there and want to drop a few pennies in the tip jar with literally no expense or effort on your part, just change your Amazon bookmark to either 
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Missing tagline: That is not a shopping cart, it is a comedy cart.
That is so funny! Deus must have been a boy scout – always prepared!
Damn those wobbly wheels! Is there no existing knowledge or technology that can rid us of that bane to the whole of human society?
>8-(
ROLF.
OK that shopping trolley has me cracking up!
XD Yeah, that got me too!
But it definitely still has the squeaky wheel that barley touches the ground. HOW DO I KEEP GETTING THAT DAMN CART! Everyone else gets the normal ones but me!
There are limits, clearly, to even riches.
He also can’t always find an open parking spot, and the sun still ends up pointed in his eyes sometimes when he’s both going to and from a destination.
Truly heinous.
Ahh, but he does have his R&D department working on the upgrade to his “CRACKATHOOOM!”-key ring fob, that will allow him to summon a thunder cloud, for just that situation.
*raises finger in protest* *silent* Yeah. That’s actually… but… no, I mean… yes.
The answer is yes.
He is doing that.
“There are limits, clearly, to even riches.”
Allow me to dissuade you of this belief.
“He also can’t always find an open parking spot,”
He can because he can buy the parking lot and have a spot reserved for him at all times. Or he can just land his helicopter on the roof. Or run a tank over some cars and park on top of their wreckage and give the people who lost their cars money to replace them.
“and the sun still ends up pointed in his eyes sometimes when he’s both going to and from a destination.”
Rich people rarely drive their own cars. :) It’s half the reason to be rich.
They’re in the back of the limo with the shaded divider up. And if he was to deign to drive, he can have all of his windshields be made of Transitions sunlight suppression material which gets darker when the sun shines at it so there’s never any glare.
Actually, have you ever wondered why all the higher-end housing developments are on the east side of the financial district in almost every city? People who live there and work downtown get to drive to work and home with the sun behind them in both directions.
ALL shopping trolleys are supposed to be wonky in some way: I remember once seeing a rather amusing cartoon in which the factory’s quality-control section actually rejected one because it ran straight…
^_^
The things keep getting hit by cars, of course they are going to be crooked!
Not to mention constant use, being loaded down with hundreds of pounds of groceries, parents with several rampaging children, wild variances in temperature, and little to no maintenance.
Huh… the shopping carts at Publix ALWAYS run smooth. I’ve never gotten a wobbly one, nor seen/heard another customer with one. The baggers escort you to your cart and then bring the carts back. Apparently they also maintain/clean/fix the carts too.
One of the perks of paying slightly more for your food I guess.
I worked there for 15 years. The stores have a maintenance team come by regularly to swap out flat wheels, pressure wash the carts, and do general maintenance all in one night while the store is closed.
Magical Cart Elves!!!!
Supervillains or shopping carts?
I look at it this way… if EVERYTHING is missing rather than just the specific items you were looking to gather how would the heroes figure out what you’re up to? Now I happen to have this handy dandy cart of gathering that will help collect the items you were specifically not taking with you.
Taking more than you need just to foil counterplanning is such a trope I’m surprised it didn’t come up. Been waiting for it for weeks.
I have been working on the assumption that everything would be nicked. After all they are not operating under the time constraint of knowing an alarm will go off and they only have minutes until the VIs arrive.
Barring there being either too much to carry or diverse defenses on every item* there would be no reason not to. Other than items which would be useless or potentially detrimental of course (including those which might give away their location).
* Which would include those items which may be intrinsically dangerous to touch/ move/ be in the same room as.
Wasn’t that portal chick in the jug?
Deus pulled strings to hire her. One of the perks of being Archon’s supplier of super technology is that he is a trusted mentor. One of the perks of having a power of global strategic importance is that the need to punish you is less than the need to make use of your services.
She was already an employee. Deus tells Max she’s vital to his interests in Africa.
Ahh, in which case, behind the scenes her ‘get out of jail free’ card might have been the use of diplomatic immunity. With Deus just being diplomatic in listing why he needed to keep her out, rather than detailing the how.
Diplomatic immunity tends to rub law enforcement officers up the wrong way, as it frustrates justice being served.
I only remember because I saw it mentioned in the comments for the previous page but apparently Opal is on some form of work-release since Deus needed her to transport goods from the coast to his sponsored third world country.
…Which is what she’s doing now, really. After all, the vault is underwater, which means it’s maybe kinda sorta close to a coast. Hairsplitting, sure – but a split hair can be handy when you get hit with a truth spell later.
not necessary. Opal ONLY was in that chamber because her portals would allow her to escape otherwise before she coul be processed.
That is how we left her. waiting to be processed, not imprissoned for any crime (yet). If her processing came out clean, Archon would have to let her go (or face pretty bad press if it becomes public)
Opal was notable as being a leader. The only checking would be to confirm that she was acting in this role at times when it could be proven that Vehemence was not around. In which case she is guilty of a heck of a lot of crimes, which she would be unable to claim ‘not being of sound mind, due to the aggro aura’.
So Achon would need to be very sure of the grounds they let her out on for her ‘work in the community’. Especially if that work was on behalf of another nation, rather than the one she had committed the offenses in.
I just love that Deus brought a shopping cart with him, even more with the bottom text implying that all the money in the world won’t let you find or buy a shopping cart without a wobbly wheel on it.
He Has a Magical curse…
as soon as any shopping cart comes into his possession it instantly gets a Wobbly wheel until it leaves his possession, then it goes back to being perfectly functional.
Please with his money and competence the wobbly wheel is intentional. Either to give him a nostalgic feeling from before he was a billionaire or because he finds it funny, probably the latter ;)
I’m quantumly entangled with perfectly functional shopping carts. When anyone observes that they have no wobbly wheel,spooky action at a distance makes my cart manifest a wobble. It’s science, can’t deny it.
Ahh, modern-day scientist-speak for ‘my cart is possessed by a demon’.
Sweet vote incentive by the way.
*puts on shades*
Lets vote our butts off and get the comic back into the number 1 slot!
Second!
Shiny too
No, the goal is back to first, not second. What’s wrong with…Ooooo, shiny incentive!
Indeed.
Oh, and to fill in the Sydney speech bubble, “The light, IT BURNS!”
Number 1 slot achieved once more!
Yay!
Good going everyone!
Please lets remember to vote on any day there is time to spare. Keeping the top spot, until the end of the month, would show how much we appreciate the comic (and vote incentive).
Always amazes me (and saddens me) when people only vote once a week (or once a month) or only when a new invotive is released: vote every day, including the weekends
Some people might only vote when they come to check for a new comic (which would still be twice a week at least).
I admit though to being bad at voting regular. Sometimes I vote several times one week, then skip a week or two. It happens less now though since changing my screen settings so the Who’s who and vote button appear next to the page instead of below it (which might be another reason why people forget as I was not the only one with that issue).
Alas, one of the two main computer networks through which I obtain net access won’t let me vote…
:(
There should be an option, to allow you to manually override whatever setting is causing that. Preferably for by white-listing the web page in question only (depending on what is causing the block). Assuming it is on a network where you are allowed to do that.
Obviously if it is your company’s IT department who set that, then you have the additional stage of working up to being chief executive officer, then ordering them to do that for you.
Easier to just become department head. Build that exception in yourself.
I found it easier to do both. CEO to ensure that the permission is granted, and head of IT to ensure it is done right. OK, like Dave, I am also my own IT monkey, but, hey, I get to use whatever website I want.
The little painting demon, in my monitor, keeps complaining that he runs out of skintone pigments though.
I’d vote more often, but I only remember to do so when I check the comic here, rather than on the Patreon site. :-/
Consequently, I think it’s resulted in me missing a few of the incentive images… >_<
You can find the key ones on Dave’s DA website.
Too bad Sydney kept the towel …
Ohh, how cute. They are fighting over who has the scarier scar.
I am really curious if Archon and the Council spotted someone else on the walls beside Coot when they opened the door.
This is where someone yells JUST KISS ALREADY!
See, see, this is why we need Sydney!
+1
Not just a wobbly wheel, but it squeaks randomly
Saw bantam in authors comment. Brain rearranged it into Batman. I read comics too much.
YOU SAY THAT WITH PRIDE!
A Batman weight fighter would be terrifying.
Just bear in mind that years worth of free samples at conventions would indeed have had a terrifying price!
Great new Vote Incentive! Soooo…. any idea when the coloured & uncensored version of this is going to be completed
No Lia in the Who’s Who?
I imagine DaveB did input Cithillia, but got the code wrong, which is what happened on the comic-before-last.
I assume Deus has “more money than god”.
Remember his name… as far as he’s concerned, he *is* god.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xECUrlnXCqk
Not that impressive, as God has no need for money. But he only has a small country, so is outstripped by Bill Gates. Now he has more money than Mammon.
Well, if Deus ever feels like going out and acquiring a large country, no doubt he’ll manage. I suspect that his first effort was more of a training exercise anyway.
He only flaunts 1/10th of his wealth the other 9/10th is used behind the behind the scene.
The Vatican is a small country, and has huge wealth – the pope is definitely a one-percenter.
A member of an outlaw motorcycle gang? I think we have very different mental images of the current Pope.
Incidentally he is a Jesuit and Ignatian aesthetic, meaning that he eschews personal wealth. As an example he chose to use a normal car, rather than the popmobile, to get around town, when he first became Pope. Likewise he lives in a guesthouse rather than a place. And he opts for much more subdued bling than his predecessors.
OK, as an institution, the Catholic church does still command vast wealth. But Pope Francis does not choose to indulge himself personally.
But does he have more money than Krezus?
You are probably thinking of Croesus. He was a mega-rich king who was the Bill Gates of his day. It was rumored that he made his fortune by inventing Windows. As in the actual holes in the walls of houses to see through. His competitor Stevius Jobicus also made a similar claim, but his were distinguished by having rounded corners.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croesus
You sure it was not the doors that people put in garden walls? Just going by nominative determanism.
To be honest, everybody has more money than God. for one thing, He doesn’t need it. For another, all of that money collected by churches everywhere, God doesn’t get any of it personally.
;)
Are we sure that god doesn’t technically own the entire world and all money therein?
I’m predicting an angry slap fight to break out at any minute.
We still haven’t seen what Vale can do (other than put up with Deus on a daily basis)
That’s already an exceptional superpower.
If the elevator had gotten stuck in this comic we would probably have seen Vale claw her way out through the door.
He he. I knew which one you were linking to. Sciona, terrifying arch-villain, does not bat an eyelid. Sydney… yaaaaaaah!
*gets a tub of mud ready*
Go ahead and pop that into position, if you want.
Not mud, body-temperature jelly (for one reason, it’s not freezing cold, and another, you can lick it off after)
OK, Scionas all yours. Actually you can have the lot. I will wait until Sydney turns up.
If Vale or Heavenly Sword join in the jello fight you might change your tune.
Naa, they are included in the gift bundle. They don’t even appear on my radar. Sciona has prettier eyes than them, for that matter. Although they do have an edge on other points, they are not in Sydney’s ball park.
I have it on decent authority that most for show mud fights are actually performed with warmed up Hershey’s chocolate, the only kind that adheres to skin correctly.
I wonder what Cthilla would do in that case. She has reasons to support each group. And if the shopping lists don’t overlap… I’d think that Vale could stop Sciona in a direct fight for a short time, but Cthilla is something else.
Cthillia is a mercenary. If she is an ethical one she will fight for her present employer. Even if she is a c**t.
Morality for the merc is Loyalty to the Contract Made
even if someone offers 10 times the money your paid you don’t break the contract unless your employer betrays you.
Now in the event that your contract ends you could go back to said person and accept a contract against your old employer, as loyalty is to current contract
(i foresee though Big Dues makes contracts predicting this and everyone has contracts setup for that specific purpose.)
That depends on which mercenaries you hired. I know I’m talking ancient history here, but the Italian condotierri had a rule: After a contract ends, you cannot accept any other contracts for three months (just in case they needed time to scrape together enough money to hire you for another contract), and, unless they betrayed you, you could not accept any contracts against your former employer for two years.
And an honest politician is one that stays bought once you’ve paid for him.
I see that someone has read at least that one entry from Ambrose Bierce’s ‘The Devil’s Dictionary’.
been years, may have been where I got it, but it’s so true it SHOULD replace whatever OED has for the definition.
Looks like Vale knows dentist-fu – she looks at your teeth and knows where it hurts most.
I did love the fact Vale is trying to eyeball down Sciona, the Vampire, able to break the defences of the vault, and whom beheading wasn’t enough..
Sciona the one tenth dark elf/ nine tenths orc blood mage, with vampire pets. But, yea, Vale gets points for her Paddington hard stare.
Honest question, but why do people keep thinking that Sciona is/was a vampire?
Vampires and blood sort of go together, and the paleness of her skin. Only a guess, not saying I agree.
She’s a blood mage, of a race with pale skin (ears like that hints at ‘elf’), if she was a vamp, the beheadinging would have worked
Or, she may simply not be keeping her seat of consciousness in her brain, in which case the beheading wouldn’t have worked no matter what her race was. (Being a blood mage, she may very well be keeping her seat of consciousness in her blood.)
But I agree, she’s not a vampire. Take a good look at her upper jaw in panel 3. Hard to tell because those orc teeth partly conceal the upper jaw, but it doesn’t look like she has any fangs. Vampires in the Grrl Power setting have fangs on their upper jaw.
I’d be careful around any bodyguard who weighs less than half the person they’re protecting, especially when the client is big enough to be a bodyguard on the intimidation factor alone. You gotta figure the client picked that particular petite to guard himself for a reason.
More then one reason I’d wager.
And in a world with supers there could be a very very good reason. Especially when you have someone with Deus’s wealth and connections doing the picking.
As someone observed and made into a t-shirt; “Beware of cute, short girls; for they are stealth ninjas at exactly the right height to punch you in the balls”.
Ahh, this might be why Sydney always expects ninjas. Any time she looks in the mirror, for a start.
Short AND quiet? Ouch. This is gonna HURT.
The quiet ones are always the most dangerous and shorter ones fight harder. Add those together and pain is coming.
Quiet? She doesn’t say a word. Silent would be more appropriate. But clearly she can be very violent…
See, in the final frame, how she is clenching?
That’s because she can smell Sci-frights breath (Coot smelt better, after he exploded, and then was set on fire)
“The quiet ones are always the most dangerous”
So you are saying that she is silent but deadly?
Silent but violent :D
Let’s not forget that a smaller stature makes it easier to get under-&-inside your opponent’s defenses, to attack their center of gravity. This is a key component of several Oriental martial arts
Combined with her previously-proven ability to move very fast indeed, I’m inclined to favor Vale in a 1-on-1 fight.
Yea I found that myself. That said I made a similar comment to a friend of mine, who is an ex-national judo champion. He disagreed. But, to put it in context, he is huge. So his fighting style took into account that everybody is smaller than him.
Sciona isn’t in a good position for a fight, Deus can bring in reinforcements easily while Sciona would need to activate her blood ritual again and have reinforcements to bring in, also Sciona’s team don’t really have any intensive to fight with her or seem to like her very much. Dues could probably turn them by allowing them take the items their after and the promise of a ride home.
I am sure he will take his dues.
No such thing as an “ex-marine”, but yea point taken.
I’m glad you didn’t get the hump.
It looks like most of them were after some form of medical or restoration tool.
Last page Robin Bobcat dissected ‘Epimorph’ as ‘covering’ and ‘change of shape’, with Oberon adding that “An epimorph is a crystal left behind when another crystal it grew over has dissolved. It’s like a cast without an arm in it.”.
So maybe the Epimorph will let one create a new body, or a hollow outer layer of a body? That would explain Sciona and Cthillia’s interest in it.
The Regenerator, that speaks for itself though what it regenerates is not yet clear.
The Lazarus Scalpel. Lazarus was a guy in the bible that was brought back from the dead by Jezus (thank you google). So possibly a scalpel with reviving powers, sounds useful for a doctor.
The secrets in the vampire book are anyone’s guess though.
“To transform yourself into a nebulous cloud of dust, able to bypass any defenses, simply insert a 6-inch dowel of fire-hardened Black Ash between the 3rd and 4th ribs under your left armpit until no more than 3/4 of an inch remains exposed. This also has the advantage of making it impossible for your enemies to kill you” ~Research Journal of Vladimir the Vapid, Vampire Viscount of Venice
There is a theme. But “Medical” and “Dark Reliquary” do not give me fluffy bunny images of what those things may actually do. Bear in mind that this is the place where they store apocalyptic devices.
The Lazarus Scalpel for instance is probably more of a necromantic flavour. Alhough the scalpel probably allows a bit of pick and mix as to what bits to use in a newly respawned Frankenstein.
I guess that the vampire book, amongst other things, allow them to walk around in daylight. Thanks to the teeny hint we get to that effect. Other weakness negation abilities might also be enclosed. And some recopies for mulled blood.
It says Regenator. Is it a typo or something completely different? What does the worm person even need it for? Sciona mentioned he can survive an explosion that could destroy regenerating metre-thick steel.
Clearly it regrows mountains. Earthworms do create mounds with their burrows. He looks like a really big one, so probably makes really big mounds. Likewise, if he is of the draconic flava, they like mountain lairs. Nice thermals and hard for tanks to get there.
Either way, if somone has stomps on his lair, he would have a device to regrow it.
Or maybe he just thinks Manhattan would look better with a mountain growing out of it? If you go back through geological time just about everywhere on the planet would have had a mountain at one point or another.
Regen is also German for rain. It must be a device made by Dr. Doofenshmirtz to control rain. Rain drives earthworms out the earth. Wyrmil needs it to gain control over his people.
Mmm….
1) Creates rain in mountains. I suspect a bit too specialised and non-destructive to warrant a place here.
2) Controls weather and raises mountains. Yup, I could do pretty apocalyptic stuff with that. Pedestal justified.
3) It rains mountains. OK, that could pretty much wipe out all life on Earth with a brief shower.
It also sounds a lot better than the king’s potato, the regentator. It could be a case where the last letter was dropped for linguistic flair.
Re_”Lazarus Scalpel”:
I’m reminded of an episode of “Friday the 13th: The Series”, in which a cursed scalpel can save any patient…
…if it’s 1st ‘charged-up’ by killing someone else.
[https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0583309/?ref_=ttep_ep7]
…classic example of the “A Life For A Life”-trope.
It’s mostly just filled with fan fiction of sparkly vampires.
Mostly.
Nooooooooo! Even Sciona would not co-operate in unleashing such an abomination on the Earth!
If that “vampire book” is the “Occito Lumen” it would be seriously important…
Based on his comment Deus could get into the vault any time he wanted, He just didn’t want any of the other “investors” (?) to know he was in the vault. I’m also assuming he knew about the magic web being down and could have done his shopping at anytime between then and Sciona breaking in. I can only assume he wanted to meet Sciona in person and what better way than to get her off balance by dropping in on her heist. Possibly for intel on what she intends to do. After all using your money for shady deals without getting caught (by anyone that matters) takes time.
Sciona had better hope it isn’t bad for Deuses business. :P
Previous page Deus thanked Sciona for leaving the door open for him to come in as well, so it is not likely he could get in at any time.
This page he mentions “compensation to access this location”. He implies he doesn’t feel the need to buy a key since she already left the door open for him to walk through.
He is also manipulative jerk/borderline evil overlord, you can’t trust everything he says, because that’s what he wants you to think he’s thinking, not what he is thinking. Maybe he just didn’t want to alert the council, and Sciona unknowingly provided him a cover. It’s not likely she will go tell the council what has happened here. If she does encounter council enforcers in the future, there won’t be much talking.
Deus?
*blink blink*
The saviour of a nation? Beloved by little girls for rescuing them from a corrupt dictator? The Apex Superheroine Max’s ex boyfriend? The supplier of Archon with all the tools they use to fight evil? The shining pinacle of capitalism? The embodiment of the American way?
How can you accuse him of such hurtful things? :-O
In all seriousness, Sciona should be aware that Deus is going to call the cops on her, as soon as he can figure out a way to get the cops to gack her before Sciona can tell them that Deus looted the vault.
‘Deus in 2020’?
^_^
I would need 20/20 hindsight to know for sure. Ask me again in three years time.
Remember that this is taking place during the Obama era, so Deus can run in 2016.
*sigh*
And I just had a pang of jealousy because a literal fucking super-villain would be better than the fascist piece of shit we have in office now.
LOL.
please stop I as a prior soldier in the military hate myself when I am forced to say yes by honesty to such negative statements about the commander in chief
Please, I have five kitties sleeping on my lap. You shouldn’t make me LOL again!
One thing people like him are not known for, is lying
… Except when they choose to do so..
No no no. They never choose to acquire a negative reputation like that. Besides which, there are never any witnesses left alive to slander them.
They do not lie, they merely phrase their words so it is ambiguous.
Lying…?
No need for THAT!
There’s never any need to speak an untruth when you can get the same results by OMITTING key details.
“If they fail to ask the important questions, how exactly is that MY problem?”
“Previous page Deus thanked Sciona for leaving the door open for him to come in as well, so it is not likely he could get in at any time.”
I think I side with [Digger71] on this one.
What makes this moment worthwhile for Deus to exploit is that his accessing the Vault at any other time would require submitting to the scrutiny of the Council, who would 1st require him to explain-&-justify why they should allow this troublesome (& dangerous) access to be granted.
Does that sound like the sort of bureaucratic “hoops” that he’d willingly jump thru, if he didn’t need to…?
No matter where the story goes from this point. IMO that shopping car puts Deus solidly in the top 20 villains of all time. That is style right there.
+1
+2
+3
FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! Kiss Kiss Kiss!
X X X
but every succubus on the planet would have been flying to get here for that. porno sense would have rendered the disabled alarms relay pointless.
“…but no tongue on the 1st-Date…
…I’m NOT that kind of a girl!”
“SHUT UP, DEUS!!!?!”
“Oooh! This whole ‘Angry Chick’-look is REALLY working for me, Sciona!”
“SHUT! UP! DEUS!!!?!”
I’m sure there’s a trope for reverse cliche’ casting of supers.
The smallest is the strongest…
The one you wouldn’t expect having the mental powers…
Is I am sure. Size matters not.
Ahah! Deus’s Superpower is the ability to summon shopping trolleys! This explains everything!
Very much aided by being within arms-reach of an open portal.
power very similar to the generals summon dramatic glasses
Steel Shopping Cart is Stunted off of the Golden Ticket power.
Sciona should recruit someone with shape shifting or chameleon-like powers so that way they can impersonate Vale or just take a front and profile shots of her,create a latex mask with a wig styled after her hairstyle,dress someone in the outfit she’s currently wearing while holding said Vale mask while someone photographs her. Sciona would either email or Instagram or whatever that pic for Deus to see and causing him to accuse Vale of betraying him…!
Real fast, if she wants to keep all the artefacts.
Vale’s bemused expression at Deus’ grabbing a shopping cart out of nowhere is pretty amusing :P
that being said Vale is apparently a Teleporter, considering how she is able to step between Deus and Scoria, then be 4 ft behind as he pulls out his shopping cart, then be in front of him again in a blink of an eye.
Just a top-notch bodyguard. They get that spell-like ability at 12th level.
Query: Is there any place we can see the finished work from the last incentive? I was really looking forward to seeing the finished version.
Probably not. Invariably if Dave does colour in a vote sketch, he will do so during the month in question and mention that it has been updated in his blog.
That said though if one of our more talented readers wants to try their paw at colouring it in, I imagine Dave would be happy to put it up in his fan art section on Deviant Art.
Either way though DaveB, it would be nice to have the old incentive on DA please, for anyone who omitted to download it.
Deus bringing a shopping cart of all things is a nice touch.
Theatricality and Presentation, now that is a super-villain.
As Megamind said, presentation is the difference between a supervillain and a regular villain.
Fight! Fight! Fight!
Sciona is out of her depth, did she but know it, and I would love to see her take a fall.
Well, considering that she is an artificer, close combat wouldn’t be her thing. At least not in 3.5 and unprepared to boot.
Cithall’s and Sciona’s mild friendship seems to have frosted over…
A shame but them insulting and threatening each other is just as good. Maybe even better.
Who is “Dr. Chuckles”? I had the Vault Raiders pegged as Sciona, Cthillia, Wyrmi and the vampire from the council. Is there another, or is that a different name for one of them?
Like any good spy, you cannot see Dr Chuckles, at the moment.
Sciona, I presume.
Naa, the guy in my second link above. An actual name (or the one he responds to anyhow) as opposed to a nickname for Sciona.
Dave, those high but solid heels are called wedges. Don’t ask me why I know that.
I imagine memories of a wedgie will be a sore point for you.
Technically, those particular heels are actually platforms. (Not being an asshole btw, I just know how much the peeps in this community love semantics and I love them for it <3)
Wedges look like this. And they are way too wobbly for efficient ass kickery.
Chunky heels which were Dave’s guess are close to platforms, but they tend to only add height in the back and they don’t usually have any treads.
Which brings us finally to platform heels which give you elevation in both the heel and the pads of your feet, as well as the tread grip necessary for running. They are the sexy badass’s heel of choice.
Short bodyguards are the best. Especially when they’re sassier than Wendy’s Tweets without having to talk!
That’s why I love Neo.
The One?
From RWBY
Her fight against Yang on that train was essentially a drawn out game of “Nanny Nanny boo boo. You can’t hit me.” And with that damn smirk the whole time…
Wow, almost ten million views on YouTube. I am assuming that this is legitimate? Having sat there, unchallenged, since 2013. Unless you are referring to some other RWBY?
*follows the white rabbit, eats both the red and blue pill*
*turns a bit yellow*
Yep, that’s it. Neo (short for Neapolitan, in reference to her colour scheme) appears significantly later, though.
That’s the RWBY! They’ve got the TV series, an official Japanese Dub (and the title of honorary Anime), a video game, and are now working on a board game.
Neo is in a few episodes as an assistant/bodyguard for Roman and Cinder, but her best fights were in Volume 2 Episode 11 and Volume 3 Episode 11. Her sass is heavily implied, winning against Yang by wordlessly insulting her and treating their fight like a joke, knocking her unconscious with only a parasol. She also shows some flair during her other appearances, and her joking attitude is conveyed via text to Roman before the Volume 3 fight. The only character to ever top her on the Yang-annoyance scale is Neon Katt (you’ll get the joke when you see her semblance in action) from Team FNKI.
I am working my way through all the episodes. So far every one has received a thumbs up. Plus I will be subscribing. Nice to find anther channel posting legitimate content of their own.
I have seen the episode of them playing the boardgame, which was very cool.
Not to mention an episode mostly dedicated to a massive food-fight! With a character casually reversing entropy. Totally awesome.
I tried the voting incentive, it showed a picture ofvsome guy labelled Sgt. Mav. The 3 choices were Heinrich, nifty and datchet. guessed wrong, rolled again, got a better mix. Has this happened to anyone else? and what was the right guess?
Happens all the time. Some of the pictures doesn’t even have a name, so unless you happen to follow the comic they appear in you have a one in three chance of getting it right.
There are many thousands of comics in the rotation, so most folks will have had different choices today. But we do have a big readership, so the odds get balanced out.
Unlabeled portraits (or ones without a matching choice) do turn up from time to time. I find it fun trying to assess the appearance to try and match the name. I can’t remember the last time I got it wrong. Although sometimes it does require a lucky guess, so I have had to go for the re-roll in the past.
Lol, I didn’t notice the shopping trolley before!
Deus did make very impressive use of slight-of-hand.
Well, the Vault hasn’t been accessed in a few decades, therefore it’s inventory shouldn’t have changed…
Oh, that’s clever. Deus manipulated Sciona and Friends into accessing the vault for him.
“Assuming someone knew everything about us” – villain 101. Know your competition.
“and had a full inventory of this vault.” – villain 102. Make your competition think you know more than they do.
“If you’re asking for compensation to access this location, I generally try not to pay for things I already have.” villain 201. Advanced blame shifting to competition. Also known as “I didn’t do it, nobody saw me do it, you can’t prove anything.”
Deus is being somewhat disingenuous here (as one would expect).
He wouldn’t be paying for access to the vault he’d be paying for not being immediately attacked. After all if I walk into the local Wal-mart I have access to everything there, it doesn’t mean I can just start taking things out without paying for them.
And Sciona and company have plenty of reason to attack him.
1) As pointed out above he can immediately narc on them or merely hold the threat over their heads
2) He has access to a lot of information he shouldn’t have, they want to close the leak
3) Just because their primarily after particular objects doesn’t mean they wouldn’t want to take the rest anyway.
4) Even from their point of view some of these objects may be to dangerous to let out in the world, or just to dangerous to be in any hands but their own.
5) Letting someone horn in on your robbery sets a bad precedent. Even if you don’t directly gain anything from killing him you don’t want people (or just Deus) thinking your pushovers
6) If you’re going for some kind of world domination thing he’s competition you have to take out eventually anyway.
7) He’s really annoying and they’ve killed for less.
The reason against simply killing him is presumably he has some reason to think he’d survive such an attack or he wouldn’t be here and they don’t really know what his resources are so he could be a danger to you if yo attack. I mean he could just be bluffing, but that seems like way to risky a bluff.
My take on Deus’ last statement is that he’s just opening negotiations for the price of her safe-cracking work.
If she wasn’t so upset, she’d see the value of his team taking stuff that her team doesn’t need.
Each additional missing McGuffin helps to ‘muddy the waters’, concerning her team’s ultimate goal,
& Deus would then be beholden to her, for a future favor.
Sciona has a very, VERY good reason NOT to attack them: they are on a time budget. As carefully as she’s planned, Sciona knows that her breach is not going to go unnoticed forever. Assuming that Deus is really willing to allow her to take what she came for, it’s in both their best interests to get what they came for and get out, asap.
Additionally, the odds are against her, unless she has some crazy stuff up her sleeve. Sciona has some powerful folks on her side, but she made an infiltration team, NOT a strike team. Deus has a strike team. If they fight, he’ll probably win. Well, until they both lose due to vault security finally swooping in on them because they hung around too long.
Once they get out, THEN she can worry about the fact that she has a new potential enemy that knows WAY too much, and start working on plans to account for him (and possibly take revenge for this humiliation).
I don’t see the problem in using someone else’s portal if they are not after the same artifacts. Crime is all about taking opportunities after all: Even Sciona used the broken VeilNet for her advantage.
Heck, he brought his own portal. Just came in after she killed defenses.
Yeah, Deus has style. He’d not be using a portal that covered his thousands-dollar suit in blood.
+1
The shopping cart is a genuinely wonderful insight into Deus’ personality.
I admit that I’m curious as to how a fight would fall out, but I honestly don’t think it’s going to come to that; Sciona knows that they don’t have unlimited time to get done what they need to get done, so it comes down to how much she’s going to pin on the principle that Deus should pay for the access she’s given him. He’s demonstrated that he knows a lot about them, so she has to assume that he either *does* have enough firepower ready to hand to make it a genuine fight, or he’s bluffing — and the only way to know if he’s bluffing is to start the fight. And while Cthilia’s death ray is impressive, I’m not sure I think it’s a great idea to start firing it around in the same room with a woman who can open up portals, unless you’d like to see what it feels like to shoot yourself in the back of the head.
I may be wrong, but I think that while Sciona will be angry, she’ll eventually — grudgingly — give ground. And at the first indication of a double-cross or contested object, sucker-punch Opal. Sciona’s hanging a lot on this heist, and I think she *will* take a chance if it looks like she’s not going to get what she came for.
These two things you said. They appear to be mutually exclusive.
Not at all. Rather it is the only way to punch her. If she can see it coming then she can open a portal to divert the attack elsewhere. But catch her unawares of the attack (which is what a sucker punch is, a surprise attack that makes the victim look like a sucker) and she has no time to actively defend.
Although I suspect that you are working from the assumption that she would spot the punch and be able to intercept that. But such is only possible if the attacker is inept enough to telegraph the move or fail to attack her when she is distracted, or do so from a spot where she is blind-sided (such as through Opal looking the wrong way or an opponent flanking her).
Yeah, that’s what I meant — sorry I wasn’t clear. My assumption is that Opal needs to be aware of an attack to be able to counter it with a portal, and that a portal takes her some minimal amount of time to establish. Catch her off-guard, and then knock her in the head — sort of like what happened to her in the Vehemence fight.
1. I’m with Cthillia and Deus here. I’m sure she didn’t snitch and Deus was resourceful and smart enough to have intel to know that this heist was going down just as he said. Although, I wouldn’t discount the possibility that *someone else* in Sciona’s group snitched.
2. I’m with Sciona on Deus compensating her for the intrusion. Because the other option is for Sciona to cause trouble to Deus right then and there. He may have Vale and Heavenly Sword with him, but Sciona has her own big guns too, and is a big gun herself. Even if a fight is something Deus can win, the trouble will slow both groups’ heists down perhaps long enough for actual security to notice, arrive, and intervene in time (even if we know it didn’t), at which point, it’s possible no thief gets anything they want. Deus may as well pay her somehow to shut her up and let them each go their merry way. Also, from what we’ve seen of Deus, he does have his own code of ethics and standards in his own greedy, ominous, villainous way. Paying Sciona for being an uninvited guest riding on her endeavor is just fair even in his grand scheme of total world acquisition*.
3. People are talking about Deus getting the wobbly wheel shopping cart despite his immense wealth. My take on it: *He specifically picked out and brought a shopping cart with crappy wheel for the lulz.* The man does have his own sense of humor.
* Instead of domination because a business term would be more fitting.
1. Agreed.
2. That is the route that fair people take. Sadly that is anathema to the thought process of ruthless corporate heads. Deus’s only concern is “will Sciona risk dying in a fight or being delayed long enough to be caught?”
As Deus’s team have caught her totally flat-footed, and she has no idea of their disposition or capabilities, but Sciona is otherwise a shrewd tactician, he can be confident that she will not fight. Sciona knows the only way she could enforce her claim is by fighting, and she realises she would likely loose.
At which point the risk of time loss becomes a non-issue, as her tactical acumen will demand that she proceed with her plan, without significant delay. After all Deus has already made it clear that he will not compete for anything that Sciona’s team are willing to risk dying to get.
Sciona has no more wish to get caught than he does, and both parties know that a top team of supers and supernaturals will be on their way shortly. They will know that it is only a matter of time before someone realises the Dark Reliquary’s alarm is no longer connected to the council.
3. One other possibility is that he was simply short of time. A shopping trolley is not something I can envisage Deus having any need for normally. Checking their intelligence on Sciona and her team, plus the Dark Reliquary, assembling the team, briefing them and more will have taken priority.
Opening a quick portal to a supermarket, to grab a shopping trolley, may have been a last-moment improvisation. Which means he would have had to grab whatever one was convenient. Not being familiar with such, he probably did not realise that would be one that had been abandoned because it had a wobbly wheel.
2. The way I see it, Deus is in the same boat. Your question of “Will Sciona risk dying in a fight or being delayed long enough to be caught?” also applies to him, and while he embraces being a chessmaster-type of supervillain, he’s neither stupid nor arrogant enough to be stupid. I doubt the Twilight Council is going to hold back just because he’s rich and famous and not under their purview (not a supernatural being himself). There’s not much difference in the obliterated corpse of a billionaire and anyone else’s.
Also, ruthlessness =/= unfair. Deus has standards both as a businessman and a supervillain. In fact, genry-savvy as he is, I’m sure he also embraces those as parts of his character.
So pay the stiched-up monster lady already, Deus.
3. I prefer my take because it’s funnier. :-D Deus’ humor encompasses silly troll lulz. Squeek squeek squeek…