Grrl Power #586 – Tentacle talk
Before starting Grrl Power, I had a nebulous concept of succubi being solitary predators, or having their own little fiefdoms, or being the wizard or seer or whatever for a lord of some sort where they’d have access to a stock of partners, willing or otherwise to keep them well fed with tantric energy.
But the more I develop Dabbler’s backstory and think about Demon society, I think it’s really funny that they might have a formalized education system. Even when those classes could entail things your typical human might find abhorrent. And not just for succubi, but for all demons, like you basically have something identifiable as pretty much regular school up to about high school, then there’s a year or two of what amounts to vocational schooling, mostly depending on race, but not so strictly that a succubus couldn’t go to Pit Lord business management school, a Balor could go to Quaistling messenger school, but that would obviously be super weird. Or a Glabrezu could just become a chef. They don’t have to do demon finishing school necessarily, but it would be like meeting a guy named Kiff Smarmington who didn’t attend an Ivy League college. Just… unsettling.
Presumably, demons went through their own Iron Age and Dark Age and all that stuff, where demonic warlords swept across lands, and some phases where the favored currency was the suffering of other races, and that’s the impression many other races have of them to this day. It’s like American car manufacturers shaking off 30 years of second-rate products while German and Japanese manufacturers just dunked all over them. It takes a long time for people to get past stuff like that.
But now they have a modern society concerned more with commerce than conquering. Actually more than modern, since they are a starfaring race. Sure, their soccer riots are exponentially more violent, and the CEO sitting behind the desk might have a flaming skull for a head, but they have a relatively civilized, if somewhat feudal, culture. Just… try not to pick a fight with anyone if you can avoid it, because that Marilith bartender might just be able to summon 6 flaming swords.
The first draft of this page had Decollete coming down with the Succubus version of Mono as an excuse for missing “tentacle week.” I spent some time trying to think of a funny sounding disease name, then realized that necessarily, Succubi are really and magically disease resistant. It’s not like they can’t ever get sick, but venereal disease is unheard of among them. Curiously succubi are pretty much a risk-free partner, in terms of disease and pregnancy anyway. (Succubi choose if and when to get pregnant.) The whole draining your life energy thing is another matter. They obviously don’t have to drain someone to fatal levels, but you should definitely plan to take the next day off work. Probably hydrate too. Get those electrolytes back up.
Oh and in case you were wondering, Decollete cast a translation spell. She figured not everyone spoke Tentaclese.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. $1 and up, but feel free to contribute as much as you like.
This may be in my top 10 favorite pages of the comic. I love the completely different take on both Succubi and Tentacle Masses.
this my be in my top 10 of all comic pages ever. Just up there with the page this belongs to https://i.pinimg.com/736x/f7/83/1d/f7831d1271b544b0b679b29673f4c883–jean-grey-marvel-comics.jpg
Too bad Wyrmil’s name didn’t end with ’tis’ or ‘teez’ or something. Then he could be named Cooties, and no one would want to catch him.
Why is there no upvote button?!
To tease you.
Well, when they first appeared Max and Company would have no idea what they were/what they could do. Maybe they’d absorb energy, or drain life, or affect sanity. They could be indestructible, and Max trying to plow though them could have just ended up with her caught in them. And as she pointed out, confusion is the best counter to super-speed.
Also, they are 1,000 meters down underwater. I’m not sure anyone besides Syndey could follow WyrCoot into the water and give chase. So, the tentacles provided just enough cover for him to hit the water and get out. By the time they realized they could politely ask the tentacles to let them through, it was too late.
As for poor Sydney, I think she’s more freaked by the public nature of such “coursework”. I say “public” because 1) It’s “normally a group project” and 2) There’s have to be someone observing to give the grade in the first place.
Perhaps she will get a nosebleed at the thought that they might invite her to study at succubus finishing school.
Lady: “Well, I never!”
Slappy Squirrel: “You should – it’s fun!”
Ah, you went Animaniacs, I was thinking you were going to go Gilbert & Sullivan.
“Well, I never!”
“But Mom – you must have!”
I think I’m required to wish for an upvote here =)
I’m not sure what’s more disturbing – tentacle eye, tentacle dentata, or tentacle eavesdropping. ;)
What about tenticular-participation?
Tenticular torsion?
Wouldn’t it be considered rude to sommon a creature/demon (or several) and then run off without providing any orders, instructions or otherwise explaining why they were summond in the first place?
There is a chance Coot could go crazy and break free from Wyrmil control or just refuse to cooperate anymore now that he has to talk to monsters. Given the demons reactions this is not the first time their summoner bail on them and have to figure themselves what to do next..
How to stop the summoned demon from subtly twisting your orders to their advantage, or risk their breaking out of your control? Don’t give orders, and don’t control them, just run away. Brilliant!
I wonder if any of the tentacles would like a spacesuit and a blaster?
Plus this would give Decollete a chance try cosplay and earn her missing merit badge.
https://pre00.deviantart.net/c8ad/th/pre/i/2016/087/2/1/earthworm_jim_by_edsfox-d5s0ogd.jpg
Is it still cosplay if you use a glammer?
No one posted the obvious question by now. What is the donation Goal on Patreon to get a full res uncensored Version of Dabblers “Graduation” in that course.
naw, I wanna see pics of the final exam – every problem that’s marked “show your work”.
Not saying no just don’t assume.
Love it.
“It would defeat the point to date a mass of flaccid tentacles.”
No, not if the date was to ‘cure’ flaccidity (wait, that’s actually a word?)
But, yeah, Dave, tentacles definitely need a Who’s Who entry. They have multiple lines, and are contributing to the story arc. Just ‘tentacles’ will do.
I dunno…I think these tentacles are rather…polite. Kinda classy even. I wouldn’t mind chatting them up a bit. As for Succubi finishing school…heh. Bet they didn’t even score in their top percentile…>:D
Definitely more like Glemph than Nort. (Very NSFW, though this particular strip is rather tame for the series)
So, not Lovecraftian horrors, but Chuck Tinglesque horrors.
I’ve long thought it’s a shame that mariliths are typically portrayed as hostile, because they’re basically built to be the ultimate glomping* machines.
Maxima hasn’t asked them nicely to move aside yet. Have we found a phobia, perhaps? Also kind of surprised nobody mentioned a certain Futurama episode.
*if you don’t know what that means, it isn’t as naughty as it might sound.
Forgot about that episode.
So, that happened. haven’t had such a good laugh in a long time. One of my favorite pages for the comic so far. And now I kinda want to see these tentacles become a recurring character, just for the joke value. 10 bucks say they have the most mundane name ever too.
Well there are thirteen of them, so perhaps: Simon, Andrew, James, John, Philip, Thaddeus, Bartholomew, Thomas, James, Matthew, Simon, Judas and Bakers?
You I like.
why Bakers? why not Rufus? surely Kevin Smith’s Dogma is canon
Bakers Dozen, typically the thirteenth product
lolz i forgot about that, i still say the 13th apostle is more fitting than a sudden cooking trivia reference tho
I have to say this is my favourite page from the comic in recent memory. The humour here is spot on.
I dont know about anyone else, but I love Sydneys brain right now….. It moves past meeting a living & breathing tentacle wall, and the succubi innuendo(s), and even the fact that they had to goto school. Then it starts asking the reeealy random questions…. How did they get graded? Was it a team grade? What did Collette need to do to get credit, or was it just an auto pass class anyway?
Now talking tentacles… that I was not expecting!
Ooh, ooh, if the tentacles do not know why they were summoned, then there is a way to distract them, so that Maxima can carry on chasing Wyrmcoot. Someone will have to take one… or several… for the team.
The only task necessary is to find out who will have to do it. I guess Dabbler, Decolette and Sydney will have to… I dunno… draw straws?
I think at least two of those may volounteer for the job.
Hence the straws, to determine who has to sit this out :P
They would never be able to agree on what the shortest straw meant.
Nobody expects the tentacle inquisition.
Hmmm, was Ari sleeping alone? Why is she wearing a robe? And more importantly, holding it closed like that? o_O
Arianna’s job requires her to be acutely sensitive to political correctness. Sydney recently had an acute anxiety attack, relating to exposure of naughty bits. So I think it likely that Arianna is trying to avoid either making Sydney uncomfortable or simply reminding her of the incident.
OK that is probably overreacting, but Sydney’s episode was extreme, so it would make sense for Arianna to play it safe. Albeit that it does make her appear awkward in the process, which could be counterproductive in itself.
On the other paw though, if your suspicions are right, then Arianna is not being very discreet. Bringing her girlfriend back to the base might be noticed by the wrong people. The rest of the press corps could feel that Arianna would become biased, to their detriment.
girlfriend? you mean that female reporter Ari found herself fighting with when Vehemence’s spell was disrupted? i didn’t know they were an item
Didn’t you pick up on the electricity? Half of the Texas power grid burnt out that night!
dating flaccid tentacles would make sense if they were RICH flaccid tentacles, amirite ladies?
Shouldn’t that be:
“Sleeps at base when Sydney is outside of the base at night”?
So going by that description the cuddly bunny Anya from Buffy was so frightened of is something succubi are unnerved by?
Dave, I have a question for you.
Now that it is the holiday season, I was wondering how it is celebrated at Archon. When Peggy decorates her part of the Armory, is she more likely to hang up Mistletoe or a TOW Missile?
Dabbler will be confused. Instead of kissing under the mistletoe, she’ll be yelled at for getting busy under it
Will poor Sydney even get to see a Christmas?
neither, i would guess she would hang up PICTURES of a TOW missile, since a sensible quartermaster wouldn’t try to decorate using high explosives
*mental image of a paint can launcher and confetti bazookas*
Incidentally. don’t imagine too close. There was a paintball game I heard about one year where a paint cannon catapult failed to open the can with the chain set up as it took off. clocked a poor guy up side the head giving him a concussion. it could have been a lot worse
and yeah, I said catapult. I know the guy and remember the story. if anyone can convince a group to put one together and fire full cans he would
This is basically how I think the behind the scenes dialogue of most summoned creatures goes… =p
Have to say, I broke down laughing at this page because if that dialogue wouldn’t have been there, I’d have added it in my head.
How many people (besides myself) Would love Dave to do a ‘Halo’s dreamrealm’ (very) short story with at least one of two pictures of her ‘suffering’ at the tentacles….
I don’t know about others, but Sydney would not like anyone to see that.
Sydney, you are slipping. You have accused both Varia and Dabbler of being an exotic princess, yet here you actually have a genuine alien/demon, mentioning attending a royal wedding, and you fail to pick up on that?
Especially given that she both represents the demonic races, in the Council, therefore probably indicating she has a high status, and is rich enough to casually give out magical jewelry, on a whim!
Wouldn’t the succubus school version of “Mono” be “Deco”? If so, that may both explain why Decolette was off school and part of the name she adopted.
Princess Mono-nookie?
No, seriously, is this talk about a school for succubi (and presumably incubi as well) actually just your way of setting up a cross-over with Dan and Mab’s Furry Adventures? :-p
Actually, seeing Sydney’s reaction to the likes of Fa’lina and Abel (not to mention Dan himself) might be worth it. Maybe even more than my earlier idea of a Whateley Academy crossover.
Although come to think of it, the Eerie Cuties spin-off Dangerously Cloe might be a little less fourth-wall-breaky. But only a little.
Probably not. If it were a comic Dave followed, then you would expect to find it in one of the three recommended comics sections. You will note that Gold Digger is in the “If you like Grrl Power then you might like…” section. This being of significance because it is the only comic (that I know of) which Dave has indicated he would like to do a cross-over with.
To cheer you up though, Erie Cuties is in his “Other comics that I like” list.
Butt “Magick Chicks” is not :(
Heh. I would have mentioned this before, but I thought that he may already have read it somewhere.
Well. If anyone wants to start reading DMFA, plan in that about a day of free time will be gone.
Now have fun!
… how Would you grade that?
By time spent… dating, or volume of “fun”.
Im slightly disturbed im taking such a interest in the grading of that class project.
excuse i need to go see my therapist.
You too Sidney come allong.
Amount of tantric energy produced. But that can vary depending on the quality. For instance observing can generate some, but participating gains more. Likewise the participants can vary the amount. Supers being a particularly nutritious source.
ARCHON should offer these guys a job. They could do security work.
Off-duty they could hang out with the worms from MIB.
Going back, i think i prefer the more cartoon graphic style than the more recent “realistic” one.
Only Sydney was the ‘cartoon style’
I think ayashi is talking more about the old ‘flat’ style graphics compered to the current ‘3-D’ look, from shadows, and other depth creating techniques, Dave has been using.
Hey Dave, just a note for the side panel descriptions, for Dabbler it should be “decorous”, not “decorus”.
So, the tentacles come out of a rift/crevice, and we can see the tips of the tentacles. What’s on the other end? The body of the massive tentacle monster? Another tentacle tip? If so, are they a gibbering worms, or tentacle monster light, or tactical tentacles…..?
“Tentacles” is a hard word to spell correctly every time.
maybe they come from a dimension where every square inch is tentacles; after all, they said something about a whole world covered in them
Covered in, but not full of :)
Plus there’s distance between the planet and orbit (assuming?)
Comic now featuring a cameo by the creator of Nerf Now.
Nerf was created by a toothy eyed tentacle?
o-O
something occurred to me, it’s hard to show different expressions with a cyclopean eye; we expect there to be 2 for the full effect
Difficult, but doable
Even harder without a recognizable face. That is where all the muscles and tissue are which form most of a facial expression. The eyes are important though, as you say, but humans are used to looking for subtle differences within a oval shaped area. With only a very thin vertical face, even if they can form expressions, humans will not be well suited to recognize them.
Most hyu-mons are unable to recognize the expressions of doggies :(
Provable with Science!
Check out the upcoming Royal Institution Lectures, this Christmas, for more.
Small details check:
I love Dabbler’s golden ear jewelry. Nice and sparkly, so they draw attention both to the bling and her ears themselves. In addition to looking great they add nicely to Dabbler’s expressions. They always have, but it helps to draw our eyes to them.
Mind you it makes me wonder where Dabbler’s ears come from. Clearly they are not succubus ears, given Decolette’s are elf-like (unless, of course, there turns out to be a lot of variability between different succubi). So would it take a doppelganger to properly interpret her ear language? Or Dabbler’s third, unknown, species?
I’m betting on the ‘unknown’, but since dopplegangers are whatever they need to be based on who/what perceives them…
Okay I added a bunch more: https://grrl-power.wikia.com/wiki/Cast
Awesome. Love your choice for the first Event Horizons staff pic!
Whole reason I chose it is because I knew you’d feel that way!
What did you think of: https://grrl-power.wikia.com/wiki/Cast#Periwinkle_Butt_Sniffer
We, the fans, support that statement!
It is the only way I can envisage him.
*wags tail contentedly*
Beginning my return journey. I know there will be problems both on route and at the other end. I may be gone some time …
How did you capture the pictures?
Most of them look to be from either the old Cast Page, or the Who’s Who.
Or, simply saved the page, and ‘cut’ the images out
Yep- screenshot, cut, upload, paste.
Few notes (understand that it’s a Work In Progress), Pixelicious needs an image of all three forms, or at least her Hybrid form
For Atomic Boom-tube‘s entry, maybe make a note how she is able to make explosions powerful enough to hurt Maxi, although no one apart from Maxi knows it (not even Boom-tube)
Also for Vektor, Opal and Heavenly, could put a note saying how they know Deus, maybe that they have worked with him in the past (not sure how ‘spoilery’ that would be though) (just read how you added Opal and Heavenly to the Machina Industries listing, but Harem doesn’t actually belong there, unless you add that she is just spying for him, possibly being a triple agent)
Glowbug is an Aussie by the way (fairly sure she is)
May have missed it, but don’t forget Krona(chrome), as a member of the special investigative division of the Twilight Council
Another addition to Glowbug: “Do not get wet!”
I will. I’m using the cast frame how it was set up by whoever did it initially, but I want it to be separate pages like the wikia for “One Piece” and “Adventure Time”, once I’ve got the time.
Cool. I may have to temporarily direct the cast page here until I can figure out how I managed to mess up the original one.
How did you capture the pictures?
I’m sorry, first time commenting from the phone.
ok this is starting to get on me. she’s seen hentai right. she knows what a succubus is so how come everytime a sucubus does what she does she seems that she’s either feels discusted or weirded out. by now she should be used to it. i mean she does this to even the tamest things that succubi do.
Umm, yeah, it’s one thing to have seen ‘hentai’ on your computer, it’s entirely another thing to see it in person
“By now”? You do realise this is no more than a week since the ‘bank robbery’, don’t you?
cryiNG
I love love love Decolette attempting to slide on a technicality (you can’t make an assumption that all succubi have had tentacle sex, I haven’t… even though it’s only because I missed class) but not even caring to keep up the pretense once questioned. Best communication style A+
Aww!