Grrl Power #655 – The Robotech
Given how powerful those orbs are, the screw ship aliens might actually have good cause to attack Sydney. Imagine them in the hands of someone who was out to actually cause a bunch of mayhem. And presumably had 4 or more hands.
For those of you unaware of Sydney’s reference, there was an amazing show called Robotech, which more or less introduced me to proper anime. I had seen G-Force and Speed Racer and Voltron, but that stuff was much more childish. Robotech had a serialized story, dialog spoken at a regular human pace *coughspeedracercough* and amazing music to boot. Hearing the opening theme to this day show gives me a serious nostalgia boner. Some of you will know it as Macross. Robotech was apparently three different anime series bought by Harmony Gold and then translated and dubbed to make them all one long story. Purists of course hate this but I didn’t know any better when I watched it and I thought it was incredible.
ANYWAY. One of the things Robotech was famous for, especially the first season (Macross) was these panoramic shots of distant explosions ripping across the sky, just like Sydney has managed to pull off here. Hence the reference. The last time I checked, Robotech was available on Netflix, and is worth checking out if you’ve never seen it. Imagine that you’re 12 and this is the first thing like it you’ve ever seen. It was pretty damned amazing.
A lot of people have questions about the physics behind Sydney’s flight capabilities. The short version is that she’s currently limited to Mach 4, which granted in most cases is like being limited to only having $4 million dollars in your bank account, but an important factor is that she is immune to gravity while using it, so things like escape velocity aren’t a factor for her. She can just fly straight up and doesn’t have to worry about slingshotting around stuff.
I say “immune to gravity” but of course, she’s only tested it out against 1G. (We can assume the Alari homeworld is within 10% of Earth’s gravity.) If I were her, I wouldn’t go buzzing any neutron stars quite yet.
Thinking about that more, I had originally thought that her speed was fixed once she tops out at mach 4, and it’ll definitely stay that way in the atmosphere, (unless she buys a speed upgrade, obviously) but in space… maybe it makes sense that she can accelerate indefinitely. 1G of acceleration is pretty fast, according to some math I found after a quick google, you could get to the moon in like 3.5 hours, half of it spent accelerating, and half spent decelerating. With 4 dots filled in on her flight tree, I’d actually give her 16Gs of acceleration, which would almost be like that scene in Futureama where Leela flies to the moon before Fry can finish counting down from 10. Ok, not actually that fast, but still pretty god damned fast. It makes me appreciate those Honor Harrington books with ships that could accelerate at 450-500 gravities.
Max never tested Sydney’s Extrosphere flight capabilities. That’s a word, right? It should be. Anyway, maybe Sydney’s speed does work like that, in which case it would probably make more sense for her to Mach 4 straight up till she hits space, then G-boost across and back down, if she ever has to make a cross country trip. Even with that kind of speed, I think the previous page holds up. Sydney wasn’t headed toward the moon long enough to close appreciable distance to it.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. $1 and up, but feel free to contribute as much as you like.
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
Meatspace ComicSeriously these are awesome. Check 'em out!
Not UpdatingNo longer updating or only updates sporadically, but definitely worth reading.
SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
As a Robotech fan myself, I’m not sure you should encourage people to watch the awful Southern Cross.
Robotech Macross and Robotech Invid Invasion are good (1st and 3rd seasons) but the 2nd season, maybe watch once, just to know how boring it is!
But…But…The secrets of Rabbitechnology?
Oooo, no more Shadow Warrior for you :)
You’re not a robotech fan, you’re a Macross fan.
HG utterly fucked up the Story. you wanna know how Southern Cross was actually linked to the first series?
the black kid in her unit was Claudia’s nephew, the gal Roy Fokker was love with. that blonde woman wasn’t even one of Max’s kids.
I assume you are referring to the original Southern Cross and not what became the second generation series of Robotech? Cause in that one Dana is of course the daughter of Max and Miriya.
With the flyball deactivated and being…oh let’s say 300 miles above the planet surface, she is definitely in Freefall, experiencing zero G. Being deep in the planet’s gravity well doesn’t matter. Except for the safety devices you could experience zero G in an elevator.
I suppose she could have some deacceration force once the bubble hits the atmosphere… not sure if it’s the flyball or force field who is responsible for protection from that multi G event.
She’s probably rapid switching from Weapon – Propulsion – Weapon – Propulsion.
The flyball should have a “Severe G Forces … Deactivation not currently available.” But that implies that the balls are actively protecting their master .. which we haven’t seen yet.
Actually we have seen it (active protection), and many times in canon. (I am not picking on you at all either – it ‘s just a fascinating question) I am also debating a AI / intelligent being level one as well.
Examples: when Max Hit her shield and the conference room glass got cracked – Her glasses did not crack as well. true that was a borderline case, but she was much closer to that impact.
The press demo: When max blew up the tank. The people inside.
However; the most current one is when the mega-nega-squidly hit them at point-blank-range. nobody was deaf, or dead. nobody had any ringing in their ears. An explosion of that magnitude at that range would have caused serious injuries. Just ask a Vet who has had a grenade explode “just a little too close” Also of note, the shield either had an insane reaction time, or was already on full max for that level. Probably drained the emergency power buffers too. Also of particular note, they never did seem to budge at all from where they were.
All sorts of very nasty effects could have happened on that last one, but I doubt Sydney could have thought thru all of them in the time she had available. It was more “OH, *bleep*, PROTECT US!:”
If anything when that gang has time to stop and think about it will probably be an epiphany moment. Which I bet then Dabs would be kind enough to break it down.
I would love to see if any of the physics types that read this could break it down a bit more too. The best I could come up with so far (based on the sheer volume of dirt that was pulverized) was about a 120-Megaton underground nuclear blast. The odd part with that is it did not produce a crater like a nuke going off underground (still searching for references)
Go, Go, gadget Syd! make them get the brown pants out!
One problem with your idea: you are assuming Mr Buble has varying levels of protection, rather than just an overall level
No one ever asks for shields to be deployed at only 10% strength, they may end up getting damaged and only doing 10%, butt even then, that’s just how much power they have before they are destroyed, not how much protection they provide
Think of it like the shield provides a certain amount of damage point protection, say, 90 million points, there is no difference in strength provided between when it is at 90 million or just 90
When LaForge tells Picard that the shields are done to 20%, he doesn’t mean the shields are only providing 20% protection, he means the shield generators have only 20% power
For fans of Macross in the US the long wait is almost over. HG’s claim on the names related to Macross are about to run out since they have not done anything with them. Once that happens we should finally get legal access to all of the Macross series.
Actually, HG will still retain ownership of what they’ve actually created, which is mostly just stories. The images will simply revert to Big West’s control and they’ll have the option of what to do with them. Nothing is hitting public domain. You can already legally view Macross, Southern Cross, and whatever the name of the third one is on Amazon Prime, provided you can stand the mullets.
Sydney isn’t an Alien Spaceship, she’s an Anime Spaceship!
OMG! Sydney is Umi Fanswa just way smarter and less cute!
cuter, IMO
Bite your tongue sir! Blasphemy!
Umi Fanswa??? Are you sure it writen like that? From with serie is she?
Panel 2: For Great Justice! Take off every Zig!
Actually, when the Zentradi became allies and they fired the Neutron Cannon from the flagship, they had a beam delivered swath of explosions as it swept across the hostile fleet. The Robotech is valid.
It should be pointed out that she has the shield up the whole time she does this. which means she had to let go of her flight orb and suddenly feel the full effects of vertigo and freefall while lasering intensely.
Except she’s in space, R-M there’s not really any vertigo or freefall in zero G
RhinoMan – 0
Vawkis – 1
Yeah, she’s in space, but if that planet is even remotely like ours, she’s still WAY inside the gravity well. You don’t really hit a ‘Zero G’ point until L1 when flying towards the moon, which is something like 80% of the way to the moon (maybe a little farther even)
Except that she’s going from zero G (under the influence of the gravity based Flight Orb) to zero G (In freefall within a gravity well) – so where would the vertigo come in?
She’s not in freefall. She did not build up enough sideways speed to get in orbit.
Instead, she’s flying down towards the ship that’s on the ground.
>She’s not in freefall. She did not build up enough sideways speed to get in orbit.
So she is in free fall because she is falling freely
Correct. There is no detectable difference between falling within a sealed container (like the shield) and orbiting in a sealed container. When falling, it’s like being on the “Vomit Comet” when it dives to simulate 0G.
Tell that to the people on the ISS
The ISS is in ORBIT. Meaning it’s going sideways at 7.6km/second.
She’s not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton%27s_cannonball
The ISS is in orbit. Meaning it goes sidways at 7.6km/second.
She’s not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton%27s_cannonball
Sydney is definitely feeling the freefall. It’s got a lot to do with relative velocity. Sydney may be high enough to be “in space,” but she was traveling directly back to the planet. As such, she is not experiencing micro-gravity like the ISS (who have a constant feeling of dropping, because that’s what an orbit is) and is instead falling at whatever her final speed was, presumably mach 4, plus whatever the gravitational pull is at whatever point above the planet she is at. She will keep accelerating until air resistance comes into play.
However, she may not experience vertigo. That is much more personal. As she is many miles up, the field of view may be wide enough to negate the feeling. Or she may just be focused enough to ignore it, for now. It’s fair to say that Max at least started teaching Sydney how to start acting rationally when falling.
Actually, I don’t think she could be in space. Sydney’s forcefield appears/needs(?) to open in order for the PPO to function (see Archive: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/2459). So if she was in space, all of her atmosphere would get sucked out… aaaaand that’s not a good thing. Unless there’s some sort of “advantage” with the shield that doesn’t let matter (ie gasses) out but still let’s energy through (see Archive: https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/1630). Or I guess the orange ring could be a visual effect rather than a physical one, in which case, SPACE LAZOR FTW!!! ^_^
However, without the flight orb being active, she will be subjected to gravity and will begin to fall. Of course, the rate of her descent will be slow at first before accelerating, assuming she came to a full stop before switching orbs. She may have also flown up just prior to switching and may decelerating against gravity before falling again, like being at the top of a roller coaster.
I’m pretty sure that the orbs have sufficient magic smoke in them to ensure that the air is not sucked out the firing port. This goes along with the “why don’t lasers penetrate the transparent shield?” question — the answer is ” Because alien space magic?”
The orbs are clearly designed to prevent the user from killing themselves by accident — cf the way the green orb came to her hand. “Don’t fire the PPO inside the shield” is probably something the designers thought of.
actually if the hole is small, and by the looks of things it’s not that big relative to the total surface area of the shield, while she would lose air, and if the Hole was left open long enough all the air would eventually get sucked out. But air can only move though a small opening so fast.. and as example if you take a regular balloon and blow it up and then hold the opening part way shut, you’d notice it takes a while for it to fully deflate. even if you to use your other hand to squeeze the balloon. if you keep the size of the hole constant there’s a limit to how fast the air can come out.
Also the idea that she does need to open a hole in the shield makes me think this isn’t just a laser but some sort of super high energy particle stream, As Lasers can pass though transparent walls but a particle stream couldn’t. So thus the hole could actually be plugged while the beam is going, leaving only a rather short span of time in between opening the hole and the stream getting up to full size and then after the beam ends to when the hole closes.
But even if we where to say the beam is not plugging the hole, it would still take a while for enough air to get sucked though that small hole for it to really be a problem. Also she could just switch orbs again and refresh the air. between PPO shots.
The Pew Pew Orb (I’m not hip enough to use the acronym) doesn’t fire directly from the orb or from Halo’s hand, but from an indeterminate point nearby, and it likely only stays near her hand because she expects it to; she could probably start the beam from anywhere around the boundary of her shield.
In fact, it seems like most of her “offensive” powers, such as the lighthook and Pew Pew Orb, have to manifest and stay outside her shield if the shield is up. She had trouble with that when she was trying to take down Vehemence with the power of boobs.
We haven’t seen her try it with the lightbee, but there’s no real reason to bother with forming a telepresence clone right next to you…except as a feint! “You have only destroyed my shadow!” And if they pick the real one, she can teleport to the other one. Most supers would just whack both at once or in quick succession, though.
You do not suddenly magically become immune to gravity just because you’re ‘in space’. She’s not moving fast enough to be in orbit, and gravity continues indefinitely – she’s falling the moment she lets go of the florb.
She’s just so high up it doesn’t matter.
She’s in space, but she’s not in ORBIT.
She’ll still fall down like a stone.
Just happens to take a long time to fall, so she’s perfectly safe.
there is also her one track mind what when focused forgets what is around her. so she may be feeling the fall but it is not registering because she is intent on farming XP. given a few pages ago i would say she is just in side the atmospher, had she kept going she would be in “space” but gravity would still be trying to pull her back. especially since it is the earths gravity that keeps the moon where it is along with its rotation round the planet. Sidney just doesn’t have the rotation part so would be pulled back down in exponentially increasing rates.
My main point is she is likely just intent on fighting off her attackers so she can live until her team comes back, and not thinking of the fall she is in.
Assuming Mach 4 is 1.1-1.3 km/s in about a minute she could go from sea level to above 99% of Earth’s atmosphere. Space-like in that there’s no UV protection, no positive O2 partial pressure, begining of the ionosphere so what you are breathing (during daytime) is technically plasma, etc.
From a height of a mere 60 km, you can see the horizon of planet of radius 6371 km at 871 km along the ground. That’s probably more than enough to see the ground is curved, since the equator is only 40,000 km long.
Sec[870.9579935 / 6371] – 1 == 60/6371
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(length)#Geographical_3
Glad to see Sydney employing diplomacy and tact, actually just diplomacy, she doesn’t have a second superweapon to name tact, yet.
Tact could be the name for the missile mode she unlocked on the PPO!
first con tact
Wait, so how is the air not all disappearing when she opens a hole in her shield? How does the hole function work? Just EM, or everything?
That is not a hole. When the bubble is up, any ranged orbs create their effects from a starting point a couple centimeters out from the bubble itself. For example, when she fought Vehemence, she initially attempted to use the Lighthook inside the bubble but could not.
Yeah the beam starts way outside the bubble so there would be no point for a hole. Think more like a targetting system or something.
I guess it normally starts near her hand just because she’s clearly watched too much DBZ, and therefore expects energy blasts to be fired from the hands. Maxima’s explodey balls definitely reinforce this assumption.
Macross Missile Massacre!
I was thinking “Macross Annihilation Wave”.
I think they call it a “Wave Motion Gun”.
I think “wave motion gun” is Starblazers.
Want to say that the “main gun” on the SDF-1 was a “reflex cannon” or something like that.
You mean Space Battleship Yamato.
I prefer the original to the non-alcoholic release.
I was thinking Sailor Moon: “Uterus Blast”.
There are so many issues with this chapter, lol.
A hole without letting out the air? Whatever happened to her breathing apparatus they were supposed to add to her suit, btw?
What happened to her fear of falling when she releases the orb? Is it just because she hasn’t looked down, yet?
I do have to say, though. It’s nice to see that the PPO can actually do some real damage. All we’ve really seen it do so far is shear off a piece of tank, melt some sand, and start a forest fire.
That’s not a hole. That’s an aiming reticule.
She’s moving fast enough and high up enough that letting go of the florb won’t really feel that much different from flying for the few seconds it takes to shoot her laser.
Also, that high up there’s no sensation of falling, just “oh the planet is over that way and I’m heading towards it.” The sense of falling wouldn’t kick in until you were close enough for objects to start visually changing size/position.
If Sydney is going sub-orbital to travel east to west than you can also factor in the rotation of the earth as it affects travel time.
I have to admit when I 1st saw the explosion lying while idea remember from robo Tech in really just made me think of Tech a man blade. The main difference is that when take a man blade the something like that is usually when the Tech a man from Earth are flying through the opposition like that just leaving a trail of devastation and destruction behind them.
It made me think of Xellos devastating a dragon army with his finger beam
Do you mean the monster who always said “now that is a secret”?
Yes, that would be Xellos, AKA the Ice Cream Cone of Death LoL.
But for me a beam streaking over an area and explosion, hmm, see it so often in anime its hard to pinpoint when I first saw it, I think Solbionica or Casshern maybe, Robotech might have done it first and it just looked so awesome everyone copied it. Heck I’ve seen it done with a sword in some series *slice through a large number of enemies, then they explode all at once*.
…*slice through a large number of enemies, then they explode all at once*.
That would be InuYasha’s Tetsuaiga…..
I don’t recall Inuyasha using a move like that, the Wind Scar and Back Lash Wave were both just slicing energy/wind attacks, his other moves were a crystal barrage he called “Adamant Barrage” and a force field buster whose name I forget but made his sword turn red.
However Gundam beam sabers usually could pull off the slice a bunch of enemies and then they explode all at once.
PS: as an off to the side comment, I will always think it such a weird decision for the dubs to translate “Mazoku” as “monster” rather than as “demon”; caused so much unnecessary confusion with there being other monsters in the series like trolls and giant slugs and such. Like the first Mazoku introduced and they translated it as “a pure bred monster”…like…just call it a demon if you don’t want to use Mazoku as a name.
In Japanese mythology and fantasy, mazoku are supernatural beings, normally evil ones such as devils or demons. The term “mazoku” was used to describe the asura and yaksha in Hindu mythology, as well as Zoroastrianism’s daeva. It is a general term for devils, demons and evil beings. In Japanese polytheism, it is an antonym of shinzoku, “the tribe of gods”.
So monster is a more accurate translation than demon… though devil is even more accurate for the Japanese version. And yes, there are differences between a Devil and Demon.
Great now I am compelled to point these out.
The modern English conceptualization of these three terms is so vague as to render them meaningless…especially “monster”.
Although “Devil” at least has a common definition of a powerful evil force. Demon is usually something supernatural and malevolent; although both terms didn’t mean anything like that in their original definitions and became as such as a result of the Church ascribing “evil” to pagan beliefs. Demon was Daemon, a spirit more so than anything, being between humans and the gods *making them more like lesser gods or elementals than anything. Daemon is a Greek concept.
Devil is several generations and bastardizations of languages removed but comes from the Greek Diabolos; or slanderer. Not something supernatural originally, but a term ascribed to Lucifer, or rather a Satan (which its self is originally a Hebrew word for a type of Angel whose job was to bring accusations against humans…or slander them basically). So “The Devil” is basically the Slanderer of Man, the Adversary, Accuser, basically supernatural prosecuting attorney against human souls. So yes, the term has ended up being ascribed thanks to Christianity narrowing down a group of evil spirits to a single entity creating a quasi-dualism system despite what they may claim to the contrary.
-as a note modern Christians would claim its the slanderer against God, but that’s not what the Bible actually describes and is more a word of mouth belief rather than written dogma concerning the character…that has lasted for over a millennia.
Now monster on the other hand…is more a slur when you look at it. Used to describe everything from abnormally large animals, to supernatural creatures, to hateful individuals, to cute animals with magic powers, it really depends on the individual…I mean seriously Elmo is a monster, Pikachu is a monster, and yet the same term is used to describe a giant fish or a serial killer. It basically just means “outside the norm”. and if we look at the term historically, it original meaning basically meant “deformed” as in “malformed shape”.
-seriously look how disjointed this definition from the online dictionary is (including using a word to define its self at one point…)
1. a legendary animal combining features of animal and human form or having the forms of
various animals in combination, as a centaur, griffin, or sphinx.
2.any creature so ugly or monstrous as to frighten people.
3.any animal or human grotesquely deviating from the normal shape, behavior, or character.
Rhuen, point out where in my comment I mentioned or meant “English conceptualization” of those terms?
And no you didn’t need to point the differences. People can look up the information for themselves IF they are at all interested
Incidentally, you didn’t mention that Mazuko is created by 魔 Ma (meaning Devil), and 族 -zuko (meaning tribe, clan or family. So Mazuko means Devil Tribe.
Maybe they changed the name in translation to avoid the religious nutbenders who were very vocal in those days
I think they just went with monster as kids KNOW what a monster is (I.e something bad), and not necessarily what a devil or demon is, and the religious aspect is a valid point too.
NICE use of Kirby crackle there, Dave B… It’s VERY well done. Kirby would be proud.
DaveB, it’s Exosphere.
And is just me or is it weird not to see Yorp replying to stuff?
Nope, it’s weird.
Definitely weird.
secondis spice , third is stacts, ok got it!
Quaded! obviously your fans miss you @Yorp
Daww.
*wipes tear from eye, with paw*
I will pop in whenever I get the chance. Figuring out a way to keep myself online even whilst migrating around.
Instead of flight of the valkryries Howabout a little of this instead: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuO7vDQ4GhE
She is the Painkiller.
PAIN!!!
Except, how many would be able to hum that tune, and how many would be able to recognize as compared to “Ride of the Valkyrie”? Besides, it doesn’t smell like victory in the morning :P
Escape velocity is the speed at which no further impulse needs to be applied to escape a gravity field. You can also leave the planet’s sphere of influence if you just keep pouring the impulse on, so you don’t need to make Sydney ‘immune to gravity’ to do so without hitting escape velocity. A rocket that reaches Escape Velocity can cut the engines to conserve fuel. Sydney can just keep flying because she doesn’t seem to use any type of fuel, so she needn’t worry about things like escape velocity.
True, but you have to remember that Sydney’s flight isn’t actually based on velocity to any degree. She literally just says “screw gravity” and starts flying.
Remember the demonstration of the Florb back in the ballroom where she just starts rotating?
Next up,Sydney does Star Blazers(or maybe just do her impression of the Wave Motion Gun…!?)
Buster beam!
Just as long as the other guys don’t try “Buster Balls”
I just finished watching Robotech on Netflix…
This is a test comment…
you have passed your test. please enter someone else’s name on the top line and hand it in…
Whose name?
I was given an intelligence test once. It came back negative.
Mine always came back as an imaginary number…
I´m surprised by Dave´s decision to make Sydney fight the monster´s army head-on and without hesitation.
I´m surprised, and that´s great. Thank you.
It’s “RIDE if the Valkyries,” not “Flight of the Valkyries.”
This is a common mistake.
Am I on crack? Because it looks like the PPO is still around Syd’s head in the fifth panel… while she’s using it to blow up a whole lot of flyers.
And they should learn to spread out, and come at the target from multiple directions so its not so easy to mow them down like that. Of course they had just launched and may not have gotten their shit sorted yet.
Everyone and their blind goldfish noticed the ball handling error
This may be the first time these guys have had anyone fight back, let along destroy so many fighters in one go. So, if they survive, fairly sure they will adjust their strategy
Are those confirmed unmanned or is Syd okay with a sudden massive killcount?
They attacked her first, twice, they also wiped out an entire civilisation (and probably a species with it*), so yeah, fairly sure she is okay with it
*She doesn’t know that anyone besides Sci survived, and she also, at this time, doesn’t know what those flying spirits were (she didn’t have time to get a good look)
I’m not saying that they haven’t proven themselves to be the aggressors, its just that usually characters tend to work up to killing folk by the hundreds. She has been a remarkably nonviolent partipant in previous altercations (whipcracking firedude aside) so its jarring for her to suddenly be nonchalantly wiping folks out. I’m not like, trying to throw shade on it or anything, but if next group fight shes just standing there shielding with snarky commentary again its going to be twice as jarring.
She’s alone with no back up.
She is being attacked with intent to kill.
They attacked with beyond necessary lethal force *for presumably not knowing what they were shooting at*…like chucking dynamite into a rat’s nest level of overkill given the crater and the average resistance of living creatures.
Very good evidence especially seen from above that these guys exterminated without concern for good or evil an entire civilization and possibly even the planet’s ecosystems.
Her first reaction was (flight), but she realized she can’t get far enough away, fast enough, so she is stuck with (fight); and she can reflect on her moral decisions later when there isn’t an overkill death armada attacking her.
Understand where you are coming from, and Sydney just shielding offering support and stupid names may just depends on the threat level of the group fight
It is possible that Sydney is coming down off of her meds, combined with survival instincts
So far the world killing alien whoever-they-ares haven’t shown their faces so it would be pretty easy for Sydney to just not be thinking of them as “people” but more like targets in an alien invasion shoot em up game. I suspect if a single one of them stepped out of a fighter or something her mindset would suddenly shift significantly but right now she’s almost certainly not thinking in terms of killing entities but rather destroying *things*… fighters, ships, massive ground based assault squidward like mechs… etc…
I mean intellectually she almost certainly knows that there’s a good chance those things have pilots, but I highly doubt that’s the mode her mind is operating in at the moment.
They kinda look like Cylon fighters to me…
For all we know, it might be That when a ‘destroy that planet in particular’ force is deployed, you don’t want it anymore. Plausabile deniability? NIMBY?
What I’m saying is that it may have had no expectations of surviving the mission.
“Mission accomplished. Time to self destruct. Oh wait…”
Sydney blowing them up may not be the war crime some commentors think it is.
Sydney’s “Practicality” Stat has been shown to be quite high. Her “Compartmentalization” Stat is also pretty strong.
Right now, she’s got a job to do. When the job is done, she’ll schedule some time for philosophy, self-loathing, and justification. Like most heroes, sometimes you make decisions you may later have cause to regret, but in the heat of the moment close analysis equals paralysis. The threat of death affects people in unique ways.
By the way Macross Liberation Day is 13 March 2021 (That’s when HG’s license Expires, If they can’t renew it, They also lose all their copyrights to Macross etc (Which is what’s been preventing the newer stuff like Macross Delta from being licensed in NA))
I’m waiting for Macross 7 and Macross Frontier on BluRay, but Macross Delta would also be nice.
Wait how is she using three orbs at once one orb for flight one for her shield and the last the valfor (ffx) laser lookalike beam I’m confused when did Sidney get more arms?
She’s using the PPO and Mr. Bubble but the artist goofed and put the wrong orbs over her head; the PPO should be replaced with the flight orb.
Since these ships are all massed together, I’m thinking she would just need to destroy one and let the shrapnel from that explosion destroy all the others. Or no?
You have to destroy enough of them to start the chain of the explosion.
Like 1 is destroyed which effect 2 but you need to hit 3 as well to make sure that 2 is very damaged to the point of that it will also be exploded.
from “Wearing the Cape: Ronin Games” by Marion G. Harmon
That’s a chapter lead-in. “Dr Piers” does not actually go on to articulate the hard numbers. Astra, OTOH, does go on to use a NASA spaceship-for-superhumans to invade Japan.
Infiltrate.
There’s a difference.
Yes, and by her own admission/observation, they invaded. In disguise, not in uniform, so it’s espionage on top of that.
I’ve got to admit that I was a mite confused why Sydney named the move Robotech, seeing as the term Roboteching (alongside the term Macross Missile Massacre) bears no resemblance to the maneuver she used. I used to watch one of the shows (can’t remember which) but friend had one of the video games, to which I’d mastered high-speed fly-bys and just peppering my opponents with roboteching missiles. Little burst to draw them out of cover then unload all salvos for the massacre.
So when I hear Robotech (or Macross for that matter) I automatically think of their iconic missiles, not the generic anime space explosion.
Seeing ALOT of discussion in four pages on what such a move is called.
Citing various anime, ones different users like, lawsuits, who did it first, which looks the most similar, ect..
let’s simplify this. No matter what complex anime, manga, comic, video game, name a franchise wants to use for their specific version of it.
When you take it apart what is it?
A beam that is being strafed across a large group of enemies who then explode.
So
A Beam Strafe.
You can ascribe fancy names to different version but that’s the nitty gritty. Like firing one or two missiles can be called things like (Giga Blaster) or (Tank Missile) or (Double D Destroyer), ect… depending on the deployment and purpose. In the end its “fire missiles”
just as this technique is a Beam Strafe when you get down to it regardless of the aesthetics and secondary effects.
And Sydney would like to point out: it doesn’t matter what something is, it’s what one calls it :P
Well yeah, aesthetics, deployment, secondary effects, intensity, these all matter and make the difference between (Water Gun) and (Hydro Blaster), doesn’t change that at its basics its a directed stream of water, only the branding of it directs to the specifics.
Not really, the name does not always imply the power or intensity, remember the ‘Cricket’ from “MiB”?
Tiny little weapon that looks like it was a toy you find in a Cracker Jack box, one hael of a blast
That’s something totally different,
that’s just an inverse of expectations. Done rather often, having some small thing with an innocent name that is really some insanely powerful weapon, being, technique, ect…
I was referring to a base line, where we can name something (brand) it with numerous different names that apply to a specific version, but they have a common base element that doesn’t belong to a single source.
like a flamethrower, water jet, ki beam, hypnosis, ect…
Like yes there is a difference between a (Spiral Dragon Flame) and (Flame Dragon’s Roar), but at their base they are both *shoots a directed stream of fire*
or Kamehameha vs Final Flash, both are ki beams, just different colors and shapes.
That was pretty ballsy by Sydney, especially since with the shield and ppo, mean shes not holding the flight and in an intense free fall..
I give her 3 panels in the next comic before the stomach tries to leap out of her head and she realises whats happening…
Aaah, finally!
Space Pirate Sydney, “Hoist the colors!” Now she just needs to find a small prisoner species on the ship to use as a talking “space parrot” on her shoulder. A droid will do in a pinch.
wait. how is she flying, and keeping her shield up, and shooting lasers all at the same time?
Currently she’s in space, so she doesn’t have to worry about falling when letting go of the flight orb. I mean, she’s still “falling” because the planet’s gravitational forces are slowly pulling her back. But at the moment the fall is slow enough not to be a worry about re-entry to the planet’s atmosphere anytime soon.
I hadn’t realized this, since I haven’t ever watched Macross or Robotech, but a favorite/memorable scene from Slayers was probably a shout-out to that series. Where one of the characters, during a battle between ‘demons’ and dragons, makes a gesture and explodes an entire army of dragons that were flying at him. It had that rippling conflagration from one side of the screen to the other similar to what that this had, and was distressingly awesome. I like how learning about other anime enriches the memories of what I’ve seen.
Yup. Also refreshes memory, gives references to possibly other cool stuff to watch.etc
As a demon in Slayers, Xellos (the mage that did that) it gives a sense of scale to what he did and how powerful he actually was. It was also the story from The golden dragon who was telling it that said he (of the golden dragon race) was “considerably weaker” than the black dragons Xellos had wiped out with that move. The golden dragon used that “ancient event” story as an example as to why he “meekly obeyed” and that you should never challenge a demon.
Yup, Xellos was an “evil” badass in a long cloak (squinty eyes included)
Personally; I’m glad they started up the “Slayers’ franchise after the first three arcs.
Has Sydney been using her “Air” orb or is she about to start suffocating soon?
She used the air orb the previous page.
*Cracks neck* It’s called Macross darnit, and it’s best subbed only. First season wasn’t that damaged, but the second and third season were rather butchered to fit it into continuity. The apparently was completely correct. I know some other issues, too. Harmony Gold is baaad people. They won’t even allow the Macross sequels to be dubbed/subbed.
Amazon Prime has the ORIGINAL, subtitled Macross, unedited, available. Go watch it if you haven’t. That said? Yeah. Robotech was awesome. It got an entire generation into anime. And it’s GOOD anime, with people who die. Oh, I love it so. I have the old X-Box game.
…I can see Sydney looking up Harmony Gold, and having to be restrained by Max from like, bombing the corporate HQ.
Honestly, I always called this sort of attack the ‘Aleksandr’ laser after the summon in Final Fantasy. It’s one of the mainstays of the series, pops up, sweeps a laser across the battlefield, no visible sign of damage for a few seconds, and then the ground explodes upwards from where it swept.
It’s to the point where I refer to other enemies as having an Aleksandr beam if I see them do the attack in other games.
Man, I hope I’m not the only one who “heard” that “LAUNCH FIGHTERS” in the voice of the Ur-Quan from Star Control 2? :P
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeuVNnY28OA
Come to think of it, the ship design of the fighters is a bit like the Illwrath Avengers, with the colour palette of the Khor-Ah Maurader ships, of that same game.
(Refs: https://wiki.uqm.stack.nl/List_of_ships )
So did Sydney just beat out Dabbler for the alien murder cup, or does she get the Samurai Jack morality default?
Science corner: G-force and human body tolerances (g-tolerance)
How many G’s a human body can stand (flight, and football) note: some of the numbers only represent certain cases (front, back, up, down, sideways etc) in some applications of force we are less tolerate than others.That tilt-o-wheel at carnivals is a puke-o-matic for me :P)
Well a normal human can stand up to about 5Gs – think normal commercial airplane flight and extreme roller coasters. some people might pass out, but they are fine.
Stepping up a bit, an fighter jet pilot with a special G-suit and High-Q training and equipment can handle a sustained 10G’s, but can handle 20Gg for 0.3 secs. (20G – ejecting plane- force from the rocket boost – very dangerous- they test with 2G simulators).
Now for a comparison: Football Physics
tackles: anywhere from 30-60Gs, 100G “all the time”, and several over 150Gs. Now remember these tackles and the G-forces generated are over a Very short period of time and can cause severe injuries as well (yea you’ll live but you are not gonna be back to normal any time soon) They also have pads (armor) training, etc to help with that. Also a good picture of some of the ‘normal’ G-forces we face in normal life.
This also demonstrates the difference between Stress and Strain
ref: for a bit more info
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G-force
https://www.popularmechanics.com/adventure/sports/a2954/4212171/
That’s nice, but her flight is achieved through localized gravity fields so even her hair doesn’t move from a default position when she’s upside down. So pretty good chance inertia dampener is part of her flight package.
Not sure if this has been mentioned by anyone in the comments, but what’s the Range/LoS limitations on her telepresence?
Could she send the “Lightbee” as she called it to the Moon and teleport to it? Maybe send it into the enemy craft, then PPO it a new one from the inside? Or even use it to teleport to Earth?
I figure if any of this was possible, Sydney probably would have tried doing so already so I was just curious.
It may have an infinite range, butt it still has to travel there physically and manually, and it probably doesn’t come close to even sprinting speed let alone Mach 10 billion