Grrl Power #983 – Business or pleasure?
Customs Agent: Reason for your visit to our dimension, Sir?
Thothogoth: Telling off an Ex.
Customs Agent: I see. I will expedite your processing forthwith.
Some book recommendations
The Laundry Files – A lot of people might know this as The Atrocity Archives, but that’s just the name of the first book. Basically, a funny-in-a-British-way-but-also-serious-cause-they’re-fighting-terrors-from-beyond version of the BPRD, following a beginner field agent as he works to defend the world from Cthonic terrors, apocalyptic math, and avoiding literal Death by Powerpoint. This series reminded me what, and I hate to put it this way, but, what good writing is. I don’t mean that all the stuff I’ve been reading lately is bad, but it’s almost entirely functional. It tells a story. Very little of it has any… I don’t want to say “poetry” because fuck poetry, but the Laundry Files makes you work just a little bit as it evokes the world. Like at one point the MC is redlining a rental Prius down the Autobahn “while someone back down the road fires Audis and BMWs at me out of a cannon.” Obviously no one is actually shooting cars at him, it’s just an artful way of saying that everyone in real cars are thundering past him and threatening to send him into a tailspin with their jet wash. Yeah, art. That’s the word I was looking for.
Oh, Great! I was Reincarnated as a Farmer – A guy gets isekaied to a new world where he’s stuck with the class “Farmer” and hates it so much that the author was able to fill a 600* page book about how hard this guy works to get around it. The thing I like about this book, well, one of the things I guess, is that a lot of the time someone winds up in a world with magic and levels and whatever, and there’s no explanation for all the game mechanics stuff. This book explains a fairly reasonable magical ecosystem that actually makes a lot of sense. I also like it because I am an inveterate “Rule Taker Advantage Of” AKA ‘Sploitzer, and this book is about a guy who is good at that, but travels to a world where there are literal scholars who study the magical rules of their world in order to try and eek out maximum gains, so he doesn’t just show up and figure some obvious thing immediately and all the XP, Gold and Women in the world just fall on his dick right away, unlike a LOT of these isekai novels.
*(According to Amazon’s page count thing which always seems to overestimate by about 25% IMO. I don’t know, maybe they’re calculating it using a 13 point font instead of a 10 or something.)
Engineering Ludus – Okay, so I really like Delvers, LLC. To me it’s like the seminal isekai novel. I mean it’s definitely not the first story of its kind, but alongside Tamer, it was one of my first. Tamer technically counts as isekai, but really I think there’s an implied value with those books that the character(s) will be interacting with another world’s culture, and Tamer is like, welp, here’s a forest. Anyway I like Delvers and Engineering Ludas is kind of like… official FanFic? Okay, Blaise Corvin invited some other authors to write short stories that take place on Ludus, and published them in Delvers LLC: Surviving Ludus. One of those stories got continued in a full length novel, which the author sent me and was like, “I hear you like Delvers.” So I read like one paragraph of it, then got annoyed and had to go buy Surviving Ludus so I could catch the start of the story, read that and came back to Engineering. Despite liking Delvers, I had never picked up Surviving Ludus before because I generally don’t care for short stories. I don’t like getting invested in a character when their story is only 80 pages long. I generally don’t even buy novels unless there’s at least two volumes published already.
But anyway, Engineering Ludus is more Delvers, well, not Delvers, but it’s more adventures on Ludus, albeit lower level than the Delvers themselves. At least in book 1? Hmm?
On an entirely unrelated note, I don’t like that “Isekai” has become the official term for “Hero from another world.” Like the Japanese invented the genre? John Carter of Mars was published in 1912, and that’s probably not even the first popular example. Yeah, I know, the Japanese largely popularized the trope. I guess no one would understand if I started writing “So the MC gets Cartered and has to fend off all the XP, gold and women trying to fall on his dick…”
Tamer: Enhancer 2 – Progress Update:
Final fight is close to wrapping up. I think it has some pacing issues as I have trouble turning off the “character moments” hose. Like, right in the middle of a fight, the MC gets his first good look at a new character, so I spend a few sentences describing them. It slows down the pace of things for readers. The easy fix it to abbreviate that description to just the absolute basics, then elaborate when the fight wraps, so I’ll probably just wind up doing that. I’m haven’t quite gotten to it yet as I’m trying to wrap the fight still, but, hey, this is “Progress Update,” not “How things will eventually be.”
September’s vote incentive is up! It’s been over a year since Max was featured in one of these, so I figured it was time to revisit.
If you just popped by to see it right when it went up, you might have missed the update. Her nipples were a touch high in the first version, and if you poke through the comments there, you can see the reference I used, only that model’s boobs were about 3 cup sizes smaller. Anyway, I flew her nipples south for the winter and updated the relevant pics.
Nude version is up at Patreon.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. 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.
It’s amusing how despite mega monsters show up to cause trouble, military protocol is always addressed, lol.
The forms must be obeyed. Otherwise it’s just barbaric anarchy. ;)
It’s also pretty smart in this case though. Either he provides her with information, and now they know more than what Dabbler knows, or he is belligerent and we’re back to square one.
It worries me more if a fight breaks out. I’m sure the the team can kick his ass (Sydney probably can do it solo), but Kevin’s still there. He might become unmanageably powerful.
I’m pretty sure ol’ Tom is only halfway out of his portal, Maxima could easily just push him back through if violence becomes necessary. Also, the dude portaled (apparently) because Kevin was dumping his excess vitamin-v, so a little demon fighting shouldn’t push him over the top, and even if he did, Sydney just proved that she can totally neutralize him regardless of how strong he is, so I don’t expect him to try anything any time soon, no matter how much juice he gets.
If Kevin gets ornery Sydney can just toss him through a portal again.
He got caught by surprise as he rushed at her, not knowing she could do that. He’s a smart guy, he’s not likely to fall for that again, so it depends on whether her portals actually need him to rush into them, or if she can form them around him. If she can’t form them around him, he won’t fall for that again.
I’m not entirely sure that ‘the team’ can beat Tom as easily as you’re assuming, let alone Maxima.
Remember that there’s only two people on the planet that ever fought Maxima to a draw, and Dabbler is one of those two people. And Dabbler has been hiding from this guy. It might just be because of her shirking some sort of responsibilities, but it could also be because he’s incredibly powerful. Maxima is one of the most powerful supers. That does not necessarily equate to being one of the most powerful beings in the universe, even if she’s capable of one-shotting a Fel Supercarrier at full shields (when using her full strength of her plasma blast).
Do you remember what comic this was mentioned in?
What comic what was mentioned in? I mentioned several things in my post. Let me know what you’re asking and I can link you to the comic :) But here’s a few links in case I can discern which you’re asking about.
If you mean:
“there’s only two people on the planet that ever fought Maxima to a draw, and Dabbler is one of those two people.”
Then the link is:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-150-not-sure-where-max-stencils-her-kill-marks/
(panel 1 and panel 3)
If you mean:
“And Dabbler has been hiding from this guy.”
Then the link is:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-737-succubus-couture/
(panel 4)
If you mean:
“but it could also be because he’s incredibly powerful.”
Then the links are:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-177-intergalactic-baggage/
(in which Dabbler was only able to banish him temporarily – possibly having something to do with the gemstone in his chest which was apparently broken a little the last time Dabbler managed to keep him at bay)
and
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-186-fingers-to-maximum-steepleage/
(panel 3 – where he’s shown to be one of the ‘big boss’ enemies, like Vehemence and the OTHER person who fought Maxima to a standstill, which means he’s not a typical scrub villain powerlevel)
If you mean:
“Maxima is one of the most powerful supers. ”
Maxima says this rather constantly – at the press conference, to Anvil right before her date with Deus, etc.
I can give links but those two are rather easy to find, plus I already mentioned one of the links above.
If you mean:
“That does not necessarily equate to being one of the most powerful beings in the universe,”
That’s just already proven by the fact that she isnt able to beat Dabbler, who is NOT the most powerful being in the universe by her own admission. I’m not even sure Maxima could have beaten the Kaiju with their shimmer shields, given they may be as powerful as Sydney’s shields and she hasnt been able to breach Sydney’s not-full-power shield either.
If you mean:
“even if she’s capable of one-shotting a Fel Supercarrier at full shields (when using her full strength of her plasma blast).”
Then the link is:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-767-maxima-effort/
This was Maxima’s maximum blast, and she made it even more powerful by focusing the beam EXTREMELY tightly after the initial blast did not get through the Fel Supercarrier’s shield, and neither did the first ‘focused beam’ or the second ‘focused beam.’ Remember how Maxima’s powers work. She normally has everything pretty much evenly distributed, but when she needs to, she can redistribute the power levels to one or two areas, like she did with Vehemence to keep herself from getting killed, then how she then suddenly shifted all her power from armor to strength to manage to punch in his trachea despite him being more powerful than she was. Same is true for the plasma blast. It was something she had never done at that level before, shown in panel 12. “Always wanted to try that.” ie, she has never tried to max out her plasma blast before, due to how freakishly powerful it already is at normal levels.
I meant the only two people fighting maxima to a standstill thing, although I suppose that wasn’t clear
Thanks for being thorough anyway :)
Happy to please! :)
I made a rather long response with a bunch of links, but it’s under moderation, probably because I had 5 links in it to different grrlpower comic strips.
You’ll probably need to let me know which thing you’re asking for a link to so I can just post the one link.
The two to a standstill part? Page 150.
That was one of the links yes. There were 4 others. I will repost latervtoday if it doesnt get through moderation
I’m going to post it again but without the links, just the page numbers.
This is a repost. Doesnt have the links because if I post the links it goes into moderation and I have no idea when it will get shown, if ever. Anything more than like 3 links tend to send a post into moderation I think.
—
What comic what was mentioned in? I mentioned several things in my post. Let me know what you’re asking and I can link you to the comic :) But here’s a few links in case I can discern which you’re asking about.
If you mean:
“there’s only two people on the planet that ever fought Maxima to a draw, and Dabbler is one of those two people.”
Then the link is:
Comic #150 – not-sure-where-max-stencils-her-kill-marks
(panel 1 and panel 3)
If you mean:
“And Dabbler has been hiding from this guy.”
Then the link is:
Comic #737 – succubus-couture
(panel 4)
If you mean:
“but it could also be because he’s incredibly powerful.”
Then the links are:
Comic #177 – intergalactic-baggage
(in which Dabbler was only able to banish him temporarily – possibly having something to do with the gemstone in his chest which was apparently broken a little the last time Dabbler managed to keep him at bay)
and
Comic #186 – fingers-to-maximum-steepleage
(panel 3 – where he’s shown to be one of the ‘big boss’ enemies, like Vehemence and the OTHER person who fought Maxima to a standstill, which means he’s not a typical scrub villain powerlevel – the only person in that list that is NOT a villain is obviously Deus, who is only there because he’s easily as powerful because of his intellect, but without being evil. All praise Deus, amen.
If you mean:
“Maxima is one of the most powerful supers. ”
Maxima says this rather constantly – at the press conference, to Anvil right before her date with Deus, etc.
I can give links but those two are rather easy to find, plus I already mentioned one of the links above.
If you mean:
“That does not necessarily equate to being one of the most powerful beings in the universe,”
That’s just already proven by the fact that she isnt able to beat Dabbler, who is NOT the most powerful being in the universe by her own admission. I’m not even sure Maxima could have beaten the Kaiju with their shimmer shields, given they may be as powerful as Sydney’s shields and she hasnt been able to breach Sydney’s not-full-power shield either.
If you mean:
“even if she’s capable of one-shotting a Fel Supercarrier at full shields (when using her full strength of her plasma blast).”
Then the link is:
Comic #767 – maxima-effort
This was Maxima’s maximum blast, and she made it even more powerful by focusing the beam EXTREMELY tightly after the initial blast did not get through the Fel Supercarrier’s shield, and neither did the first ‘focused beam’ or the second ‘focused beam.’ Remember how Maxima’s powers work. She normally has everything pretty much evenly distributed, but when she needs to, she can redistribute the power levels to one or two areas, like she did with Vehemence to keep herself from getting killed, then how she then suddenly shifted all her power from armor to strength to manage to punch in his trachea despite him being more powerful than she was. Same is true for the plasma blast. It was something she had never done at that level before, shown in panel 12. “Always wanted to try that.” ie, she has never tried to max out her plasma blast before, due to how freakishly powerful it already is at normal levels.
She may be hiding from him, but in a flash back it also looked like she was defeating him.
while I wouldn’t shrug at the idea of demon lords also easily taking down Borg class aliens, mainly because of things like Disgaea, Darkstalkers, and YuYuHakusho having some influence on my outlook there.
She didnt ‘defeat’ him – so much as she managed to temporarily banish him. Something that might have had to do with the glowing gem on his chest, since in that flashback, there were also a few broken pieces of that gem on the ground near the pit where he got sucked in.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-177-intergalactic-baggage/
But she obviously KNEW that she didnt ‘beat’ him in any sort of permanent sense, because if she had, she wouldnt be hiding from him on Earth in the first place.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-737-succubus-couture/
(panel 4)
when a football team (defeats) the other team they don’t murder the players and the other team isn’t permanently gone.
a defeat is a defeat, it doesn’t have to be permanent or fatal.
“when a football team (defeats) the other team they don’t murder the players and the other team isn’t permanently gone.”
I’m pretty sure the stakes are a lot higher for Dabbler’s adventures than a football game.
Irrelevant, you are arguing the definition by the way I used it.
How many “beats” does a Boxer have? or a gamer?
if you defeat someone, I’d say sealing them away, banishing them to another dimension, or beating them down till they have to surrender, counts as a “defeat”.
you can argue semantics, or which words sound cooler or more permanent or *feel* right to you for the situation; but all of that is entirely due to your own experiences and usages of the terminology and not the definition.
-Win a Victory over (someone) in battle or a contest.
beating them is a synonym for defeating them; except beating also has a ton of other usages pertaining to physical assault. Hence why I use the word “defeat” not “beat”, she defeated him in whatever contest that was because she banished him and possibly got whatever it was they were both after on that adventure.
there is no argument here, only preferences.
“Irrelevant, you are arguing the definition by the way I used it.”
So what you’re saying is I’ve sidestepped your argument, but I havent beaten you despite having ‘beaten’ you in a very technical sense :) Interesting.
“How many “beats” does a Boxer have? or a gamer?”
If the boxer wins the match by slipping something in his opponent’s food so he gets sick and has to cancel the match, does that count as beating him? :) If a gamer exploits a glitch in a game or uses a cheat code, did he or she really ‘beat’ the game? :) I’m just saying a BFR isnt really a defeat, except in a very technical sense.
I admit, as a lawyer and a fan of futurama, technical wins are the best types of wins though.
“if you defeat someone, I’d say sealing them away, banishing them to another dimension, or beating them down till they have to surrender, counts as a “defeat”.”
Technically speaking, Dabbler didnt do any of those things. Even with the ‘banishing’ idea, she only temporarily relocated him long enough for her to get away with the loot. I think she wouldn’t have been as concerned about him returning if she felt it was an actual defeat that she accomplished.
My main point is people should not be underestimating the guy just yet.
“you can argue semantics, or which words sound cooler or more permanent or *feel* right to you for the situation”
So what you’re saying is if I argue semantics, I might ‘win’ but I havent actually defeated your argument. Again, interesting. :)
“Hence why I use the word “defeat” not “beat”, she defeated him in whatever contest that was because she banished him and possibly got whatever it was they were both after on that adventure.”
Usually defeat would involve ‘victory’ over someone else. When Synch fought Hulk and his powers kicked in and just relocated him somewhere else to make sure Synch would survive, did Synch ‘defeat’ Hulk in the fight? Or did he just survive the fight. I mean, Dabbler ‘defeated’ him if the goal was ‘getting the loot’ – because then the goal of each person is ‘get the loot’ vs ‘stop her from getting the loot.’ But I wouldnt say she defeated him in a fight per se. :)
Again, all I’m saying really is not to underestimate thothogoth just yet as a villainous threat.
Did Sciona ‘defeat’ Maxima either of the times that they fought and she escaped? Did Cooter ‘defeat’ Arc-swat when he escaped from the reliquiry? I guess technically, but only if you redefine the terms of a defeat to be ‘escape vs not escape’ rather than ‘beat your enemy in a fight.’
So… okay actually if that’s what you mean I agree with you and I’m just having fun on the semantic arguments with you because I’m an attorney and we are a really messed up people when it comes to enjoying arguments, according to what the dean of my law school said at our orientatation.
I can’t even freaking spell orientation. Dangit.
you are being pedantic.
you are clearly aware the words are synonyms but are falling back on which ones FEEL better to the situation; which is based entirely on your own exposure and preference. In short nitpicking based entirely on subjective usage.
-somehow whole sentence didn’t post-
you are being pedantic intentionally in other words.
“you are being pedantic.”
So you’re saying that a pedantic argument that technically wins is not really ‘defeating’ your argument. :)
“you are clearly aware the words are synonyms but are falling back on which ones FEEL better to the situation;”
Eh…. not really. I’m just pointing out how a BFR is not the same as actually defeating a person in a fight, just like my being able to beat your argument with technicalities and pedantic arguments would not be the same as beating your argument with logic.
Which ironically is not a pedantic or technical argument. :)
“In short nitpicking based entirely on subjective usage.”
I’d say it’s more like winning a court case on a technicality of a possibly wrong venue, or winning because the opposition took 11 days instead of 10 to respond to the initial pleading or used the wrong method of giving notice, rather than winning on the facts of a case itself. In both examples, I win. In one, I win based on the actual merits of the case, instead of some civil procedure technicality. I’d say that winning on the merits of the case is a lot more of a ‘win’ than winning on a procedural technicality.
I get the impression that Dabbler takes many of those adventures less seriously than the average football fan takes their football games.
Touche’.
“a defeat is a defeat, it doesn’t have to be permanent or fatal.”
Also defeat isnt technically defeat if you just manage to get away from them or trick them into getting away from you.
That’s why, in all of those Quora ‘who would win comic book battle scenarios, they usually differentiate between actually winning and BFR (battlefield removal – the act of one character forcing their opponent out of an established fighting area somehow). A BFR can be a default ‘win’ but it’s not an actual defeat of the other person. What Dabbler did looks like it was a BFR.
According to D&D it is:
I dont think any of those are the same as BFR. Routing maybe though? Although that actyally means to make the other side retreat, not just ‘remove them from the battlefield’
I’d agree that removal doesn’t fit neatly in any of those three categories. However, I would also point out that “typically” implies that these are just the most common options, not a closed list. Most adventuring parties are only able to drive an opponent away via conventional means of motion, which would easily come under ‘rout’. But for those who have access to the requisite magic and/or items, surely driving the opponent through an interplanar portal is just as valid a defeat as if they’d been driven off a cliff?
Right now that is exactly what it does.
Consider the following:
* When Maxima was fought to a draw, unless they started out as deadly adversaries (which isn’t the same thing as casual adversaries) Maxima was restraining from using killing force against Dabbler;
* The same applied when Maxima was trying to gauge how strong Halo’s force field was. She couldn’t just blast away freely, and she even stated that she didn’t use full power during the test;
* Cora’s ship was no match for the Fel supercarrier, being only able to hold shields for a scant few moments ;
* Dabbler was not much use against the Fel supercarrier;
* So far we have seen no evidence that anything else can one-shot a Fel supercarrier.
So right now Maxima is solidly at the top of the class of “most powerful being or construct we’ve seen demonstrate their power.”
“Right now that is exactly what it does.”
It clearly does not, since we’ve already seen multiple examples of Maxima being capable of being stopped by aliens – the only limiting factor tends to be their not realizing the power levels they were up against in preparation. Remember, the lizard guy would have been okay with going back for another attack but they’d need the right EQUIPMENT first, because they had no idea that their time slowing device would not be sufficient to handle how fast Maxima can move.
Dabbler herself, who does have preparation, has been able to apparently fight Maxima to a standstill. The Mannekiller Supreme was able to entrance Maxima to make her unable to fight, and had to be helped by Hiro in order to win. Vehemence was thoroughly on the path of killing Maxima if not for Sydney’s intervention during the restaurant fight. And Death Toll would likely have beaten Maxima as well if, again, not for Sydney’s intervention. Even Sciona, who is definitely not at Maxima’s power levels, was capable of escaping Maxima multiple times and fighting her to almost a standstill with VERY LITTLE preparation, and with half a dozen arc-swat elites helping in the fight, including Dabbler, who was the one to actually defeat/end the fight against Sciona (not Maxima).
“When Maxima was fought to a draw, unless they started out as deadly adversaries (which isn’t the same thing as casual adversaries) Maxima was restraining from using killing force against Dabbler;”
You literally do not know that since you never saw the fight, and you also ignore that Dabbler was ALSO not using killing force against Maxima.
“The same applied when Maxima was trying to gauge how strong Halo’s force field was. She couldn’t just blast away freely, and she even stated that she didn’t use full power during the test;”
True. Although again, anything you’d use to assume that she COULD blast through Halo’s force field would be pure conjecture, since she was not able to even strain her shield, unlike the Kaiju blast. And again, Halo’s shield is not at full potential strength – it’s only 4 pips worth of strength.
“Cora’s ship was no match for the Fel supercarrier, being only able to hold shields for a scant few moments ;”
Also incorrect. Cora’s ship was clearly capable of withstanding the Fel supercarrier’s barrage. But it couldnt take off during the barrage. I don’t know where you’re getting ‘a scant few moments’ from, but it’s not from the comic. In case you forgot the actual battle and how well Cora’s shields did:
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-763-its-an-evil-spaceship-not-a-death-dreidel/
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-764-they-probably-realize-this-means-war/
As Cora clearly stated, the problem was that Cora’s shields were ‘stretched thin because they were ALSO trying to cover the entire building of ARCHON, plus were under strain of a Fel tractor beam as well. It then proceeded to tank all incoming fire during the ENTIRE battle, up until Maxima went full power on her plasma blast against the ship, 4 comic strips later.
Also have to mention that Cora’s ship HAS been a match for a Fel supercarrier, because they’ve fought them before and won or at least survived, which was mentioned right during their introduction into the comic when they were going to the Alari homeworld to find Sydney on Dabbler’s request, not to mention they were able to steal the Fel artifact of unspeakable …. cuddles. Assumingly from the Fel. Who it would be a good guess to say didnt just let them take it without a fight.
“Dabbler was not much use against the Fel supercarrier;”
Dabbler was busy helping ARC-SWAT fight the ground troops, if you recall.
“So far we have seen no evidence that anything else can one-shot a Fel supercarrier.”
Clearly not true. Cora’s already said there were strategies to defeat the Fel supercarrier. She was just concerned because she did not think Earth HAD those capabilities, since they’re a pre-FTL more primitive civilization, except for Sydney’s orbs. In fact, Cora’s original plan, before seeing that ARC-SWAT was very capable of fighting the FEl, was to, and I quote:
“Board the carrier and deactivate their tractor beam so we can take this fight into orbit.”
Because Cora’s main concern was the collateral damage to the terrans, who she did NOT think had the capability to fight back because she underestimated super powers. She clearly did think that, in an orbital fight, her ship would, at the very least, stand a chance against a Fel Supercarrier, or even beat it outright.
Also the space police were also capable of beating a Fel Supercarrier, but they were not capable of stopping it in time before it got to Earth, if you recall
The Fel are clearly an enemy that the Xevoarchy are aware of and have strategies and technology for fighting against. They just had no idea that Earth was capable of doing it without that tech.
That does not make Maxima the most powerful being in the universe – that makes her just a lot more powerful than the Xevoarchy and aliens thought a human was able to be.
Heck, even Superman, pretty much the be-all end-all of ‘powerful superheroes’ in comics, can be beaten. Physically. Not only with Kryptonite – but by magic, red solar radiation, and certain other alien species who are at or surpass his power levels (Imperiex, Darkseid, Lobo, the Collector, the Flash if using the speed force as a prison, based on what he did to Superboy Prime, Rogol Zaar, Lucifer Morningstar, Spectre, Parallax, Anti-Monitor, Monitor, Mr. Mxyzptlk, Mongul (the Senior), etc.)
Oh and I almost forgot Vale, who Maxima seems to think might be a match for her, or at least it would be an ‘interesting fight’ to the point where Maxima was curious about who might win.
Well the next comic is here, so let me just say that I reject everything you’ve said as being either wrong, circumstantial, lacking in any basis in canon, or any number of other reasons.
Especially when you drag Superman into it, and take pains to point out a pile of things the he is vulnerable to but which Maxima is not…
Whose side are you on here, mine or yours?
To be fair to Thothogoth, he hasn’t actuallydone anything yet to cause trouble. A bit of extra excavation in the quarry floor from his entrance, sure, but apart from that he seems quite willing to state his case and play within the rules. And to give Maxima credit, she’s keeping him in that mode rather than jumping to a prejudiced (and soda-predicted) conclusion.
He hasn’t really demonstrated willingness OR unwillingness in that regard, really. Thus far he’s only shown up and started arguing with Dabbler, we have absolutely no idea how he’s gonna react to Maxima being in charge yet.
that’s kinda the point
“hey boss, when things are unimaginably fucked, what should be do?”
“hold the line, fix bayonets, and glory to the Emperor”
“sir? we’re contractors….”
“i SAID FIX BAYONETTS AND GLORY TO THE EMPEROR”
Well, When you are as Tough as Maxima…. you can afford to follow protocols. He’s just lucky Syd was expecting something due to Harem’s MacGuffin soda can. :D
gad that reminds me of when Ray did his shpiel on the traveler Gozer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGPsBgkbdBU but i think Max can make it stick A LOT harder than ray ever couls … also she would probably answer yes to the counter question ……
‘could
*takes notes: This is how Maxima would address herself to an extra dimensional demonic entity.
I think I was close in my fanfic. Got to remember the field commander of Arc Swat part.
Also super funny Sydney is now so jaded she has gone from swinging a chair to straight up addressing the giant fiery Surtur looking guy; which Maxima rightfully stepped in.
on that some ponderings, first Kevin’s reaction after being flung, we know just being thrown up and over like that shouldn’t incapacitate him so his next reaction is in question like run in the confusion, attack Thothogoth, or is he standing by like he said.
and second, with the Fracture guys taking notes, likely contacting aliens already on or near Earth to speed things up, will this demon lord potentially be used as a scape goat for the Aethereum causeway (the point of my question last page on how hell gates relate to the Aethereum causeway.
I demand to see this fan fic
it starts off a bit wonky but I hit a nice stride a few chapters in. I have an outline for another part that I have yet to write down.
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13858133/1/Grrl-Power-fanfic
Nice start!!!
thank you.
Maxima is one of those characters I have a hard time getting a read on so not sure how she’d react in situations not presented in the comic; and not sure what all Dabbler is capable of. Like I had an idea of Dabbler scanning a portal and recreating it to send Sydney through as a spy; but then I remembered the blood portal into the vault and was like…oh she probably can’t do that; so now I need to re-do the outline for the next part.
I’m sure dave would be happy to give a quick guideline though lol.
Wouldn’t it be more advantageous for Kevin to use his aggro aura on unsuspecting Thothogoth, in order to take advantage of the confusion created by a massive brawl and make his escape?
We know he’s smart, and has decent judgment about cooperating when it’s advantageous. Now we get to find out whether he also stops cooperating when that’s more advantageous.
Kevin showed he had some knowledge of the nether realms, and his aggro energy somehow made a window this guy could see through and zero in on. If I were him I’d be worried this was one of those demon lords that feeds on negative human emotions like fear, hatred, anger, ect… and could suck all of the Vehemence energy right out of him.
like trying to fight a lord of darkness with dark energy, not going to work. At least that should be something he could consider given the circumstances.
Would it be more advantageous at this point? Given his need for violence to absorb and his clear desire to gorge on it, I can’t imagine it wouldn’t be super hard for Archon to track him down again, and they have at least 2 people that have demonstrated that they can outclass him even when his power is at or nearing max, next time Sydney might either decide or be ordered that he’s too much of a liability to keep so just drop him somewhere in space and be done with it (as far as he knows, I honestly don’t think Sydney would be willing to actually do that unless it was genuinely, absolutely necessary, like if he took out Maxima or otherwise demonstrated he was a world class threat).
Honestly, I’m not sure why he would want to. What he *should* be doing right now is angling for the same deal that Jabberwocky got: membership in ARCSWAT. Celestial-tier pay, lots of great perks such as constantly being around stunningly beautiful men/women (whichever way he swings, if he does), and plenty of opportunities for violence. Sure, he would need to take orders, but ARC is pretty relaxed all things considered and his alternative is to take orders from the prison staff.
The problem with that is Jabberwokky got a ‘not guilty’ on charges related to that fiasco, on account of our boy Kevin there screwing with her mind using the aggro aura. So she had no independent will to commit a crime, so no mens rea.
Kevin on the other hand very deliberately instigated the fight, *AND* dragged a bunch of relatively innocent people into it who wouldn’t have been there otherwise. So not only does he get mens rea for the fight himself, but also mind control (which probably isn’t illegal yet, so lawyers better get going – meanwhile they’ll probably prosecute enslavement instead) plus property damage and reckless endangerment.
Basically everything that happened at that fight involving damage to, or by, any of the people who were subject to his aggro aura, they are innocent of but he is guilty of. And a whole lot of things like that happened.
Remember Arianna and Suzie News punching each others’ faces? If either of them broke a nail or got a scratch or ripped one piece of clothing they can sue him.
Fair points all. Still, they could consider it something like a work release (I think that’s an appropriate term). The law is wide and deep enough that there’s generally a way to make something happen if powerful people want it so, and it would definitely be more sensible for him to be under the direct supervision of powerful supers, using his abilities in ways that benefit society, instead of leaving him mewed up where he is motivated to hurt (good) people and escape.
If we’re doing book recommendations…
One of my fave Isekai LitRPGs is “Delve” by SenescentSoul. ( https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/25225/delve )
What’s great about it is that the LitRPG system is obviously artificial within the setting itself. From what we readers can tell, it was assembled by an ancient magitek civilization as a tool to augment their regular much more organic/freeform soul-Cultivation-style magic, except it was so much easier that the old system is mostly forgotten. But when you peek into the gaps in the System, you can see there’s something beneath…
The MC chooses a min-maxed support build in a world where the majority goes DPS, going through the novel simultaneously overpowered and underpowered (“What do you mean you didn’t put a single point in Endurance? And your mana regen is WHAT again?”) and eventually gets interested in the underlying mechanics…
—
Another fave is “The Way Ahead” by NorskDaedalus. ( https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/42202/the-way-ahead )
What’s great about it is the very organic Skill/Path System, with many viable strategic options. You can focus on a few Skills – reaching supernatural proficiency – or have a whole bunch of lower-level Skills which synergize well together. You can upgrade often with small Paths, or save up points to use the impressive ones. And you can follow a tried-and-true build precisely, and get the expected result 99% of the time, or you can roll the dice with a new Path and hope it upgrades a Skill into something cool.
The main character, a severely introverted scientist, does not take the tried-and-true path, making his way through a stodgy traditionalist fantasy empire with a skill set that includes Skills like Sleeping, Breathing and Nutrition, and way too few combat Skills…
One comment on Delve: Absolutely do not read it in real time. Binge through it in batches instead of reading one chapter per week.
The story is extremely engaging for the first ~50 chapters, presenting itself as an adventure story with lots of exploration of the magic system. After that it turns into something that still has some adventure-story elements but is much closer to slice of life. Plus, SenescentSoul draaags ooout theee prose… Two examples: In one chapter he spends multiple paragraphs explaining exactly how the gearbox on the peddle-powered wagon works, and in another he tells us in great detail *how* Ameliah went from point A to point B instead of simply saying “Ameliah went back for the bags.”
Additionally, often 1/3 to 1/2 of the vertical height of a chapter will consist of blue boxes that tell you in mind-numbing detail every aspect of the protagonist’s character, or giant lists of skills that have been posted multiple times in previous chapters. The author has made an extremely crunchy magic system, for which he should be applauded, but it’s not something most readers are going to care to delve (:>) into in such detail.
Again, it’s a fun and engaging story if you’re reading it large batches but absolutely infuriating if you’re reading as they come out.
This reminds me of a (high mythic) TTRPG I was in where the party was attending a wedding that was crashed by Asmodeus (or an incarnation, anyway). My character, a lawyer, calmly informed him that this was a private event, and unless he had an invitation, he was going to need to leave. He followed up with the fact that, as a lawful entity, he was bound by the local customs regarding this situation.
Asmodeus didn’t leave, but he did get rather flustered.
Thothogoth….
Do you think Sydney will resist the urge to shout “Begone, Thot!” when he gets banished?
Now I’m hoping for a “derailed train of Thot” joke during the nigh-inevitable fight.
I hope not. :D
Dave: I just wanted to say I really appreciate it when you recommend other books & series. I find I always like the books you recommend. Thanks!
Complaining about Isekai being the colloquial term for “another world” stories, is like complaing that the term for searching for something on the internet is called googling when there were a bunch of different search engines around before it.
Yeah, but the others all kind of sucked.
Bing is the best. Because I am a hipster and refuse to use the giant mega corp website………
It does nothing, but dang it, I do feel slightly better.
Oh yeah, because Microsoft is a mom an’ pop company.
Have you tried startpage.com? Like Google only anonymous. And no ads.
Yeah, no. Microsoft was never the underdog, and many consider that their anticompetitive tactics seriously hurt the software industry. Just look at what happened to Netscape, Corel, and many others.
Complete Agrecian with you: refuse to use Giggle, and was actually banned from a game thread because of it (didn’t say wouldn’t search, if knew what was searching for, just wouldn’t use Giggle)
This was around the second season of Walking Dud, when Michone was introduced, and all had to go on was a single image of a black girl with a samurai sword with a pair of zombies on chains
Duck Duck Go … because I find the name hilarious
Personally liked ‘Ask Jeeves’
They didn’t all suck, you know. At the time AltaVista was excellent and fast. Provided you were capable of using Boolean operators and wildcards to write a search expression. Google isn’t better, it’s many ways it’s worse. But it’s suitable for uneducated or stupid people who don’t know the difference between “and” and “or” and this makes it commercially successful because that’s most of the population. There was an opportunity to force people to learn, and it was squandered. That’s on par with deciding to use pictures instead of teaching the population to read.
Right? Even if you use quotes the damned thing won’t search for an exact match for a phrase.
Google *used* to have those options available if you knew they were there. Not anymore. They’ve dumbed their interface down a lot and made the search much less useful in the process.
Agreed. You could use AltaVista with the advanced interface, to search for ANYTHING. You can only use Google to search for the most popular few things vaguely related to at least one of your search terms.
Google decided to make it possible for idiots to get the most use out of their product, and in the process they made their product so nobody can get any better use out of it than idiots. Intelligence is no advantage if the tools available don’t allow it to be brought to bear. It’s like having a lever but no place to use as a fulcrum.
one of the primary clubs fighting that definition is google itself.
(When googling, becomes using a search engine in general protecting their trademark becomes unbearable.)
Good, serves them right.
OMG, if all of my fanfics are wrong, and i have to start referring to Xuriel as “Mrs. Tantalis”, I’mma be pissed.
You can use a hyphen, “Mrs Leander-Tantalis” :D
She seems like the sort of character who’s likely to have worn at least a couple of different names during her career.
As a mistress of the social disgraces who speaks fluent vulgaritese and is usually there to provide immoral support, not to mention the whole Demon-From-Hell thing… She probably needs to change her name every time she moves.
Otherwise, people who have unfinished business that she really doesn’t want to finish would be showing up all the time – like Tom here.
Dabbler is probably Lord of the Dance, and mayor of a little village up the coast.
with all the talk of Isekai type series I think this might be a good place to ask this hypothetical,
the rat avatar hypothetical
Let’s say science invents a way to mind control a rat and you can use this system to take control of a rat and with a VR helmet see what it sees and sort of feel what it feels. Would you use this to explore what a rat experiences? Should scientists?
Now let’s expand, they invent techno-organic drone rats or clones of rats *maybe with modifications for better survival and to see how rats react to “super rats”. Now using a dream like system where you go to sleep you can pilot these rats and fully feel what they feel. Basically avatar bodies with you in a stasis pod to prevent any sensory hiccups between what the rat feels and you. Would you use this? Should Scientists?
Now we go to a third version, science has created a way to use quantum entanglement to isolate a rat fetus or baby rat. You will go into stasis and “dream” project into the rat. In truth you will have very little control as in this experiment you will see, feel, hear, and experience everything AS a rat, the way the rat does (barring any odd feedbacks or safety protocols that require some small level of control to be taken over; in which case the stasis system will treat it like a semi-lucid moment in a dream that quickly fades. However unlike the above versions due to the quantum entanglement method used to link to the unborn or baby rat you will have to be in stasis until it dies *if full lifespan somewhere from 2 to 4 years or so*. Would you do it? Should Scientists?
The above is a hypothetical on humans learning about rats using a first hand method. This same concept may be applied to higher intelligences trying to learn about humans from a first hand experience to eliminate any bias they have. Walk a mile in another’s shoes indeed.
on deviant art someone remarked about somehow being trapped in the rat’s body or an avatar’s.
I felt I should post my reply to them here to better outline how this system would work.
To address these concerns.
you are in a stasis pod along with your brain (barring some Ghost in the Shell brain box scenario), at no point in these scenarios should your core consciousness be outside your body.
in the first scenario you are hijacking a living rat’s motor skills with its sensory information being transmitted back to you. basically the same thing as controlling a robot using a VR helmet with advanced sensory equipment (which labs are working on, touch being the big one right now). If there is a hiccup in the system there would just be a disconnect; you wake up from stasis and the rat is freed from what was probably a living nightmare for it.
in the second scenario you are remote controlling a bio-android basically. So even more robot like, same situation, if there is a hiccup, system disconnects; you wake up in the stasis pod and the remote controlled body goes inert (barring a self destruct system to prevent contamination or something).
the third scenario is trickier. However you are in the stasis pod and your mind is in a dream state; a sort of accept whatever as reality, don’t question, don’t think. You are limited by the rat’s neurology in this, the rat will act, react, and do things as a rat would. Its memories will be transmitted back to you. If a hiccup occurs and some of your thoughts are triggered via the dream system, *being an experiment seeing if the rat could act on blurry images or emotional responses to certain sights and smells; without context as your actual brain is still dream like would be the point*, however too much feedback from you and most likely the rat’s brain would be overwhelmed resulting in an aneurism or stroke most likely. When the rat dies or something external comes up, you wake up from stasis with the rat’s memories…only now you can contextualize its memories with your own expectations and analyze what occurred properly. As this was an entangled mind situation, chances are most likely if you disconnected early your awake mind no longer in dream state would feed back into the rat and overwhelm it resulting in a very short lived madness followed by death. Whether or not your human mind sees after you wake up is questionable, but a good reason not to wake up prematurely and let the rat die on its own.
There is a zero percent chance of your mind being trapped in its body, as at no point is your mind actually inside its body. Floor 13 was very bad science when it comes to neurology. Although being an experiment, seeing if any aspects of the rat’s experiences influence your behavior or outlooks would be something to keep tabs on.
on the human avatars thing, a complete transfer of consciousness is likely impossible without either implanting your physical brain in a new body (Ghost in the Shell style), or discovering a way to transfer, not just copy, the electrical (and other) energies in the brain. However any deviations in the new body’s neural structure could cause massive shifts to your personality. Behavior is a mixture of memory, association, and biochemical controls. Kaguya syndrome could very well occur just by transferring your memories to a more complex structure than your brain (a syndrome in which you undergo a dramatic shift in your personality, and what you care about, due to your new mind being so vastly different than before despite having the same memories and being the same person.).
The Greeks called this one metempsychosis. :-)
Should switch from rats to lawyers….
We have too many
Nobody would miss em
Would not hace activists all uppity
The hypothetical is the ethics and self identity issues of posing as or taking control of lower life forms. You wouldn’t have less of anything by doing this.
It is essentially just taking the idea that higher dimensional beings are exploring and interacting with humans through these methods which are interpreted as possession, manifestation, and incarnation.
but changing the perspective to humans doing this to animals via *controlling an individual animal by force*, *using a duplicate of the animal*, or *entangled mind to experience what it is like to be the animal with all its limitations including neurological*, the first part is the straight forward question on your view of the ethics of such an experiment and if you would take part in it; the second is further explaining the mechanics.
in other words what you just said is you’d rather remote control some lawyers brain, make a bio-android lawyer to spy on a law firm, or entangle your mind with a lawyers…which being human to human is probably not a good idea.
“One, the scientists become less attached to the lawyers, and two, there’s certain things that even rats won’t do.”
Heeyyyy!!!!!!!
*shakes fist*
Present company excepted, of course. We’re very attached to you.
wait do you mean kidnapping the lawyers and performing the experiment solely in a laboratory setting?
by the way you worded that I was thinking you somehow mistook the experiment to somehow also be extermination.
although a controlled setting would probably be preferred the idea behind the experiment is more *in the wild*, natural environment observations. you could switch out with other animals, dolphins, chimps, monkeys, various birds, ect… to get the same affect but maybe tug at the is this ethical mindset a little more.
One of the only comics I can think of where a giant, glowing eyed, heavily armored, creature can come exploding from the ground and turn out to be someone’s Ex.
I can think of several where that could plausibly happen. EGS, EGSNP, Girl Genius, Skin Horse/Narbonic, Order of the Stick, Widdershins, GPF, Wapsi Square, etc. And that’s just from the tabs I have open right now.
Also probably Goblins.
The real question is why reading comics where this CAN’T happen?
In the last panel, did anyone else have a flashback to:
“Good evening. As a duly-designated representative of the City, County and State of New York, I order you to cease any and all supernatural activity and return forthwith to your place of origin, or to the nearest convenient parallel dimension.”
Remember Max, if he asks you if you are a god(ess), say YES.
Ah, a fellow connoisseur of the classics! Here is hoping the Stay-Puft Marshmallow man shows at some point.
I sincerely HOPE they don’t cross the streams to get rid of this guy since he is acting fairly laid back for such a being. I can just imagine Gozer the Gozerian in such a setting and it wouldn’t end well.
this IS Stay-Puft, someone just got him a wee little too close to the flames (burn, marshmallow, burn muahahaha)
My mind just froze on the thoughts-
Dabbler
Marshmellows
uuuuuuum…..
NO COMMENT!
I’m bribging the graham crackers and chocolate!
Cause everyone wants smore dabbler
I’m bringing the graham crackers and the chocolate¡
Cuz everybody wants smore dabbler
Suddenly Thot zaps Vehemece into a poodle…
The Japanese got to name the genre because we call them “other world” stories, which includes stories that entirely happen within some other world, with no Earth inserts, “out of world” stories which includes stories that don’t happen in a world at all, but apart from the beginning and maybe the end happen entirely in space, and a few other multi-word terms that aren’t coming to mind at the moment. We didn’t give them a catchy one-word name that everyone agreed to.
The Japanese apparently did that first, so point to Japan.
They didn’t, actually.
That honor goes to Celt mythology and the “Fair Folk.”
Just because they made up the name doesn’t mean they did it first.
Ed was saying that Japan came up with a one word name that stuck/caught on first, not that they did the genre first, I don’t think I’ve heard anybody claim that Japan invented the genre/concept, but it’s fairly obvious that they named it and popularized it.
Well, named it, anyways.
The idea’s been in mythology worldwide for millennia. Which I’d call popular.
“A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court” from 1889 is probably the real first, so i always say just say “Oh so they got Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Courted”
Urashima Tarō, which has been kinda running in some variant in Japan since around the 8th century (the name Urashima Tarō only came to be in the story in the Muromachi Period – 15th Century, prior to that being called Urashima no ko or Urashima no Shimako right back to the Nara Period – 8th Century (found in the Man’yōshū, which was compiled at some time after 759 AD)). (Not very) interesting thing of note: Urashima Tarō was also one of the first animes when it came out in 1918.
So, if you want to be more accurate, I guess it’d be ‘they got Urashima’d.’
That said, I imagine that if we went through even older stuff, we’d find some other cool stories in that vein that predate Man’yōshū.)
Alice in Wonderland came before that.
And then there’s Dante’s Inferno which comes well before that.
Dante’s inferno is very different. Alice, however, is EXACTLY the case and 1865.
Dominus secunde? He’s “second hat”?
Dominus means “master” or “lord,” not “hat.”
Duex, however, does not appear to be Latin at all, unless it’s applying the numerical prefix Du- (meaning “two”) to the preposition Ex (meaning “out from/of”), but “bringers of order out of two” is even less sensical as if “duex” is just a string of letters intended to sound cool and vaguely latinish. I suppose it could be sourced from another language, but if so, then it’s decidedly out of my wheelhouse.
Only if you take the transliteration literal
It clearly means “Heralders of the Second Order”
Never underestimated the power of a Nice Hat.
Don’t even need to go to that cesspit to know what that is about (been reading that webic for years :D )
Or a Dubious Hat
lol the millinery version of the Old Man of the Sea, love it.
It probably is something like that, but that doesn’t change the fact that Duex is not a Latin word, unless it’s a ridiculous construction that is effectively gibberish. I don’t know what language that word comes from, but it’s not Latin.
Google says it’s probably french, which I don’t speak/read/understand, but it probably means 2 in some way, shape, or form
Unless you were referring to the Dominus Secunde, which I take to be “second lord”, meaning either second in charge, or after the first lord stepped down/was removed Thothogoth took over as the second, in the same way that John Adams was the second president of the US. According to the translation aide I use (Whitaker’s Words) “Secunde” is ordinal. The fact that it’s in the vocative case tells me it’s clearly modifying Dominus (which could be either nominative, or vocative, but given context vocative makes more sense as he’s giving his title for address), the only other Latin word there, as well as being immediately adjacent to it, I highly doubt Secunde would be modifying order here (or at all, since order comes from a totally different language).
Im sort of intrigued by the name of his group “the bringers of order deux”
… so this is either the “bringers of order 2” or theres only two people in it? so hes the second in command of two people. one of which is him…
which is funny and puts a sarcastic twist on dabblers comments. :3
I definitely feel like it’s the sequel. :D
Thothogoth? Doeth he get a lot of people athking him where the butcher’th thop ith?
I just enjoyed Maxima taking charge in such a no nonsense manner.
Hey! I notice the forcefield is not spherical and not centered on Sydney. Is this a power upgrade, or artistic license?
She’s been able to control its shape ever since the first time she actually got around to trying it.
It’s visibly elongated in the scenes where Maxi is going out to test her fight speed and she’s having big fun with loving the sensation of flying.
Vehemence is escaping.
Just thought I’d throw that out there.
So did Thoth, apparently.
One of the few reasons why the Japanese seemingly “owns” the Isekai concept is because of their collective ridiculous output. They churn out the things in the hundreds of thousands, and quite a lot more than a few of those go on to be popular enough to rate actual commercial releases in the form of light novels, manga, animation, the works.
Very few other “ye average independently published webnovel” outside Japan makes it to the level of “Saturday morning cartoons”. So… yeah.
It’s not a new concept, true. Plenty of “man arrives onto the shores of a new world” stories out there, but the Japanese took the concept, codified it into a template (for good or ill), and ran miles with it.
“Thothogoth… good evening. As a duly designated representative of the United States of America, I order you to cease any and all supernatural activity and return forthwith to your place of origin or to the nearest convenient parallel dimension.” ~ What Maxima wanted to say but can’t because Sydney is in in earshot.
I kinda hope Thothy doesn’t take her very seriously.
I’d like to see her MAKE him take her seriously. ^.^
Which’ll likely be what occurs, given he was one of the foreshadowed folks after the Media day.
Doubt it’ll take as long as the Restaurant Scrap, but that can also be chalked up to the fact Thoth here just out and showed up, as opposed to Kevin hanging out on the sidelines getting some munchies.
“Thothogoth” is too long. Imma call you ‘Thot’.
Does that make Max the Thot Police?
Maxima says “OUT DAMN THOT”
Max: “Begone, Goth!”
Bystander behind Tom in metal band shirt and black eyeshadow: “Who, me?”
Max: “No not you, Thotho goth!”
…and now I want Tom to stick around and open a THot Topic franchise.
Their name is Tom, didn’t you listen to Dabbles?
Sydney’s face! Good Lord, that’s going to haunt my nightmares, I can’t close my eyes be without seeing that demented grin!!!
classic Tom.
Laundry Files: Bob wasn’t driving down the Autobahn in a Toyota Prius but a SMART car, the thing like a motorized roller skate. Makes the comparison with all those big Mercs, Audis and so on even more extreme.
No one considered rescuing Kevin, in case he was still airborne and out of V?
When he was warned that his power dump was a bad idea, he paused and asked for more information.
Anyone else interested in what ‘agreement’ Dabbles agreed to (and subsequently reneged on)?
… How small is Tom there if he needs to be that tall to assuage his ego?
I love how Thothogoth is raising a goat horn in the last panel, like an intrigued eyebrow wondering why this particularly shiny human thinks she can interrogate him
Any bets on the next words from Tom starting with “PUNY MORTAL…” then ending badly for him?
Tanya Degurechaff: “No visas?” *shoots them*
In regards to John Carter being the first of its type, I contend that while time travel it’s enough of a difference in society that A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court written more than 20 years prior to John Carter is the first. Or possibly HG Wells or even Jules Verne could be argued.
Totally just thought of Gulliver’s Travels. 1726
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, 1865
Daemon origanaly meant messenger to and from the gods.
However, later on it did come to refer to beings that monotheists thought of as evil, but that is only a recent historical line of thought on such matters.
Also, they lost the “a” in the process :-).
Just a reminder to those expecting a quick smack-down…
Tom is one of the foreshadowed villains.
The Arab is going to be an Awesome fight when it comes around to his turn.
Especially for the facial expressions Max is going to make since she assumed he’s dead.
He might even show up with his own team.
Maxima does not have balls of steel, she has balls of carborundum!
Hi. If you liked the laundry files you have to read accelerando by C. Stross to. One of the best entertaining prospective sci-fi I ever red.
So “Dominus Secunde” = “2nd Lord” = in the “Bringers Of Order Deux” ?
This would sound like a pretty high rank, except “Deux” suggests there’s only 2 of them ( as in “pas de deux” or folie à deux”) so it’s basically being the junior member of a partnership. Were Tom and Xuriel in a band together? Is Dabs being sarcastic with the “pretty impressive” bit or is the Universal Translator is mucking up again?
He’s kind of whiney demon but that still leaves him a demon, possibly tough
Bringers of the Second Order, is my guess.
Dominus Secunde could be second lord as in second in command, or it could be second lord as in “I succeeded the first lord and am now the lord” (like how John Adams was the second president of the US).
As for Duex, I got nothin’, it’s not Latin, google suggests it’s probably French with a meaning of some kind of “2”, but usually that’s deux from what I saw, not duex. Could be a typo, could be something else, could be a made up word, I dunno. It could be intended to be bringers of the second order, as some have said, or it could be bringers of order 2: electric boogaloo as others have suggested (but they didn’t use those exact words, from what I saw).
Xuriel? Is that you? https://ilarge.lisimg.com/image/22001750/740full-ewa-staniszewska.jpg
I wonder: Is “Bitch slapping a giant.” on Maximas Bucketlist?
Will she get around to it here, just to establish dominance?
hooooooooooooooold up, is that tom in the background, bottom of page 331?
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-311-succubi-rarely-diet-insert-joke-about-juice-cleanse/