Erfworld 106; the battle for Gobwin Knob

[Moral Wiz]

Well....


Aggro indeed. High power Killermancy.

Doesn't seem to be aimed at Jillian though. Selective?

[Laurentio]

Don't mess with a scorned witch?

Laurentio

[Yellowbounder]

All necromancy spells always affect the skeleton.

That is why oozes are immune to necromancy. Ever seen a zombie ooze?

[Dhavaer]

Ouch. That looks a good deal gorier than I was expecting.

[Green Bean]

I think I speak for everyone when I say: Holy. Crap.

[Gez]

One Archon down, two to go.

Also, Unipegataur look so useless now. Never did anything cool.

Vinnie's fate is unknown.

[Stallogarro]

...Wow. I really didn't expect any of the archons to buy it. Naïve fool that I am, I actually started thinking of them as main characters. 'Course, Misty died too...

Definetly a selective spell. That, or Jillian's got more hitpoins than the Death Star.

I'm not sure if the spess affects the skeleton, though... It may be just to illustrate how incredibly powerful the blast was?

On second thought, it may be the skeletons. Reminds me of a spell in Ars Magica, which transforms the spinal chord into molten lead... "For those who wants to see their enemies suffer".:smallbiggrin:

[Emperor Demonking]

I don't think it was worth the wait.

[hajo]

I guess, that qualifies as "trouble", so let's see how many of them make it to the rendevous (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0104.html) :smallamused:

[los olvidados]

Seriously scary artwork, gorgeous page.

[Nargrakhan]

If Parson has access to (can command) a unit with power like that... :smallcool:

[Uncle Festy]

:smalleek:
Holy epic...
That's big!

[Laurentio]

If Parson has access to (can command) a unit with power like that... :smallcool:
We don't know if this power display brings some cost. In many games, a special character can boost is power for a short, time, but the price can be high (money, energy, or a "once in the life" limitation) or total (unit is destroyed at the end of turn).

Second possibility, Wanda's Limit Gauge was full.

Laurentio

[BlueHelmet]

nice indeed, but I have to admit that a followup should be posted rather quickly. how long did we wait for this one?

[Moak]

Die,my enemies,DIE!!

Clear the battle site from minions..and now,it Jill vs Wanda,face to face..

[Templar]

Holy boop! Massive spell there; Wanda is a one-woman wrecking crew. I just hope the follow up comes quickly.

[Radar]

This spell could porbably not only kill targets, but maybe transform them into some powerfull uncroaked units? Anyhow casters are far more fearsome then i thought. :smalleek:

[Bendal]

I think Jillian will need some more flying allies; that spell appears to have fried everyone she was with (with the possible exception of Vinnie).

As for the power level of Wanda's spell, I'm of the opinion that it's a "one shot" deal and may have erased all of her ability for the turn, or more.

[Dark Wolf]

Eerily reminiscent I think of a fusion of Dali and Bosch.

[Braggi]

...Wow. I really didn't expect any of the archons to buy it. Naïve fool that I am, I actually started thinking of them as main characters. 'Course, Misty died too...

Definetly a selective spell. That, or Jillian's got more hitpoins than the Death Star.

I'm not sure if the spess affects the skeleton, though... It may be just to illustrate how incredibly powerful the blast was?
Doesn't look like a blast to me, rather like forced uncroaking (zombification). Watch how Jaclyn and the left unipegataur(?) look at themselves in disbelief.

I also doubt this is selective, as Wanda's spell is obviously area. Jillian is probably simply too highlevel to be affected. She said before she is lvl 9, while Webinar and his girlfriend are 5 and 2. Her high level and leadership bonus should be the reason why she leads Stanley's pursuit.

Who is affected? Note that one unipegataur drifted besides Vinnie 2 strips ago, behind the other Archons. So the whole battlegroup except a few high level creatures might be hit by the spell. Vinnie's level is unclear, but he is undead already so I hope he is fine.

The question is still - what actually happened? If the units became uncroaked, does Wando automatically control them or can she assume control? Do they just become barbarian, attacking the remains of Jillian's force?

Then the fliers might almost be wiped out, or Parsons even be left with air superiority. What is more, he might aquire a few valuable spell casters (Jaclyn seems to be a thinkamancer). And last but not least, such a heavy loss due to Jillian's private agenda might blast the alliance apart, because this blows the chance to hit Stanley.

[Ink]

Whoa. I would not want to mess with that woman, ever.

[los olvidados]

Based on the new page, it seems this effect is likely a special event.

There's a lot to make Wanda very angry, all happening at once:

1. Enemy force standing over center of capital
2. Engaged by your betrayer
3. Threat to Overlord
4. Cute Archon in proximity and showing attention (and affection?)

She won't kill Jillian like that, but it's open game with the Archon (natural Croakamancer enemy?)

Jaclyn became the focus of Wanda's rage. Nice transference.

So who else did the blast affect?

[Tom90deg]

That may of been a end-game move for Wanda. I don't know if it's lightning or cracks over Gobwin Knob, but some serious crap just went down. And since she's just now rebooted, that may've been too much for her.

Secondly, the actual NAME of the spell, or the command word was "Aggro" As for what that means, I'm not sure. I'd bet it's either mass vaporize or mass Zombify. The potential downside, is it my be very literally "Mass" as in, "Effects all creatures in X radius." which may mean that a lot of Gobwin KNob's forces are now uncroaked.

I think Wanda's not thinking right now. You don't set off the nuclear bomb in your own base unless all you care about is the fact that YOU will survive.

[SirBel]

Cool strip...Not worth the 16 day wait. But cool.

[fendrin]

Hmm. First page without text.

Looks like Stanley's going to survive.

New Theory:

Wanda seriously hurts herself with this spell, possibly croaking herself or burning out her magic (probably only temporarily, though). The uncroaked units are either destroyed to fuel this spell, or are significantly weakened by the damage done to Wanda (before she was physically ok, but mentally absent, this will be more physical in nature).
Jillian is captured. Again. Ansom doubts her love and becomes angry, convinced she betrayed him.
Vinny is croaked or captured. Either way, Ansom believes him croaked, and the war gets (more?) personal. I anticipate that we will not get a concrete answer on Vinny's fate any time soon, though many readers will presume that because Ansom says/is told that he is croaked that it is true.
Stanley reaches Faq unmolested, despite the malfunctioning foolamancer.
Ansom goes postal on GK. He looses many troops to Parson's machinations, and probably looses some allies, but in the end, he is knocking on the door to the Tower of Efdup.
Parson &co. flee to Faq. Jillian tries to go back to Ansom, but, but in a rage he rejects her. She heads to Faq ostensibly to kill Stanley and 'prove' herself to Ansom.


Hmm, seems a bit long for just a few pages, though.

[Mr. Goodwraith]

Hmmm...Jillian better hope Vinnie survives to corroborate what happened, or Ansom could begin wondering if she's the subject of Parson's "at least one member of your Coalition sees the writing on the wall" statement. If the allies start to seriously suspect treachery in their midst, things could fall apart for them quickly.

[Friendly_Nut]

:smalleek:...

I'm under the impression that the effects of the spell are like those of a nuclear blast, at least to Jaclyn and the 3 Unipegataurs. You also get that surprised look at themselves from the victims every now and then when a movie features this kind of theme. In Terminator 2 it was even worse, when Sarah Conor had her dream about the bomb going down and even though all that she remained to be was a charcoal skeleton, she still was conscious of everything.

I'm kinda glad that I'm an adult and all,so nobody's gonna tell me I can't come here for updates anymore, still this is a bit too gory for my liking. I hope the story continues in a "milder" way.

[BRC]

Erfworld 106: Things Blowing Up!

[raekuul]

Wow, am I on the first page?

I get the impression that Aggro is a Cone Area spell, designed to affect all airborn units under a certain level in the hex, or all units in an adjacent hex, etc.

[Narthon the Bold]

It looked more like a strike style spell. Who knows though.

In response to past posts:

I hope main characters can die. I really do. A war story where only cannon fodder gets killed is lame.

We still don't know that Vinnie is uncroaked and have very little to indicate that he is.

[Moral Wiz]

On the "Not hitting Jill" thing.

Jills the only unit there we KNOW is a warlord. Vinnie, we don't know, and the Archons seem like either high level units, or caster variants.

Some games make Warlord equivalents immune to certain spells, because they'd be too unbalancing.

One of these, is indeed, zombification. Turning other warlords into Uncroaked, as a combat spell, may be an impossibility. High level creatures, all right. But warlords follow different rules. Uncroaking the boss to your team would make things too simple.

Out of combat, it may be a different matter...

AGGRO = Forced Uncroaking. More it's said, the more I'm starting to agree.

[SteveMB]

Whoa.

This could end the mission to chase down Stanley. Normally, I'd expect Jillian to keep going after Stanley despite the losses she just took. However, the shock of Wanda apparently trying to croak her might shake her rationalization (that she's bound by a loyalty spell and it's all ultimately Stanley's fault). If so, and her heart isn't really in chasing Stanley as a result, she might decide that the mission has to be scrubbed.


On the "Not hitting Jill" thing.

Jills the only unit there we KNOW is a warlord. Vinnie, we don't know

"We've got the move to reach the column, except for one mount. That's exactly enough to fly in, mount the three warlords, and get to safety." (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0071.html)

In context, "the three warlords" are clearly Ansom, Vinny, and Tarfu.

That said, you may be right about Jillian showing no apparent damage because it's a spell that doesn't affect warlords.

[Dacia Brabant]

I knew it was going to be nasty, but... wow.

So with (at least) one of the Archons biting it here, how much does that affect the possibility of a Charlie-Parson alliance further down the road?

Charlie is mercenary so he must know to accept losses and separate them from the business, and he can probably plug a new Archon into the cast, like Tanya Roberts in Season 5. :smallwink: But how would the Archons feel, at some point down the road, about allying with a side that croaked (uncroaked?) one of their own?

[Scubasteve0209]

Booping Boop.

[Jeivar]

Ho lee crap.

I was expecting a hailstorm of magical power, not an a-bomb. Yeah, that woman is pissed.

As for Jillian, she's just been proven VERY wrong about Wanda's allegiance, and her overconfidence in Wanda's nature has gotten several valuable allies under her command killed. That's going to be a tough one to live with, and I'd say their relationship is pretty much unsalvagable at this point. :smallfrown:
Very nice dramatic turn.

So what's next? Jillian's mount seems to have survived, so she has a choice to either retreat with whomever survived or charge at the woman she loves (or did up until this point, anyway). And that's assuming she isn't instantly assaulted by newly-created uncroaked, or Wanda's next spell, depending on what the caster's plan is.

This story has my rapt attention . . .

[The Old Hack]

That... was more brutal than I had expected. Hell hath no fury indeed... and now I am wondering where all that power came from, and what its use will cost Wanda.

(Small aside: I prefer slow updates to no updates. And as I have said before, I am following this story for as long as the esteemed creators care to share it with us, and I am SO getting the croaked-gump version when it is ready for release.)

[SteveMB]

Hmmm...Jillian better hope Vinnie survives to corroborate what happened, or Ansom could begin wondering if she's the subject of Parson's "at least one member of your Coalition sees the writing on the wall" statement. If the allies start to seriously suspect treachery in their midst, things could fall apart for them quickly.

Even if he does, the events can still be interpreted as either "seriously booped-up judgment call" or "deliberately led expeditionary force into a trap". Anybody inclined to distrust Jillian is obviously going to prefer the latter interpretation....


I'd say their relationship is pretty much unsalvagable at this point. :smallfrown:

Unfortunately for Wanda, the answer to "Whhat... do.. you want?" was not "I want it all back the way it was." She didn't take it very well at all. :smalleek:

[SauroGrenom]

Wow. Nice blast effect...

I'm expecting that at the beginning of the next update we'll get a look of Efdup tower from afar, showing the mushroom cloud.

I get the feeling that this spell has some limits on the unit types effected. Probably in this case, it effects non-hero (read as warlord or leader) units and generating a stack of undead.

It would be interesting if Parson got a stack of flying undead out of this deal. That would encourage Ansom to go underground.

[Furin_Mirado]

I subscribe to the theory that the spell either doesn't affect Warlords or can only affect so many Hit Dice or Hit Points of units, like the Sleep spell in D&D. So it takes out a lot if not all of the minor units but is not strong enough to take out the warlord. Now the question is whether it instantly creates uncroaked (which would be really cool) or simply disintegrates. Then, depending on the area we're left with only Jillian and Vinnie (I'm pretty sure he's a Warlord too) or those two plus whoever wasn't flying too close to Jillian at the time.

[SteveMB]

I subscribe to the theory that the spell either doesn't affect Warlords or can only affect so many Hit Dice or Hit Points of units, like the Sleep spell in D&D.

If it does turn units into uncroaked under the caster's control, there's a good "game balance" reason it wouldn't be allowed to affect warlords but would be allowed to affect casters -- uncroaked warlords still function as warlords; uncroaked casters are just another infantry unit.

[Shatteredtower]

...I think we can well and truly write off the fan after that. We've gone well past hit to buried.

[fendrin]

On the "Not hitting Jill" thing.

Jills the only unit there we KNOW is a warlord. Vinnie, we don't know, and the Archons seem like either high level units, or caster variants.

If this is a 'non-warlord-affecting' spell, then we have to conclude two things:

1a) A warlord's mount is considered for all intents and purposes to be part of the warlord
or
1b) Jillian's gwiffon was affected, but has no bones for us to see (since when do peeps have bones, neh?).

and

2) Archons are not 'human' casters. We know that casters are essentially specialist warlords, so a caster should not be affected. Archons, however, could be a 'human-like' unit that is not actually a caster.

[Moral Wiz]

Yeah

I think uncroaking warlords would be an out of combat thing, similar to poping a unit. The difference? Quicker, and instead of a city, all you need is a croakamancer.

[Bongos]

superawesome!

[Moral Wiz]

If this is a 'non-warlord-affecting' spell, then we have to conclude two things:

1a) A warlord's mount is considered for all intents and purposes to be part of the warlord
or
1b) Jillian's gwiffon was affected, but has no bones for us to see (since when do peeps have bones, neh?).

and

2) Archons are not 'human' casters. We know that casters are essentially specialist warlords, so a caster should not be affected. Archons, however, could be a 'human-like' unit that is not actually a caster.

Your ignoring option three, which I think is what SteveMB is driving at

3) When it comes to spells, their is a distinction drawn between casters, and "combat" warlords

Why? cos casters are nothing without their spells. Spells require intelligence. And Uncroaked have none of that. Makes sense that animating casters would be useful and balanced.

We have seen such distinctions drawn before. Royalty?

And where do we have the fact that Casters are warlords anyway? Not disputing it, just curious, as I can't remember that one.

[SolkaTruesilver]

Nice.. my guess is, Wanda simply used a Cheat Code (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0041.html)

[fendrin]

Your ignoring option three, which I think is what SteveMB is driving at

3) When it comes to spells, their is a distinction drawn between casters, and "combat" warlords

Why? cos casters are nothing without their spells. Spells require intelligence. And Uncroaked have none of that. Makes sense that animating casters would be useful and balanced.

We have seen such distinctions drawn before. Royalty?

And where do we have the fact that Casters are warlords anyway? Not disputing it, just curious, as I can't remember that one.

I wasn't ignoring SteveMB's point, it wasn't there when I hit 'reply'.

As for casters as warlords, I was slightly wrong.
According to this (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0094.html) casters and warlords are both commanders (e.g. can lead troops, preventing auto-attacking of the enemy).

[Moral Wiz]

I guessed you weren't ignoring it, in fact I don't think SteveMB had actually outright stated it as an idea), I just meant you hadn't thought of that point. No worries, just my peculiar style of writing.

@commanders, yeah that makes sense. If Uncroaked units can't cast spells, warlords are going to be way more powerful, and thus much harder to uncroak than casters (who'll probably just make basic infantry)

[Eugenitor]

Interesting. Unipegataurs have two sets of ribs.

I figured she was just burning their skin off and Jillian's Warlordness gives her SPF 9000...

[jindra34]

Ouch how of do we get to see a pillaring beacon of doom?

[AtomicKitKat]

The way I saw it, the blast left only the skeletons untouched. The silhouettes of the bodies are just the afterimage. Sort of like a black hole. Or in the case of a nuclear explosion, the white patch on the wall where the body shielded it from burning.:smalleek:

[Cybaster]

Owwwwww.

Looks like Erfworld's very own Shuu Shirakawa just blasted the Allies with her Degenerate Cannon. That's gotta hurt tons. \m/ \m/

[Gez]

I also doubt this is selective, as Wanda's spell is obviously area. Jillian is probably simply too highlevel to be affected. She said before she is lvl 9, while Webinar and his girlfriend are 5 and 2. Her high level and leadership bonus should be the reason why she leads Stanley's pursuit.

Leadership score is not level. I don't remember indications of level anywhere, in fact.

[Bongos]

Kind of reminds me of when the Archons blasted the Dwagons.
Only I like this much better!

MUCH MUCH BETTER!

[galdon]

Definetly a selective spell. That, or Jillian's got more hitpoins than the Death Star.
I'm right with you.
Porkins, no! stay back!
I can hold it!
Get out of here Porkins!
*kaboom*
You..Killed..Porkins!



I'm not sure if the spess affects the skeleton, though... It may be just to illustrate how incredibly powerful the blast was?

On second thought, it may be the skeletons. Reminds me of a spell in Ars Magica, which transforms the spinal chord into molten lead... "For those who wants to see their enemies suffer".:smallbiggrin:

The way i saw it, it looked like she blasted them with a spell to convert them directly into undeads.
Edit: http://lfgcomic.com/page/9 richard did it ><;

[fractal]

Leadership score is not level. I don't remember indications of level anywhere, in fact.
We do know they have level, though.

So what I'm wondering is why the other Archon was concerned about Jaclyn being so close to Wanda before. That definitely implies that the effect may depend upon distance from the caster, or, alternatively, that the Archons are more powerful when close together.

Since we weren't shown them being fried, I would venture a guess that the other two Archons and Vinnie came out alive, as they were further from Ground Zero.

This also shows a tremendous amount of power from Wanda, even if she can't do it at will. I think the fact that she already has access to this kind of power rejects the theory that she will acquire the Arkenpliers, at least as a "good guy". On the other hand, if she ends up as our main villain, the pliers could be the icing on the cake to her personal abilities. Will she uncroak the whole stack (sans Vinnie and Jillian?), dominate Jillian again, and take off for parts unknown, leaving Parson in the lurch?

[raphfrk]

Even if he does, the events can still be interpreted as either "seriously booped-up judgment call" or "deliberately led expeditionary force into a trap". Anybody inclined to distrust Jillian is obviously going to prefer the latter interpretation....


Also, he seems to be a bit far back, maybe he wouldn't have heard the conversation.

See panel 3 of this page (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0105.html), the Archons are much closer and that is why Jaclyn is able to hear about Jillian's theory about the loyalty spell, but she was fried. Maybe if one of the 3 Archons was a warlord, then there would be someone who heard what was said.

[Kriel]

Hmm. Erfworld suddenly seems not quite so cute... that spell looks, and most likely is, positively brutal.

[Lycan 01]

Several things come to mind after seeing this comic:

"Pwnt."

"Fatality!"

"Owwwwwwwwww....."

and

"WHAT THE BLOOP!?"



Seriously, that was sheer destruction. I figured she'd summon a monster or something, not melt people from the inside out or whatever's happening to those people....... :smalleek:

This comic was so tame up until this point. I mean, very little blood, censored words, et cetra... Then lo, without warning, we see this...

Personally, I think it was a selective spell. I mean, even if Jillian was too high of a level to be effected, look at the power behind that spell. That's the defenition of "overkill" right there... I doubt ANYONE would be too high of a level or too special of a class to be eradicated by that thing. Wanda simply decided to kill everyone in the general area so she could have a one-on-one encounter with Jillian. Be it a conversation, or a fight to the death, she wanted to make sure there would be no interuptions or distractions, what-so-ever.


I can't wait to see the rest of Erfworld's reaction to this... Parson will try to get a grip on the situation, Stanley will have a spaz attack, and Ansom will freak out because he things Vinny and Jillian are dead... or worse.


Oh, and I hope Vinny isn't dead/croaked/uncroaked... :smallfrown:

[dragongirl13]

Yow. Wanda is so cool. That was one sick spell. I need to see if there are any equivalents for that in any RPG's, I want it.

I love scenes like this... those Archons and Unipegataurs are just evaporating.

[FoE]

Bitchin'. :smallamused:

[Zeku]

It doesn't make sense for "Aggro" to be the name of the spell, it's just the activation word. The spell probably doesn't have a conventional X-uses-per-day "name," given the circumstances under which it is used.

There's also no reason to assume this is forced uncroaking. I've never heard of any instance of a undead creature being created directly from a living thing. The body has to die first, which is probably what this is, a kind of burning wave of superheated air, or some life-force destroying "evil" attack. It may even be a new kind of magic for Wanda.

I also don't think this is extra-gory? We already have weird lesbianism and violent activities involving razor-sharp objects, it's not a big jump to see cartoon flesh being burned off, leaving cartoon bones showing. I think this originates from thinking of the Archons as people, rather than units. This is a millenia old bias, placing the physical welfare of women arbitrarily higher than men. It originates from the male's desire to possess the female body, not a special respect that females somehow deserve or desire.

I'm very pleased with the art, and with the writing, as before.

[Braggi]

Leadership score is not level. I don't remember indications of level anywhere, in fact.
This was just the explanation why Jillian leads the pursuit instead of Vinnie. As she is constantly fighting, her leadership should be very high. Her level definitely is, because she outranks Webinar with ease, who seems to be second in command for jetstone. Vinnie is Transsylvito.

Level seems to play a role with magic use, and in many games determines magic resistance (and either available spells or spell power). Maggie said to Parsons "I'll do my levelbest" in regard to protecting him from Charly.

[Guancyto]

Hmm. Erfworld suddenly seems not quite so cute... that spell looks, and most likely is, positively brutal.

Cartoon violence has always been pretty brutal, though. Not a lot of other places you could get away with that level of sheer bloody mayhem and gore back in the day.

[Ganurath]

Subtle is for the weak. Kudos to the Killmancer.

[SteveMB]

I also don't think this is extra-gory?... I'm very pleased with the art, and with the writing, as before.

There's been a fair amount of violence (naturally, what with a war going on and all). Often, it's presented in dissonance with the cutesy-boop trappings of the background. Every once in a while, rarely enough to avoid losing the ability to make the reader sit up and take notice, it's presented a bit more bluntly.

Very nice presentation of the Apocalypse In Pink and the characters' reactions.

[FoE]

Just throwing this out here: aggro is the name for a type of strategy in Magic: The Gathering. It involves blasting stuff a lot.

[Starlong]

A Dark, Dramatic point in the story, and very well done at that.

[Braggi]

There's also no reason to assume this is forced uncroaking. I've never heard of any instance of a undead creature being created directly from a living thing. The body has to die first, which is probably what this is, a kind of burning wave of superheated air, or some life-force destroying "evil" attack. It may even be a new kind of magic for Wanda.
...
I think this originates from thinking of the Archons as people, rather than units.
There are several reasons, but we will see soon enough.
For one, if it were an explosion, Jillian should at least get harmed. She doesn't.
Second, Wanda pulls all the stops with this spell. This is probably the most powerfull thing she ever cast in her existence - and while she is a proficient spellcaster, she proclaimed to Sizemore to hate anything but necromancy spells. So it is reasonable to presume a necromancy spell.

The uncroaked objection is valid. But the "zombie" state may be transmissible (see "Shaun of the Dead", or Megatokyo's latest chapter), so a Necromancer might inflict it directly. Vampirism and Lykantrophy are supposedly contagious as well; in both cases the victim doesn't need to die.

Archons are commanders, so in the game sense they are "people", just like Vinnie or Jillian.

Personally, I think it was a selective spell. I mean, even if Jillian was too high of a level to be effected, look at the power behind that spell.
The power unleashed is exactly my reason why I doubt the spell's selective nature. Wanda throws everything including the kitchen sink at the column; how shall she controll this? I never heard of an area spell used selectively; but different resist chances are common.

[Coldheart]

First my reaction to the page:
Holy ..... HOLY!
There can and is no other word for it.:smalleek:

Also,am I the only one who thinks about the OOTS way of showing the effects of the "Desintegration" spell?With the showing of the skeleton and all that?
The forceful uncroaking idea can propably dismissed,because although Wanda has more power on her then we have thought,she only had come out of her coma.Uncroaking in this way would be way more taxing then just simbly croaking them.

If anyone wonders,I´m a long time Lurker deciding to speak up a bit.Hello to all,may the dark Gods be with you.:smallbiggrin::smallbiggrin:

And please forgive all my spelling and grammatic errors,english isn´t my first language.

[Guyinthestreet]

I don't know about the story or the spell, but the art was really good. Must have taken a long time to do up as well. And I'm curious to know whether the strip was done using digital painting.

[Renx]

New Erfworld motto:

"Do your job, keep your head down and NEVER insult the croakmancer"

Croakmancy is strong stuff, though I guess Wanda is blowing more than her daily allowance with that spell. I wonder what kind of Croaked the three sisters will become :smallbiggrin:

[StClair]

Wow.

... that's a Bad Thing, what just happened.

[JBrian]

WAR WANDA!!! :smallfurious:

[Jeivar]

Even if he does, the events can still be interpreted as either "seriously booped-up judgment call" or "deliberately led expeditionary force into a trap". Anybody inclined to distrust Jillian is obviously going to prefer the latter interpretation....


Unfortunately for Wanda, the answer to "Whhat... do.. you want?" was not "I want it all back the way it was." She didn't take it very well at all. :smalleek:

Yeah, no kidding she didn't.:smalleek: Though I wonder if it would have made any difference. Wanda seems hellbent on preventing Ansom from taking Goblin Knob (my guess is she wants the Arkentools for herself, and Stanley is a useful tool in that quest).
And you're right about the consequences this could have for Jillian. If she's the only one who makes it back, this is going to look really, really BAD.

[rosebud]

I'm at a loss for words.

No, wait, that's the strip. :smallsmile: Is this the first strip to have no words?

As for the spell, given that it is based on cheat codes, it seems ridiculous to make any assumptions on its effects on Wanda. It is only wildly speculative to make assumptions on what its effects on the spell radius. Dead or zombie or whatever. We'll know soon enough (a week or two :smallsmile:)!

As for Ansom and friends, if the entire sky opened with lightning of death, there seems some possibility that they'd see it. (Of course, if Everyone but Jillian were ex, that might be somewhat suspicious. I am still curious why her mount did not get roasted to a nice gooey crispness.)

As for too gory? Meh, it's no worse than Raiders of the Lost Ark's climax when the arc was opened. It's not like the strip is showing S&M or anything. :smallwink:

[scotty new]

I can't wait for the follow up for this strip to see the effects of the spell. It was definitly a "pull out all stops" spell. I wonder if it was a saving throw oriented spell which a fail leads to imediate skeletalization, paralysis, or even death. That would make sense in the fact that jillian wasnt hit, and seemed to avoid damage as well. Some people commented on the fact that spells which imediately convert living units to undead soldiers does'nt exist, but maybe in Erfworld with a master croakamancer, there is such a spell in existence. I hope so because that would be freaking sweet, having jillian, and vinny fighting their own troops. However, I think she just killed the heck out of them.

[Liminaut]

Ow.

I just thought of a really nasty spell. I have no idea if this is what Wanda is casting, but imagine a spell that uncroaks your skeleton -- without effecting the rest of you. Suddenly you're wrapped around an undead under someone else's control.

[Fuzzy_Juan]

I will say, while very cool...I was hoping for more story. we got 3 panels...very nicely drawn...but man...I wanna know what is going on.

I do hope that the next comic comes in a day or so and not in 2 weeks like this one.

[PresidentEnder]

Vinnie's great. He's my favorite character in the strip. That said, I hope he is dead as a result of this spell (or better yet, insta-uncroaked) because of the interesting and brutal storytelling that makes possible.

[fractal]

I just thought of a really nasty spell. I have no idea if this is what Wanda is casting, but imagine a spell that uncroaks your skeleton -- without effecting the rest of you. Suddenly you're wrapped around an undead under someone else's control.
That's a fascinating and scary idea. Presumably the lack of living marrow would kill you in the medium-term, but in the short term... ow. Humanoid undead are typically of similar strength to living humanoids, so you could be wrestling against your own skeleton to avoid attacking your allies, etc.

[Aquillion]

Um, isn't Parson in that tower? Like, directly under the massive magical explosion?

[MedPig]

Wow, this is SERIOUSLY going to mess up Jaclyn's hair...

LOL.

Is it just me, or is Wanda WAY sexier when she goes all-in like this? Anybody can kill ONE bad guy, how many girls can fry a LOT of them?

[El_Chupacabra]

As I recall reading somewhere, this was supposed to last no more than a few strips more. If that's the case, the storyline would probably be a better fit in terms of dramatic climax if only Jillian and Wanda survived this spell and be stuck fighting to the death. Jillian would win, but be too scarred to continue further. Plus, the balance of power would probably shift just enough in Parson's favor to make his plans more feasible (yes, losing Wanda would be big, but eliminating Ansom's Air capability and his highest warlords would more than balance that out).

However, for a more enduring storyline, it would seem more likely that Vinnie and some Archons would survive and Jillian would retreat rather than face Wanda, even if she's spent. That would give us a very shaken Jillian, a Vinnie with a more cynical view of his leader's mindset ("Why Jillian over me? When she leads, this sort of boop always happens!"), and Archons much more wary of their abilities to overwhelm their adversary.

I can see a scenario where the effects of this spell are seen outside GK for miles. Ansom panics and presses his forces to engage at an unreasonable tempo, sort of another girlfriend rescue writ large. Some units sustain heavy losses as they weren't prepared properly or run across Sizemore's traps or Parson's killzones (think Stalingrad). It takes a turn or two for the survivors to return; either they just run out of move or their retreat is forced to be away from Ansom so they have to circle back. If the skeletized units are actually uncroaked they could attack and force Jillian farther away from Ansom. Upon return, Jillian is too shellshocked to continue for a turn or two, Vinnie is starting to think this whole thing is a clusterboop, and the Archons have to return to base for "Consultation" and replenishment of lost units. Wanda goes back into a coma under the stress or is just out of Mana points for a turn or two, but has already indirectly given Parson some desparately needed assistance.

I'm starting to think that perhaps this is where Parson will find what he needs to win. It seems that culturally, Erfworld has not taken advantage of castors as much as they should. Parson seems to be one of the few to be willing to risk them as frontline units, and he'll probably realize that Wanda could have tilted the balance of many previous battles if Stanley had actually put her in command instead of his pretty-boy warlords.

[SteveMB]

Um, isn't Parson in that tower? Like, directly under the massive magical explosion?

Hmmm... it depends on whether "inside the tower" counts as a separate location, and whether the spell is selective (e.g. a couple people suggested that warlords might be immune, explaining why Jillian is shocked but not apparently injured).

A few random speculations:

1. If the effect includes the tower and bypasses Parson because he's a warlord (even with a bonus of only 2), Bogroll might be well and truly boned (and Parson likes him enough to be pretty upset about that).

2. If the effect inherently bypasses warlords, Wanda presumably knows that, and was intending to "clear the decks" of Jillian's allied units without attacking Jillian herself. (There's still Vinny, but that can't be helped, unless Wanda still has something up her sleeve.)

3.Considering the earlier comments about how suspicious this fiasco might look to the Coalition, and Wanda's demonstrated facility for manipulation, perhaps she's about to throw Jillian's suggestion right back in her face. ("Turn. You can't go back to them now.")

[Burrito]

Ow.

I just thought of a really nasty spell. I have no idea if this is what Wanda is casting, but imagine a spell that uncroaks your skeleton -- without effecting the rest of you. Suddenly you're wrapped around an undead under someone else's control.


Yeah, but wouldn't it be your muscles/tendons/ligaments that were moving the skeleton?
Now if it were some sort of undead symbiotic relationship thing going on with an undead skeleton and your body, THAT would be cool. Lets say the Undead Skeleton gains nourishment from the red blood cells produced by your bone marrow, and in turn confers some sort of undead Con bonus to you, to make up for it. Immune to disease, fatigue etc. Maybe the ability to heal with both Positive and Negative Energy...

As far as the spell goes, I think it is kinda like an area affect Disintergrate, where either you save, or you're toast. Just because you see bones doens't mean there is some sort of zombification going on. They are just harder and denser than the rest of your soft mushy body, so they burn away slower.

I loved the art on this one too. Probably the most evocative one soe far. It would be even cooler if it was actually done with watercolors (like it looks like) and scanned in, rather than done with digital. I'm not sure what Jamie's technique is though. It reminds me of some of the Anson Maddocks art from the older Magic: The Gathering editions.

[Leewei]

My guess is that either:

1. Jillian resisted the spell; or

2. Wanda bypassed her on purpose, intending to either capture her again or else have her uncroaked units destroy her.

[Jeivar]

I think no matter what, this whole thing is going to look really bad for Jillian, given her repeated captures and the suspicion Parson planted in Ansom, and which already existed in Vinnie and Webley. For one, it looks like the spell left Jillian completely unscathed, and if that's a selective effect on Wanda's part it's going to have people wondering why.

Man, there are so many things that could happen next:

-Wanda captures Jillian, and no one in the group survives to report on what happened.
-Jillian freaks out and attacks Wanda, which could end in any number of ways.
-Jillian freaks out and returns to the camp, which further arouses suspicions.
-Wanda opens up a can of punishment on Jillian, but lets her leave alive, telling her they're through.
-Wanda puts Jillian under a proper mind control spell, and either keeps the barbarian to herself or turns her on her own comrades.
-Wanda just uncroaked all of those units and now turns them on Jillian, who is forced to kill them in self defense. Which could very well be mistaken for treachery by anyone viewing from a distance.

I'm 99% sure both Wanda and Jillian will stay alive until at least very late in the story, so I'm left trying to decipher what would be the most dramatically juicy way to continue this. Love could turn to hate for both of them, leading to a gruesome and tragic final showdown, or they could both stay angry and confused for a while before trying to reach some sort of understanding, one of them could end up turning and joining the other at a vital moment, one could decide the other means more to her than anything and die to protect her. . .

Well, I could go on and on and on like this, but for now I'm more interested in what people think of my suggestions. Any thoughts?

[Jeivar]

3.Considering the earlier comments about how suspicious this fiasco might look to the Coalition, and Wanda's demonstrated facility for manipulation, perhaps she's about to throw Jillian's suggestion right back in her face. ("Turn. You can't go back to them now.")

Ahhhhhhhh . . . now THAT would be quite an interesting twist :smallamused: And it could easily lead to a deeply hurtful situation where the affection is amputated out of their relationship, replaced by bitterness and manipulation.

[Ablogqwer]

Blood for the Blood God!

Uh... Yeah. <_< Anyway, I like the colored effects for the spells. Wonder if stock patterns were mixed and matched or whether it was created personally.

Anyway, on to the analyzing. I believe people here are mistaken as to how the spell was cast; the first panel appears to be a SIDE view of the tower, and a closer look reveals a gemstone buried in some sort of cone-shaped thing. The tower itself probably has defenses which can be activated by a caster. Now as to what that does or means? Who knows!

However, I suspect this means that when an opponent breaches the walls it isn't game over, but quite the contrary...

[stsasser]

That's it? That's all they got?!

meh

[kunou126]

I believe people are making the spell out to be more powerful than it was. I don't think there's any evidence to suggest that large quantities of Jillian's stack were croaked or uncroaked.

In fact I believe that the spell only affected the three archons, albeit in a very gruesome way. Three archons. Three uncroaked thingies. And at least 2 of the archons were in close proximity to ground zero based on the previous strip.

I'd bet the rest of Jillian's stack is probably unaffected (except for perhaps some psychological impact of watching three archons turn into unholy units in front of their eyes). It makes sense that Wanda would specifically assault the Archons. She was watching when the Archons broke her suggestion spell and it would be plausible for Wanda to blame them for what happened with Jillian.

They were powerful archons though. Each was able to one shot some wounded dragons. Still a very powerful spell even if limited to those three targets.

[El_Chupacabra]

Anyway, on to the analyzing. I believe people here are mistaken as to how the spell was cast; the first panel appears to be a SIDE view of the tower, and a closer look reveals a gemstone buried in some sort of cone-shaped thing. The tower itself probably has defenses which can be activated by a caster. Now as to what that does or means? Who knows!


Hm... Could that have been a previously unnoticed point on the staff? I see that this way:

1. The last statement by Wanda was AGGRO. That could be her adding her power -- notice the energy arc -- to the base power of the staff, which was activated by the AYBABTU command and being stabbed into the ground, cracking the floor. The other commands were the setup of whatever spell she's currently casting.

2. The energy arc from her AGGRO contacted the staff at a point that's blocked by light. That would be where this cone is located.

3. The blast appears to be a beam with a slight amount of scatter, so most likely Jaclyn bore the brunt of the attack, which was not aimed at Jillian in the first place. Weaker units further out were still fried, but I suspect higher units on the periphery -- Jillian and probably Vinnie and other Archons -- were "missed".

So, to sum my theory up; Wanda decided to isolate Jillian and blasted Jaclyn with a mid-level spell that had a blast through effect; the unipegataurs may have been a bonus kill. This could very well mean that she's still got a lot left; she needed to use a decent amount of energy to whack Jaclyn with overkill, but is holding enough back for any others. The others will not intervene for fear they could meet the same fate. Depending on how affected Jillian is (psychologically), this could mean a one-on-one fight, or a stunned retreat to reevaluate one she considered herself close to.

[Dacia Brabant]

There's also no reason to assume this is forced uncroaking. I've never heard of any instance of a undead creature being created directly from a living thing. The body has to die first, which is probably what this is, a kind of burning wave of superheated air, or some life-force destroying "evil" attack. It may even be a new kind of magic for Wanda.

In D&D 3.5, there's an Epic spell called Animus Blast (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/spells/animusBlast.htm) that deals damage and up to 10 of the creatures who die in the blast are immediately reanimated as skeletons under the caster's control.

It's as yet unclear of course whether the victims of Wanda's spell are going to become uncroaked, but presumably if they are that's the same principle at work as Animus Blas--the same spell kills them and reanimates them.


Level seems to play a role with magic use, and in many games determines magic resistance (and either available spells or spell power). Maggie said to Parsons "I'll do my levelbest" in regard to protecting him from Charly.

It's something of an archaism but "level best" just means doing something to the greatest possible degree of your ability, you see it used more in older literature, which seems to fit Maggie's stuffy personality. But no, like most other uses of the word it doesn't have anything to do with "levels" a la D&D and RPGs.

[The Old Hack]

Anyway, on to the analyzing. I believe people here are mistaken as to how the spell was cast; the first panel appears to be a SIDE view of the tower, and a closer look reveals a gemstone buried in some sort of cone-shaped thing. The tower itself probably has defenses which can be activated by a caster. Now as to what that does or means? Who knows!


I rather like the idea of this being part of a built-in tower defense. It might be something as simple as the tower amplifying any spells cast within its structure, or simply allowing casters to tap additional power from it in combat. Alternately, the power may come from the staff Wanda is packing -- it might be a one-shot item like a bazooka, crafted for a time where some extreme effort might be necessary. (I can't remember ever seeing Wanda using that staff before, I think I'll be spending much of the night happily rereading in an attempt to spot it. :smallsmile: )

[Prince_Rohan]

Cool, but that was a long wait.

[Lamech]

I rather doubt it was a highly focused blast that only hit a handful of units, the entire tower has lighting running up it and everything being washed out in pink. I think it was probably more of a large area blast that can exclude units to a degree, probably designed to be used in battle. (On a side note it sucks for tightly packed air units to be struck by a large AoE even more than tightly packed ground units.)

I thinks it is possible that the blast was one of those above ground spell defenses Sizemore talked about (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0086.html). If it is Parson will probably be quite annoyed: if it is one shot (or any limited smallish number) it was wasted on units that would wander off anyway; if it isn't he will be annoyed he couldn't fire it sooner the last time they were scouted.

Well the fallout from this will be fun. I can already see several ways cracks could form quite quickly in Ansom's coalition from everything that has been happening.

[EagleWiz]

AGGRO = Now jillions angry.
As for where the power for the spell came from? God mode. :smallbiggrin:

[Mr. Goodwraith]

In fact I believe that the spell only affected the three archons, albeit in a very gruesome way.

Um, we see one affected Archon and three affected unipegataurs so far, with Jillian (and her gwiffon?) unaffected. Hopefully the next strip will give us a better idea of the full scope of the spell's effects.

[Lycan 01]

I thought the Gwiffon got hit, too? They don't have skeletons, so it wouldn't be as obvious, but he seems to be getting fried just like the rest of them. Or maybe that is just the glow of death reflecting off his candy flesh?

[FoE]

I just can't get over how much I love that image in the last panel. It's so awesome ....

[Lycan 01]

Its like something you'd see on a cliche death metal album cover... Or that Led Zep album cover, Hell-ized... :smallbiggrin:

[Moechi_Vill]

I think Jillian will need some more flying allies; that spell appears to have fried everyone she was with (with the possible exception of Vinnie).

As for the power level of Wanda's spell, I'm of the opinion that it's a "one shot" deal and may have erased all of her ability for the turn, or more.

Vinnie is not a main character, and thus less exempt to the possibility of death.
Die coalition, die.

[Edea]

If magic of that scale can be used by a single unit without serious repercussions...yeah.

I'm not sure if any of the units actually croaked, though; we're kinda just stuck seeing them in agony, or extreme shock. I'll-assume- that the spell did indeed croak the archon and unipegataurs (as well as many off-page coalitionists).

[Zienth]

Most impressive.

Looked to me like Wanda's rage opened up a mighty big channel for magic to come through. Of course, the cheat codes may have really been cheat codes. Knowing a few cheat codes might explain why Wanda is so good at so many types of magic, but doesn't like using them. She may not feel good about using cheat codes in normal circumstances. But this was hardly "normal".

I'm not sure that blast was completely under Wanda's conscious control. That might explain why it seemed to miss Jillian and her mount. I'm very curious to see how it effected Vinnie. Also curious to see how it effected Wanda. I suspect it cost her more than just a few mana points.

Zienth

[Arkenputtyknife]

Let's not forget that Wanda knows Jillian very well, and may well have the ability to tailor her spell to a power level just below Jillian's ‘toasted’ level. Thus she gets rid of Jillian's companions and they can carry on their little conversation on a more equal level.

Not saying it's the right explanation, but it should be considered.


Level seems to play a role with magic use, and in many games determines magic resistance (and either available spells or spell power).
Don't forget Jillian's “You'll level. It'll be fun” comment way back when. Erfworld most certainly has levels and leveling.


Um, isn't Parson in that tower? Like, directly under the massive magical explosion?
Yes, but he's on the same side. It'll be interesting to see if this makes a difference.


Anyway, on to the analyzing. I believe people here are mistaken as to how the spell was cast; the first panel appears to be a SIDE view of the tower, and a closer look reveals a gemstone buried in some sort of cone-shaped thing. The tower itself probably has defenses which can be activated by a caster. Now as to what that does or means? Who knows!
Oh boy… Get out the pruning shears, the epileptic trees are on the march again. That cone-shaped thing is Efdup Tower.

Note the little spots on the ring (the viewing platform where Wanda is standing) on the lower left side. Those are Jillian's forces, getting fried, or at least suffering a bad sunburn.


meh
One more for the ignore list.

[Ptorquemada]

Anyway, on to the analyzing. I believe people here are mistaken as to how the spell was cast; the first panel appears to be a SIDE view of the tower, and a closer look reveals a gemstone buried in some sort of cone-shaped thing. The tower itself probably has defenses which can be activated by a caster. Now as to what that does or means? Who knows!

I'm of the opinion that the black speckles near the point of the cone are the flying units and that this is a very long distance aerial view of the tower itself.

Your interpretation does explain some things (What's that curved thing? Lip of the tower. Why aren't there any other buildings visible? Because it's the side of the tower. Why is Jillian pink on one side only? The beam is going to one side of her.)

Of course, the answers could also be "City wall, they're washed out by the glow, Jaclyn burning is brighter than the glow of the spell itself."


I thought the Gwiffon got hit, too? They don't have skeletons, so it wouldn't be as obvious, but he seems to be getting fried just like the rest of them. Or maybe that is just the glow of death reflecting off his candy flesh?

I think reflection, since it's the same color as Jillian. The soft bits of the ones that we know are hit went black, not pink.

[Cespinarve]

I don't think it was worth the wait.


No, no it was not. Very impressive, but if it's not followed up by a post, say, tommorow, I'm going to be very... put... out.

[Cespinarve]

I don't think it was worth the wait.


No, no it was not. Very impressive, but if it's not followed up by a post, say, tommorow, I'm going to be very... put... out.

[Avilan the Grey]

I second the guess that what Wanda is doing is opening up a one-time use defense or power; probably the built-in last defenses of Gobwin Knob, or less likely destroying an artifact (the staff) to use it's powers in a one-time use explosion. This means that Wanda should still be kicking in the next round, no power drawn from herself...

Also, I second the opinion that what we see is a long distance view of the Knob itself.

[Fighteer]

One word... Meganuke.

I can't wait for the next strip to reveal which units survived that blast. Magical tower defenses, ultimate last stand spell by Wanda, or something else, you can't cast something like that without a lot of casualties. I honestly expected the Archons to last longer, but something had to whittle down the attackers or Parson would have had no hope at all.

I'm thinking that the next comic will show reactions from the observers: Parson, Ansom, and/or Jillian.

[the_tick_rules]

BEST ARTWORK EVER!!! Boy charlie is not going to take this well. So many questions. Maybe Jillian made her "save" or whatever. Or maybe the spell only affects the archons creature type specifically. so is that the archons we see vavporizing, why to they look like winged centaurs or are those other flying units?

[Braggi]

It's something of an archaism but "level best" just means doing something to the greatest possible degree of your ability, you see it used more in older literature, which seems to fit Maggie's stuffy personality. But no, like most other uses of the word it doesn't have anything to do with "levels" a la D&D and RPGs.
Nice, thank you. I looked it up, never heard this before. Sounded like an intended ambiguity to me, in the spirit of Sizemore's "many a boring turn" in #86.


Don't forget Jillian's “You'll level. It'll be fun” comment way back when. Erfworld most certainly has levels and leveling.

Yes, thank you. In strip #84 the listing of remaining troops in GK mentions levels as well, though it displays them erraticly.

I wonder wether, for a warlord, level and leadership are the same? It would make sense for a "simple" system. Parsons mentioned in his blog that his bonus is 2, which equals his level shown in #84.
Conversation between Jillian and Webinar was in #56, it is unclear if she refers to leadership or level.
Stanley was angry at first about Parsons retreating his stacks in #61 ("your warlords won't level up").

[Ablogqwer]

Oh boy… Get out the pruning shears, the epileptic trees are on the march again. That cone-shaped thing is Efdup Tower.

Note the little spots on the ring (the viewing platform where Wanda is standing) on the lower left side. Those are Jillian's forces, getting fried, or at least suffering a bad sunburn.


Rather poor taste to insult someone like this just because of a disagreement in opinion. Please do not respond with a lofty, nose-in-the-air "that is because you are wrong." It isn't a valid argument. Or particularly polite.

The only argument as to why it isn't is simply-


Your interpretation does explain some things (What's that curved thing? Lip of the tower. Why aren't there any other buildings visible? Because it's the side of the tower. Why is Jillian pink on one side only? The beam is going to one side of her.)
... And that the base is far too wide. It clearly isn't a tower which are objects, by definition, that are tall and skinny. Unless it can change shape. [Insert Transformers Themesong Here]

No doubt there is also the counter explana-


Of course, the answers could also be "City wall, they're washed out by the glow, Jaclyn burning is brighter than the glow of the spell itself."


...

Damn it, Ptorque. Anyway. The shape could also be explained by

A. The spell distorts space, time, natural light, and/or B.

B. Artistic license slash perspective.

[Moral Wiz]

@Leadership/level, the two are probably related in the long run, but are different. I'm thinking of it as like D&D style charisma modifier, but independant of your other stats, and probably much less (I'm thinking Jill's quite a bit higher than Level 9.)

Mind you, if so, and Parson's bonus is equal to his level... that'd mean that he'd start weak, but get monumentally powerful, given time. That works. (Special. That word torments me so.)

[kunou126]

Oh...

Now I see.

I was wrong about the spell only affecting the archons. I thought the 3 unipegtaurs were what remained after the spell.

Having a nuke like that in a back pocket is way too convenient, in my personal opinion. Almost takes the strategy out of turned based strategy having something like that at your disposal. Still hard to say how many will be croaked, but if it's pretty much the whole new coalition stack then I feel extremely cheated. Other wise that spell needs to have some catastrophic side effects, such as croaking the caster in the process and invoking some kind of natural disaster on the tiles nearby (like an earthquake).

[El_Chupacabra]

Oh boy… Get out the pruning shears, the epileptic trees are on the march again. That cone-shaped thing is Efdup Tower.

Note the little spots on the ring (the viewing platform where Wanda is standing) on the lower left side. Those are Jillian's forces, getting fried, or at least suffering a bad sunburn.

Ah, now I see it....

So this is a spherical or ring (ie, anyone within a certain radius and within a certain range on the Z Axis -- think UFO/XCom) attack and VERY Powerful, not mid-range.

I think we can safely say it: That's Efdup.

I'm thinking to avoid being unbalanced, either Wanda just shot her wad for the turn -- probably several -- or there's some consequences of that spell, such as all units in range not under shelter are subject to fryination. We might have some Blackened Gobwins to go with our Fried Unipegataurs.

[Alacar Leoricar]

Um.. yeah. Holy crap indeed. And that's just her in a weakened state :smalleek:

[SteveMB]

Having a nuke like that in a back pocket is way too convenient, in my personal opinion. Almost takes the strategy out of turned based strategy having something like that at your disposal.

I expect that there are some serious limitations and/or costs to that Apocalypse In Pink spell -- if it was something that could be trotted out whenever convenient, they situation wouldn't have been particularly desperate to begin with.

With Parson's luck, it'll probably be something that boops up his next plan.

[Laurentio]

I expect that there are some serious limitations and/or costs to that Apocalypse In Pink spell -- if it was something that could be trotted out whenever convenient, they situation wouldn't have been particularly desperate to begin with.

With Parson's luck, it'll probably be something that boops up his next plan.
Apparently, Wanda is proficient in using scrolls (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0030.html), magical items (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0039.html) and activating pre-made magics (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0013.html).
This show of power could me nothing on her alone. Her new staff could be part of it.

Laurentio

[Moral Wiz]

And we don't know how she got that staff. Gobwin Knob probably doesn't have a treasuretrove of such things, otherwise as said, this wouldn't have happened.



Possibly it came thru the Magic Kingdom portal. But who sent it thru?

Someone known to Charlie. He knows quite a lot, and seemed to know something in Parson's favor here.

But not known to the RCC at large. They seem pretty sure that Stanley stands alone.

Someone who doesn't have a direct army, but is known to have casters. And who's casters might just be capable enough to wip up something like this.

Banhammer may have just declared what side he's on.

Just a guess, mostly at random, and very unlikely. But a possible.

[teratorn]

Poor Jaclyn...

When I saw the first panel I thought the volcano was erupting. It's an awesome display of power just to kill a few flying units. I'm not sure how Parson will react, particularly if this could have wasted most of Ansom's army. On the other hand, Wanda may just have saved Stanley, and so Parson will live another day.

[Stallogarro]

Is it just me, or is Wanda WAY sexier when she goes all-in like this? Anybody can kill ONE bad guy, how many girls can fry a LOT of them?

She is a sexy bootclad goddess of death, Wanda is. :smallcool:

[Archpaladin Zousha]

:eek: OUCH!

[lamguin]

Cool page.

My theory: Instant uncroaked. Warlords immune.

Archons are neither casters nor warlords. They are magical creatures with spell-like abilities. They are not casters themselves. In much the same way that red dwagons can breathe fire and fly, the archons can detect spells on a person, send thinkagrams, and do glowy cutty disintegrating things to dwagons. It's built in.
[/theory]

(the website is crawling for me right now. I'll edit in links later.)

[Calmness]

Wow. Wanda just doesn't play around, does she? I hope she lightens up, someday.

[DeathQuaker]

"My spellcasting. Let me show you it."

Thoughts:
- Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous artwork. Appropriately terrifying, love the colors.

- Wanda is now officially a textbook Psycho Lesbian (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PsychoLesbian)

- No! Not Jaclyn! She's the one who stayed through the whole series! She even had a cameo in the second movie! God-dang-it!! That's just WRONG! :smallfrown:

- Jillian knew last time she asked Wanda to leave with her, she got, "The very hard way." She was foolish to have asked again, and she endangered her troops to do it. Gets all she deserves after this, really.

Speculation/Opinions:
- Wanda intentionally missed Jillian, despite Jillian ticking her off. But that's also because torturing her through the loss of her comrades will be more satisfying.

- The "Aggro" spell is what it says on the tin: lots and lots of aggravated damage. Don't think it's any more complex than that--lots of powerful flying creatures just got disintegrated.

- I wonder if this will put a strain on Wanda. She was only just recovered, and barely at that, given her slurred speech and bags under the eyes. This is obviously a last-ditch sort of spell, or she would've told Parson ages ago, "Oh, by the way, I can annihilate a number of powerful units with a single spell." So she may have done a number on that part of Ansom/Jillian/Vinnie's army, but I wonder if that's all she'll do for awhile.

[archon_huskie]

After all this, i am still not sure what I am looking at. I hope 107 comes soon with an explanation, and pie.

[TheWombat]

I have a few theories about who and what will survive the mega-damage blast.

First, if the blast was indeed an instant uncroak spell, then in all likelyhood Vinny will be fine due to the fact that his unit designation is probably living-uncroaked or something along those lines.

Second, Parson and the rest of the people in the tower should be fine as they are on the same side as Wanda.

Lastly, the reason Jillian is fine is not because she wasn't part of the targeted area, nor because Wanda purposefully wanted her to not be affected. If we go back to when Jillian was held captive you can see that she was strangely affected by the start of Stanely's turn. If you infer that she is somewhat linked to both sides there, it could be that the spell could not designate her as a target because she is somehow part of Parson's side, willingly or otherwise.

[Aerysil]

I think the word you're looking for is.... ow?

[Carne]

I see no-one has speculated that the blast may have been that powerful because it was utilizing ALL of Wanda's power.

Much like if you should suddenly drop the magnetic containment field around the warp core antimatter stockpile.

Self Destruct Sequence, in other words.

Her love chose other than her. The battle is not going well. Her mind seems broken. What else does Wanda perceive that she has to live for?

[Caractacus]

Nice, thank you. I looked it up, never heard this before. Sounded like an intended ambiguity to me, in the spirit of Sizemore's "many a boring turn" in #86.


Yeah, it's a well-known phrase in the UK. I wouldn't call it an archaism. It's just a rather staid, understated thing to say.

I think it could still always be a deliberate pun though...

[Vanguard]

Well I mine as well considering that maybe someone will see this.



!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!HOLY FREK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!



:smalleek:

[Occasional Sage]

Poor Jaclyn...

When I saw the first panel I thought the volcano was erupting. It's an awesome display of power just to kill a few flying units. I'm not sure how Parson will react, particularly if this could have wasted most of Ansom's army. On the other hand, Wanda may just have saved Stanley, and so Parson will live another day.

That seems to be very much what this is, even if it's not the volcano itself it's close enough; I haven't seen the perspective discussion from 105 revived, but the black specks appear to be the flyers (there are a couple of sillouhettes that look like unipegataurs, for instance), which makes this vastly more frightening that I'd thought previously.

[Vanguard]

I have a few theories about who and what will survive the mega-damage blast.

First, if the blast was indeed an instant uncroak spell, then in all likelyhood Vinny will be fine due to the fact that his unit designation is probably living-uncroaked or something along those lines.

Second, Parson and the rest of the people in the tower should be fine as they are on the same side as Wanda.

Lastly, the reason Jillian is fine is not because she wasn't part of the targeted area, nor because Wanda purposefully wanted her to not be affected. If we go back to when Jillian was held captive you can see that she was strangely affected by the start of Stanely's turn. If you infer that she is somewhat linked to both sides there, it could be that the spell could not designate her as a target because she is somehow part of Parson's side, willingly or otherwise.

I really don't think Wanda gives a crap about who she's hitting, even if Parson was in there she would do it, just as long as Jillian was not in the area, but that was just for the second part, everything else looks about right to me.

[Vanguard]

After all this, i am still not sure what I am looking at. I hope 107 comes soon with an explanation, and pie.


Pie, sweet sweet Pie. :smallsigh:

[Occasional Sage]

Pie, sweet sweet Pie. :smallsigh:

Plans, anymore, must include pie. They must also avoid causing you to lose your hat.

Piiiiiie.

[Wadoka]

Eh. I vote plain old-fashioned "Retributive Strike".

So what if Wanda doesn't have a Rod of Lordly Might?


I say Wanda's croaked. That the spell she used is that famous "Everything I Have" last-stand blast that results in the caster's demise along with everything else below a certain number of hit dice in the blast range.

[Ptorquemada]

Eh. I vote plain old-fashioned "Retributive Strike".

So what if Wanda doesn't have a Rod of Lordly Might?


I say Wanda's croaked. That the spell she used is that famous "Everything I Have" last-stand blast that results in the caster's demise along with everything else below a certain number of hit dice in the blast range.

I don't think Wanda croaked herself, because I don't think she'd go that far to take out a few coalition units she has nothing really personal against. If Ansom had been within blast range it would be a different story.

I would not, however, be horribly surprised to find out that she just uncroaked herself.

[SteveMB]

I really don't think Wanda gives a crap about who she's hitting, even if Parson was in there she would do it, just as long as Jillian was not in the area

Jillian is in the area; for some reason (the ZOT only affects certain unit types, she made her "saving throw", whatever) she doesn't seem to be getting toasted.

[Arkenputtyknife]

Rather poor taste to insult someone like this just because of a disagreement in opinion. Please do not respond with a lofty, nose-in-the-air "that is because you are wrong." It isn't a valid argument. Or particularly polite.
I insulted no one; I gave a sharp and well-deserved kick in the pants to a poor and ill-considered theory. No nose in the air. No apologies.

You say my argument isn't valid, which is funny because I didn't present an argument. Okay, let me present it.

First, I think it's Efdup Tower because it LOOKS LIKE Efdup Tower. It's the same shape. It has the necessary features at the right places. It's viewed from an unusual angle, and is foreshortened because of that (if you don't know what foreshortening is, ask a photographer), but it's still identical in detail to the form of Efdup Tower as it's been presented in the artwork to date.

Second, I reject the tower-mounted weapon argument because it postulates something that has never been seen or even suggested, and the only evidence for it is an idea, pulled out of thin air, that maybe Efdup Tower has a superweapon that looks like a miniature Efdup Tower mounted on its side. When we have to choose between a theory which postulates something for which there is no evidence whatsoever, and one which is fully explained by what we already know, which is the better theory?

Recall that we have never seen a single superweapon such as this anywhere in the strip. We have, however, seen people casting spells that have similar effects. Remember when the Archons croaked the dwagons? They didn't use a superweapon, they used spells.

Third, I reject the tower-mounted weapon theory because Wanda is a CASTER. Everything in the recent strips has indicated that she is casting a spell of great power, not pulling a formerly invisible cannon out of the walls.

Yes, I think the theory is ridiculous. Yes, I think it should be seen for what it is and stomped into the ground. Yes, I think people should think clearly about what they're looking at, and not come up with wild speculations that have no justification in the strip.


The only argument as to why it isn't is simply-
<arguments annoyingly omitted by quoting mechanism>
... And that the base is far too wide. It clearly isn't a tower which are objects, by definition, that are tall and skinny.
If you believe that, you haven't seen very many towers. There are such things as squat towers; in medieval times, when civil engineering was poorly understood, they were very common, and can be found on many castles where strength is more important than looking pretty or being very high. In some castles you will find towers that are wider than they are tall. I've climbed more than a few towers like this. I've walked through forests and suddenly come across towers that are no more than twice their width in height.

Very tall towers often have a broad base, out of necessity; Toronto's CN Tower is a good example. If it were slender all the way down, it would have collapsed while it was being built. If it were made of stone, it would be much broader and nowhere near as high; in fact it would be a lot like Efdup Tower.

Does Efdup Tower change shape? Go back through the comic and look at all the different views of it. Sometimes it looks banana-shaped. Sometimes it's so tall that the big office is high above the rim wall; sometimes it's lower. Yes, in the artwork, Efdup Tower changes shape. I'm sure it's just artistic license, and the tower doesn't "really" change shape, but that doesn't alter what we've seen. In this case, due to the foreshortening effect, the tower would be much taller than it appears to be in this one frame. I'm sure Jamie understands foreshortening.

[HamsterOfTheGod]

My reaction was...Jillian really has betrayed them all (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0104.html) after all.

[shadowdemon_lord]

Heheh, spare Jillian? Nooooo, not if Parson is on his game. Jillian just had her entire force wiped out hard core right over an enemy city, she's probably only got Vinnie left. If Parson doesn't take this as a blessing from the gods (titans?) and order his archers to launch a full scale attack on Vinnie and Jillian right now, I'll be quite surprised. I mean really, when is he going to get a better opportunity to try and croak two enemy warlords? My moneys on them escaping, but not in good shape.

Also, if the effect of the spell is what it looks like, the alliance just lost just about every heavy hitting flyer they have. No way they can fight the dwagons without the archons and unipegataurs. What does that leave them with? Gwiffons, ORLIES, and bats? As I recall, they weren't that much stronger a force from the start, minus the archons they are booped. Stanley just earned some respite, if not a definite victory.

[Laurentio]

Wanda is now officially a textbook Psycho Lesbian (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PsychoLesbian)
Actually she is bisexual. Or more probably, she doesn't give a crap on your gender, as long as you lick her boots and call it chocolate!

Laurentio

[Keymort]

Actually, I'd have to disagree with pretty much all of you.
I'd say the smell did damage to all of them, but seeing as Wozername is a warlord, she would likely have more hitpoints than the average unit, so despite taking damage, she would survive.
Anyway....
THAT WAS FREAKING AWSOME!
I just love the sweet smell of cooking person in the morning!

[Laurentio]

Actually, I'd have to disagree with pretty much all of you.
I'd say the smell did damage to all of them, but seeing as Wozername is a warlord, she would likely have more hitpoints than the average unit, so despite taking damage, she would survive.
Donno. The spell is clearly painful, and Jillian "Bisex R Us" Zamussels seems not touched at all. She looks surprised, horrified, but not in any pain. From previous panels we know that wounds are felt for, so she should show some reaction.
Most probably, the spell is a "all or nothing", and she made her save (or is inherently immune, or never been a target at all).
Her mount too, as we know that a mount is just the "merge" of a hero.

Laurentio

[Moral Wiz]

If a mount gets affected, sending her to death, there is no real point of making her immune, really. (from a game point of view)

[DrivinAllNight]

OK, I am confused, I tried reading the posts to figure out this strip. I looked over the strip again and to me it seems like she activated some huge spell, especially when looking at the first panel, which looks like a very high view of the tower with little black dots representing the fliers who flew in, what the rest of the area is I don't know, unless this is some sort of game map view? Cause the lightening arcs go from the Wanda's hands (as seen in the previous strip) to down around the tower as seen now. How in the Boop a spell this size doesn't take most if not all out of the caster would be beyond me, since Wanda seemed to be channeling the energy of the spell through her, and my limited understanding of electronics would seem like she just overloaded herself and may be out of commission for awhile again. ANd parson may just be pissed enough to not have known that Wanda could do this kind of spell.

The artwork was good and whatnot, but this part of the story leaves too many questions unanswered. I guess I'll just have to wait till the next one to come along and helps explain some of what just happened?

[DeathQuaker]

Actually she is bisexual. Or more probably, she doesn't give a crap on your gender, as long as you lick her boots and call it chocolate!


Referring more to the fact that she's lost it due to the behavior of her female lover. Not necessarily a literal lesbian per se, but she fits the the trope (other bisexual women, like Talia Winters from Bab 5, are also listed in the trope description).

The real point is she's becoming a bit of a cliche.

[SteveMB]

Referring more to the fact that she's lost it due to the behavior of her female lover.

Or it could be a reaction to loss of control over the situation. That would fit the fact that she wandered off and went catatonic after the battle (and with it the last apparent hope of salvaging anything) was lost, and not immediately after Jillian slipped her leash.

[SirBel]

I still think Jillian was unaffected because she's a double agent for Stanley! She healed when the sun came up when she was captive, and she didn't take any damage now. She's a tool of Stanley!!!!

[Kudzu]

If this is simply a damage attack, I think that the other two archons and Vinnie will survive the blast (though they may suffer serious injuries). Jillian seems to be (physically) unaffected. The blast appears (to me) to have three distinct areas of intensity. Jillian and Jaclyn are within 'ground zero'. Vinnie, the other archons, and some Unipegataurs are roughly where 'Ground Zero' ends and the secondary damage zone begins. All the rest of the flying creatures are within the secondary zone...beyond that the blast continues onward as a cone. Seems to me that we're seeing the worst of what the blast has done (frying an archon and three Unipegataurs) though I expect most (if not all) of the Orlys and bats to be wiped out as well as a few more Unipegataurs. Depending on how the spell works, the Peeps may all survive (alternatively, Jillian's mount may be getting some form of defense bonus from it's rider and the other Peeps will get torched). The crippled few units remaining will (after some shouting back and forth) likely follow orders and leave to meet reinforcements before attempting to tackle Stanley. Next time Ansom is contacted, Jillian will have some 'splainin to do.

[Laurentio]

Referring more to the fact that she's lost it due to the behavior of her female lover. Not necessarily a literal lesbian per se, but she fits the the trope (other bisexual women, like Talia Winters from Bab 5, are also listed in the trope description).

The real point is she's becoming a bit of a cliche.
I know. But still, I think that she is a Depravated Bisexual (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DepravedBisexual). Almost same trope, and more fitting. And, if Wanda ends to be fully lesbian, I lose my chance to lick her boots.

Laurentio

[lovelyluthien]

*gulp* Holy Boop.

[Jeivar]

I know. But still, I think that she is a Depravated Bisexual (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DepravedBisexual). Almost same trope, and more fitting. And, if Wanda ends to be fully lesbian, I lose my chance to lick her boots.

Laurentio

I'd hardly call her depraved. Cold, ambitious, driven, manipulative and self-centered. But not depraved.

[brob]

Whoever noted that earlier panel with Sizemore talking about above ground spell defences absolutely nailed it. This is obviously excessive force for a regular attack. It is a (probably single-use) spell defence. Parson will be awed, and possibly pissed if he was aware of this and was counting on using it. It also explains why Bogroll asked if he wanted a generic caster, if any caster could fire off the defences. The other theories are wrong because they are dumb.

[Zienth]

The other theories are wrong because they are dumb.

Hard to argue with that logic.

[brob]

Hard to argue with that logic.

Nods. Simple, yet ineffible.

[Keymort]

Whoever noted that earlier panel with Sizemore talking about above ground spell defences absolutely nailed it. This is obviously excessive force for a regular attack. It is a (probably single-use) spell defence. Parson will be awed, and possibly pissed if he was aware of this and was counting on using it. It also explains why Bogroll asked if he wanted a generic caster, if any caster could fire off the defences. The other theories are wrong because they are dumb.

Yeah, so you're saying anyone who's made their own theory is dumb... Thanks man. You are a really nice person.
Anyhowm, maybe she's just freaking powerful, but has never revealed her power until now.
She's obviously not a complete idiot, so I doubt she'd waste a major spell like that for revenge. She just seems to cold and calculated to do that.

[brob]

Yeah, so you're saying anyone who's made their own theory is dumb... Thanks man. You are a really nice person.
I think you have stephen hawking's, Aaron Sorkin's and Gaius Baltar's brains smooshed together inside your skull. (Especially compared to me!) But the only part of my statement above I would change is that I said ineffable instead of inerfable.

[Jeivar]

She's obviously not a complete idiot, so I doubt she'd waste a major spell like that for revenge. She just seems to cold and calculated to do that.

Under normal circumstances, yeah. But no-one has 100% control of their own emotions, and given recent events I'm willing to believe she's in a "SCREW CONSEQUENCES!!" frame of mind.

[Keymort]

Under normal circumstances, yeah. But no-one has 100% control of their own emotions, and given recent events I'm willing to believe she's in a "SCREW CONSEQUENCES!!" frame of mind.

Maybe, but personally I think she's too cold for even that.
I'm may be wrong, but if it is some kind of UBER death spell that drains all of your mana, I still doubt it would be something Stanley would be saving up, and its probably more than a one shot spell that can never be cast again.

She may just be a Dues Ex Machina too though.

[ideasmith]

While Jillian is obviously important to Wanda, there are also other things important to Wanda. It is worth noting that Wanda started spellcasting promptly after Jillian announce her intention of killing Stanley. It is also worth noting that the more flying troops she croaks (or whatever), the fewer are available to help kill Stanley.

Wanda obviously wants the Arkenhammer kept out of enemy hands.

Not badly enough to kill Jillian, however.

Edit: Fixed grammer.

[kreszantas]

All I can say that this indeed is the end of this story arc... What better way to leave it than to your own imagination as to what happened. So many sequels and "TV Series" final episodes in this fashion. Why not a webcomic? :smalltongue: This gives the story a little more emphasis and allows for an acceptable / reasonable plot shift without really causing to much pain.

Roasted Archon could be just a case of wrong place wrong time so it is not bad bonus after seeing them croak plenty of dwagons.

[Oslecamo]

I'd hardly call her depraved. Cold, ambitious, driven, manipulative and self-centered. But not depraved.

Did you forget her speciality is turning people into rotten walking corpses?

How much more depraved can you get? The only reason why she isn't eating childrens for breakfast it's because there are no childrens at Efworld.

And for all it seems she kills puppies and cuddly things for a living.

[Justyn]

Did you forget her speciality is turning people into rotten walking corpses?

How much more depraved can you get? The only reason why she isn't eating childrens for breakfast it's because there are no childrens at Efworld.

And for all it seems she kills puppies and cuddly things for a living.

In all fairness, Wanda turns rotten corpses into rotten walking corpses. They stopped being people when they had sharp pieces of metal shoved into them; and it's not like the corpses were going to do much else exept disintigrate at the start of their side's next turn.

[Wender]

Did you forget her speciality is turning people into rotten walking corpses?

How much more depraved can you get?

Wanda craves control, perhaps more than anything else, and who has more control than a necromancer over the undead? The archons were exactly right when they called her pet warlords "puppets." In this, Wanda is not unlike some of history's most vile killers.

The thing with the utterly depraved is that they are often, in their own terms, coldly rational. It is to the extent that they reject irrationality—any true love, humanity, spirit, or emotion beyond their own—that they are depraved.

I think Wanda has felt love, but she only understands it from another person as a voluntary submission to her control. It's hard for her to have a relationship to a peer. Not impossible, apparently, as she seems to have mustered something like that with Stanley and with Parson, but hard. She will always seek the advantage.

[R.I.P. Manpower]

well, I would look at this from a D&D point of view...basically we can compare to Croakamancy is Necromancy. The functions of the necromancy sphere of magic is to either kill things or reanimate things that have been killed...maybe even reanaimate things as they get killed, however that would have to be a suitably epic spell!!!

...but that is neither here nor there, epic level characters can take epic spells, spells that are not normally cast as part of your normal magic daily uses, these are feats that have a once a day use.

Seeing how that Wanda is a suitably epic Croakamancer, it would make perfect sense that she have at least one or two epic spells at her disposal. Especially as necro/croaka -mancy go very well with epic spells!

As a level 9 barbarian, Jillian would naturally have a very high fortitude save. Most save or die spells are fortitude based. Otherwise it's possible that there is an HD cap on the level of creatures effected in either the sense that it will only affect creatures up to level 8 or it only affects a total number of HD summed up!

...a good reason for not having seen power like this from Wanda before is because she has not yet had the opportunity. Even if we had seen her in battle, it would make little sense to use your Epic Spell, when a simple magic missile would suffix.

A seasoned caster knows when to use which spell so as to maximize it's efficiency...using your 1xday epic spell vs. a horde of your opponents highest level fliers seems like the perfect opportunity to unleash the beast!

What I'd like to see it the life-energy taken from all the croak targets coaless into some kind of summon to fight at Wanda's side! Ala Vampiric Feast from Neverwinter Nights 2!

[HamsterOfTheGod]

Looking at it again makes me think like the great story is coming to an end soon. Seems the time for it. (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0074.html) It would make for a good cliffhanger ending to Part I.

[Oslecamo]

Wanda craves control, perhaps more than anything else, and who has more control than a necromancer over the undead?

A wizard/artificer/dirtmancer over his contructs? Golems not only follow your orders, they do it with a smile on their face.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0097.html

Granted, it's harder to turn your oponents into golems than zombifying them.

That's why I defend Wanda is depraved. She manipulates people untill they die, and then she reanimates them as zombies so he can "play" with them a little more.

Jillian seems to be the first to have escaped Wanda's tight control. And she's pissed. Really pissed

If Jillian didn't got hit by the blast, it's because Wanda decided death is too good for her. The croackmancer wants to breack her first.

And what's the best way of breaking a comander? Kill the troops under their control of course right on front of them of course. This will be a great blow to Jillian's pride. Wanda is showing the barbarian how wrong she was in trying to defy her directly. And then god knows what other atrocities Wanda will unleash to further torture Jillian untill she's an empty obedient shell that she can comand
again.

On the other hand, it seems like Stanley will be able to make his escape, with the pursue force hit so hard.

[Freederick]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that Wanda just jumped the shark (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JumpingTheShark)? :smallyuk:

Many of the telltale signs are here: it's done to boost the strip's sagging ratings (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_the_shark#Origin); we have a drastic mood whiplash (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MoodWhiplash), going directly from AYBABTU to Hiroshima; and Wanda's heretofore complex personality is grossly flanderized (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Flanderization). All this makes me seriously doubt if the strip will continue past the current story arc. :smallfrown:

Yes, the artwork is superb. But it too clashes with the rest of the strip.

[Moral Wiz]

It's just you.

This is just effects. It;s basically one, rather powerful attack, probably at high personal cost, and very much at an appropriate dramatic moment, as this is about the end of book one.

[Laurentio]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that Wanda just jumped the shark (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JumpingTheShark)? :smallyuk:
Well, no. To me, it's just quite linear. Rejection, denial and homicide frenzy are just the expression of her being a little pissed.

More seriously, seems me not.

Laurentio

[SteveMB]

I'm not seeing this "mood whiplash". Wanda has had her (over)confidence suddenly shot down, been decisively rejected by Jillian, and lost all control over the situation. After she (somewhat) recovered from her collapse, she first tried to make sense of what had happened. When the answers she got were simply not acceptable to her, she lashed out.

That all sounds like a natural progression, and perfectly in character based on what we've seen so far. In particular, the initial attempt to ask "Why?" seems very natural -- for someone with a strong need to be in control, a sudden feeling that The World Isn't Making Sense Anymore can be far more alarming than petty trifles like the approach of an enemy that outnumbers you 25:1.

[HamsterOfTheGod]

Is it just me, or does anyone else think that Wanda just jumped the shark (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JumpingTheShark)? :smallyuk:


Actually a quick survey of the previous posts shows that most people thought it was an awesome moment. This means either that the comic is in full swing, hitting its stride or that ... its a cliffhanger ending to part 1.

[Jari Kafghan]

Everyone keeps referring to the "Cone of Death" as a spell. I think its less that and more of a lethal magical manifestation of screaming at the top of your lungs or going apesh*t on someone. All the cheat codes leading up to it are kind of similar to the, "fine. You want to be like that? I can play that game. Lets see how you like it." More talking to herself kind of trying to gather her thoughts and not doing it well, then unleashing whatever she was barely controlling before.

Shortened, I don't see it as a spell, but more of a release of raw unfocused magic. No straight uncroaking, no disintegrate, just "eat this" kind of magic. Not calculations just an action.

And to me there are very few things scarier then someone who is complete control all the time and prides themselves on it, losing control in such a way.

And I think Jillian made the Fort save.

[Rollin]

I still think Jillian was unaffected because she's a double agent for Stanley! She healed when the sun came up when she was captive, and she didn't take any damage now. She's a tool of Stanley!!!!

If this was indeed the reason the blast didn't kill Jillian (not that we know this yet), Wanda might even have set it off in order to find out Jillian's present allegiance (and kill her if she is truly on the other side now).

This idea would probably only make sense, though, if Wanda had reason to take Jillian's allegiance as standing for her personal loyalty to Wanda. (Otherwise the mega-attack would be absurdly over-the-top, as opposed to just astonishingly over-the-top.) And we simply don't know enough about this either. So, I guess, never mind.

[EvilDoom]

Interesting, I didn't think of the aggro-ed croak-o-mancy spell so much as allowing selection of targets, but as limited to only affecting regular troops and not leaders, i.e. beings with leadership scores per Parson's blog.

My perspective is probably too rules oriented, but I can see how a powerful spell like that might be limited to not immediately terminate (or better possibly convert to undead) enemy leaders, but only regular enemy troops.

It appears pretty kick butt already and affecting opposing leaders may be game unbalancing.

[Jeivar]

I'm not seeing this "mood whiplash". Wanda has had her (over)confidence suddenly shot down, been decisively rejected by Jillian, and lost all control over the situation. After she (somewhat) recovered from her collapse, she first tried to make sense of what had happened. When the answers she got were simply not acceptable to her, she lashed out.

That all sounds like a natural progression, and perfectly in character based on what we've seen so far. In particular, the initial attempt to ask "Why?" seems very natural -- for someone with a strong need to be in control, a sudden feeling that The World Isn't Making Sense Anymore can be far more alarming than petty trifles like the approach of an enemy that outnumbers you 25:1.

Agreed. The optimist in me is a little disappointed by Wanda's true colors, but from a realistic standpoint this hardly clashes with her previous behavior. I must strongly disagree with the "jump the shark" comment. No matter what happens next, we're going to have some juicy, well-constructed drama on our hands. :)

Oh, and could someone tell me if there'll be a waiting period between book 1 and two?

[SteveMB]

Oh, and could someone tell me if there'll be a waiting period between book 1 and two?

While we're coming up on the originally projected page count for Part 1, the actual page count remains to be seen. As Rob put it some time ago:


Still aiming for 90 [pages]. My aim ain't what it used to be, though.

[Jeivar]

While we're coming up on the originally projected page count for Part 1, the actual page count remains to be seen.

Uh, no, I meant if Balder and Noguchi will take a break before launching the next part of the saga.

[Occasional Sage]

Uh, no, I meant if Balder and Noguchi will take a break before launching the next part of the saga.

Nothing has been said one way or the other, that I've ever seen.

That disclaimer aside, I'd be surprised. They both enjoy the Erfworld project a great deal and would like to devote more (or all) of their time to this as their primary means of income; a pubishable volume would give them quite the boost toward that, I would think.

Speculative, but it matches what else I've heard from them.

EDIT TO ADD: Well, there is more said on this topic than I thought, later in the same thread SteveMB linked to. See below.

[Occasional Sage]

Plans to continue Erfworld into new story arcs have always hinged on fan reaction and fan demand. That's been pretty good so far, but it's kind of hard to judge before getting to the point where we see how many people liked Erfworld enough to want to own it in book form. Remember, Jamie and I have made a couple dozen dollars from Erfworld buttons at conventions so far, and that's it. For 15 months of hard artistic labor.

Somewhere around the time when The Battle for Gobwin Knob wraps up and/or GiantITP starts taking orders for the graphic novel, we'll have enough data to make some major decisions about "what next?" In the meantime, my attention is focused on bringing the story to the kind of conclusion I have always wanted for it, and on how to make that book collection awesome.

I want to do future story arcs. If you ask me today (and you did), I would say yes we very probably will.

So, when CAN I preorder? And, will there be a limited edition, leather-bound version signed by both author and artist in a nice slipcase? It's right up Subterranean Press (http://subterraneanpress.com/)'s alley....

[SirBel]

Uh, no, I meant if Balder and Noguchi will take a break before launching the next part of the saga.

Do you mean more than 2 weeks between strips?!?!?! Charles Schultz is rolling over in his grave! I don't think peanuts took a two week hiatus until after he passed away!

Erfworld's interesting, but the long waits between updates is getting old.

[SteveMB]

Based on those statements, it seems that Part 1 will continue to some resolution of the current siege, the story will be published in croaked-Gump form, and Rob and Jamie will make a decision about continuing after that. So the next continuation from there, if any, will be a while coming. However, that will be at a closure point (albeit perhaps with some fairly obvious sequel hooks) in the story.

The time interval between strips within the story is a separate issue (which the Giant has placed off limits for these boards).