So was Stanley aka The Tool running away as a chicken actually a good thing?

[ishnar]

The same applies to the reverse: You can believe that they do not teleport, but there are strips which can and have been used to support the theory that they can teleport. You can't prove that the implication given by those strips is invalid. You're reading just as much into the strips when you look at them and assume overland flight as I am when I look at them and assume teleportation. Perhaps the question will be answered in a future strip.

Any teleportation theory now has to explain why the Archons didn't teleport out when the volcano blew up. Teleportation is not movement, it's casting, so when Parson's strategy affected Charlie's archon's they would have had the ability to cast to defend themselves.

The "support" for the teleport theory is really non-existant. The assumption that Charlie is so far away that he would need to teleport any support troops to bolster his existing mercenaries is rendered false with his command to "proceed" not teleport to Ansom's location. If he needed some other means to arrive on site next turn, he would have ordered it utilized. It is known that aarcons can keep up with Jillian, so we know they have move to burn.

[SteveMB]

Any teleportation theory now has to explain why the Archons didn't teleport out when the volcano blew up. Teleportation is not movement, it's casting, so when Parson's strategy affected Charlie's archon's they would have had the ability to cast to defend themselves.

The only real argument I see for the notion that Archons can teleport is:

1. Charlie refers to the "great western conflict", implying that the scene is far away (i.e. a significant number of turns' move by even fairly fast units) from his base of operations.

2. The Archons Ansom hired were delivered in one turn. Ditto for the Archons Charlie sent when Ansom hired more to reinforce the expeditionary force against Stanley (which fell through when Charlie started playing both ends against the middle).

3. If Archons can simply fly a really great distance in one turn (see #1 above), they're just too powerful.

This is a somewhat thin line of argument. Even if it's true, if would still only support the conclusion that Charlie can deliver Archons by "respawning" them at the location desired by the hiring side, but not that they can teleport in general.

[Kreistor]

Oh, does it? Please demonstrate this by citing scenes from the comic. Because it looks to me as though you are simply assuming that the archons have some kind of a foil, where one has never been shown.

Don't ask for what you can't do yourself to prove your point.

One archon died when "most" of the GK air defenses were fired off.

Based on unknown knowledge: we don't know how powerful the defenses were, how they could be targetted, how much spent on them, etc. Not an indicator of strength or weakness without something to compare to. )Stanley might not have bought heavy air defenses due to the presence of dwagons, for instance, who are a pretty good deterrent.)

Maybe, but you're guessing again.

Like you don't? Your entire argument is speculative without definitive proof.

We have no scenes from the comic to support that guess of yours.

Not so much a guess. Remember, Charlie is smart so you will never see a single example of Archons facing their weakness.

I look to our world for examples. I think the best is circa 1812. You have three basic types of military land units -- infantry, cavalry, and cannon. (I'm going to stick to English army for this... if I tossed in the French there would be an additional argument.)

Infantry could arrange themselves in two patterns, generally. In square or in line. When in line, cannon did little damage, hitting only two men (English used a two man deep line). Cannon didn't have the maneuverability to get to the side of the faster moving infantry. Cavalry, however, could outmaneuver infantry and attack from the sides, and due to slow reload times (3-4 roudns per minute), the infantry had little it could do to defend themselves.

Infantry in square was far more vulnerable to cannon fire. A lucky shot could take out a lot of men; however, cavalry could not affect a square. Horses would not approach the prickly mass of a pike square, and that's what bayonetted muskets were in square. (There's a single exception in 300 years of fighting in this style.)

It's the perfect example of rock-paper-scissors in our world. There are others. Fighters destroying bombers, which destroy battleships, which destroy airfields of fighters.

No, I can't prove that there is a unit that is particularly capable of killing Archons, but I can say that you can't prove that Archons are better than an equal cost of archers, either. Charlie is smart enough to not let a unit under his employ face units it is weak against, so no, I don't think I'll ever have evidence of Archon vulnerabilities, and certainly not soon. But I know they are vulnerable, because they must be.

What we do know for fact is that 30ish archons are able to fight all of the remaining GK forces, which include 3 potent casters, Parson, and a good number of troops and defenses, and win in a single turn.

I wouldn't be surprised. You cna't prove that 30 Archons didn't cost Charlie 2x as much as all of those units combined. The Archons are facing the remnants of an army, with only 200 living creatures, and masses of decaying uncroaked, many of which were created weak and sub-par in the first place. This is not evidence of anything.

You could try, but I'd ask you to list the shown dwagon abilities. That list is far smaller than the shown archon abilities, even if you refuse to allow teleportation on the archons list.

What have we seen of the Archons? They can kill an injured dwagon. They can cast a few spells. And dwagons can take the hits of any archery units Ansom deemed adequate to protect his seige train and survive. We have not seen Archons come under serious attack, because Charlie has never allowed them into a situation where they could be.

You miss the point. [snip] Then it's not just a matter of flight, it's the whole package.

When did I say they were weak? I said they have undemonstrated weaknesses, not that they weren't powerful. Dwagons are powerful, and they have weaknesses. (Looks to me like swarms of small units are their weakness. I suspect dwagons can only breath once per day, which would explain why a bunch of bats killed a lot of dwagons.)

I do not note this, at all. Quite the contrary, in fact.You are again assuming that they are vulnerable to something.

And you are assuming they are not. Big whoop.

And you're making a lot out of the fact that they appear to be uniform,

I never said anything about their uniform. I said they appeared to be interchangable by their abilities. True casters have a specialty and more or less ability in other fields. But here we have all the archons able to seemingly do the same castings. That's not normal for casters, who all seem to be unique.

A large group of the same kind of tank is a potent force, no matter that they all have the same main gun.

And are all vulnerable to air-to-surface missiles. Add more tanks? Still vulnerable.

Sure. But please point out a demonstration that archons are not potent in all circumstances.

Can't. Don't need to. This is, ultimately, about teleportation and your opinion that the Archons are uber-powerful. Asking for this is just as absurd as me asking you to prove the Archons are powerful in every circumstance. We have only seen the Archons fight weakened dwagons, and lose to air defenses. That's two fights, one win and one loss. We haven't seen them fight infantry, archery, undamaged dwagons, etc., ad infinitum. It is an impossible task for both of us. There is insufficient sample space to make any determination of their defenses.

They always had the power needed at the time.

They always were at full power. Not evidence of lack of resource limitations.

(BTW, we've never seen Archons melee. Ever. Suggesting they don't need to dance fight when meleeing requires evidence that they can melee at all. Note they don't carry weapons.)

And I'm pretty sure I haven't listed all of their abilities, because the list is quite long and it's easy to miss something.

Most of it is weak relative to other casters.

Another guess. The RCC is in the area of "the great western conflict",

And you guess that a particular image is a sunset instead of sunrise. DOn't fault me for something you did first.

Charlie has already been seen saying that he'd like to grab Parson's mathamancy artifact before the RCC can get their hands on it. And Charlie already has an attuned Archentool. Why would you think that having the Archenpliers would change anything for Charlie, other than to make him more powerful?

Parson's artefact is not yet known to anyone but GK and Charlie (because Parson himself told Charlie in order to deal). No one else knows what it can do. Still, it's not different from having a Mathemancer, so it's not really terribly powerful. It's like having a free, 0 upkeep caster. Nobody is going to start a war over that.

The sole reasons we've seen for the conflict is this: Royals like to gang up on non-royals. Stanley wiped out Milquetoast, killed a few Jetstone field units, and Ansom thinks he is a regicide.

Most of those occured long after the RCC was formed. Here's the reason for the coalition here: 83.4. Stanley pissed off enough sides. Tell me: how many sides would be pissed off if Charlie snagged the Arkenpliers after GK offed Ansom? All the ones in the RCC now, actually. They would suspect collusion, and that would be enough.

But the bottom line is of the issue, as shown in the conversation between Vinny and Ansom, is that Stanley is not noble.

Don't confuse Ansom's own hatreds for the reasons behind forming a coalition of nations. Nations don't come together to destroy someone a single individual hates: they come together to defeat something they fear.

It is not stated anywhere that non-royals are allowed to get wealthy, but are not allowed to form large sides or become powerful. Wealth is a form of power, after all.

Wealth is a form of power, I agree, however it doesn't conquer nations. If Charlie tried to use that wealth to buy his kingdom larger,well, someone might take notice and go after him. But wealth unused is potential power, and not a threat. When it gets turned into units, that's when it becomes power to fear.

Proximity. Knowledge. They are both not near Charlie, and may not know where he is at all. This is supported by the strip. Not explicitly, but there is support for it. There is no support for any theory that any of the RCC or GK know where Charlie is or that he is close enough for them to bother sending troops his way.

Except look at the incredulity that Faq remained hidden for so long. Faq was unique. Jillian survived as an unknown merc because she never told anyone where she was from. RCC knows of Charlescomm. If they were unable to find it, Faq would not be considered unique and unbelievable.

Which is no different than your own possibility 2, and possibility 1 assumes that the archons are actually casters and don't just use natural whateveramancy to power their abilities.

Why could the Archons cast the DDR spell? They were part of the Coalition and it was now technically their turn. But they could not move because all of Charlescomm's units' move went to zero when Charlie ended turn. Move and hits are restored to full at the beginning of a side's turn, and (re)forming an alliance does not count as starting a new turn.

Why could the Archons "cast" the contract, when it was not their turn? Well, why could they still fly? It's not a spell, it's a natural magic.

"DDR Spell". If it was natural, it would have fallen under the next question, instead of getting its own. Archons have both.

Vulnerable, how, exactly? Vulnerable behind the walls of a city that it takes 5+ turns for an army to array itself against? Vulnerable when they have the option to fly off during any turn?

You'remixing your time frame with mine. I was not speaking of what happened in the comic, I was speaking of using teleportation as a tool of assassination. One way teleport means you have to fly your way out, past the targets guards. Useful, sure, but not incredibly so.

That is not a vulnerability by a long stretch. Note that when Parson told Charlie that the RCC would just take GK right after Charlie took it, Charlie said "they can have it!" He wasn't worried about his archins being stuck there and being killed by the RCC forces, they clearly had enough move to take GK, collect the mathamancy artifact and perhaps Parson, and fly or teleport to safety.

Uhm, you're missing something -- hey aren't stuck in GK. After capturing GK, Charlie owns it. Now he gets free movement inside the city. If he knows Ansom is coming, he takes the city, grabs what he wants, and retreats to Airspace. Of course, if they are not out of move they can fly away and abandon the city. He's not planning on losing a single Archon to RCC... he'll give them the city once he has what he wants.

That is your presumption, but you're assuming much that is simply not known.

No, not really. All I'm saying is that if the Archons were really as powerful as you say, and had no balance to limit numbers, Charlie would have no ned of being mercenary. Your theory is incomplete, and so has no weight. To make such bold, sweeping claims, you need something serious, something definite. This isn't like my old thread where I tried to prove Archons are all casters. That's just a unit definition: if they are or anren't, it wouldn't change the story. But if your theory is true, and Charlie is uber-powerful, the story has to change to compensate. He doesn't need to be mercenary, and he's a far greater threat than Stanley, so the attacks on Stanley using him as an ally make zero sense. You need more, before I'll lend you any hint of agreement.

[ishnar]

The only real argument I see for the notion that Archons can teleport is:

1. Charlie refers to the "great western conflict", implying that the scene is far away (i.e. a significant number of turns' move by even fairly fast units) from his base of operations.

Since this is a turn based game that seems to use hex movement and cardinal directions are used for describing relative positions, I'd say the only implication here is that it is west of Charlie's position and that the conflict is big. The other implication is that Great Western Conflict might just be the commonly accepted name for the war, and Charlie's relative position might be completely unrelated. All teleportion arguments require at least two assumptions, (Charlie's base is distant, and Charlie can only reinforce from his base). Considering the different geography between 46.1 and 46.2 there is no reason to believe that the archons are proceeding from Charlie's base.
Flight requires no assumptions and simply accepting known statements at face value.

I'm for occam's razor here.

2. The Archons Ansom hired were delivered in one turn. Ditto for the Archons Charlie sent when Ansom hired more to reinforce the expeditionary force against Stanley (which fell through when Charlie started playing both ends against the middle).

Jillian was able to beat Stanley to Faq--in one turn, by going through Trans. Trans, Faq, and Charlie's base all have similar geography. It's more reasonable to assume they are relatively close together.

[Kreistor]

1. Charlie refers to the "great western conflict", implying that the scene is far away (i.e. a significant number of turns' move by even fairly fast units) from his base of operations.

If Charlie is mercing out across Erfworld, he would need to specify which conflict he is talking about. That means he could be anywhere, including the west, because he'd need to specify they weren't hired by a side in "the minor southeastern conflict", or the "middle-upper-southern conflict". There's an implication that Charlie is not in the west, but he could still be in the north, south, or middle and still not be in the west.

2. The Archons Ansom hired were delivered in one turn. Ditto for the Archons Charlie sent when Ansom hired more to reinforce the expeditionary force against Stanley (which fell through when Charlie started playing both ends against the middle).

Actually, no. we don't know where those three archons were in the first frame. They could have been in the west, awaiting word that Ansom had finally met the price,and then the flight is actually quite short. We do know with certainty that there are mountains in Archon flying range of GK... the same mountains Stanley tries to fly through and failed. And Charlie, sensing opportunity, may have hidden more in the mountains just in case Ansom needed more. Everyone is presuming that the archons are all located in Charlescomm when they start flying, but cagey birds like Charlie are prepared for when opportunity arises. If you need to provide a service, and the customer needs that service quickly, it is important to ensure your people are in position to provide when the line is signed.

3. If Archons can simply fly a really great distance in one turn (see #1 above), they're just too powerful.

Teleportation being less powerful? Sorry, that's not an arugment for teleportation, calling flight of the same distance too powerful.

[HamsterOfTheGod]

Stanley leaving was not an act of cowardice but a loss of faith...

Stanley said Ansom was bringing him the arkenpliers. And he was right, if only he had stayed and trusted his instinct.

Stanley asked for the perfect warlord. And he had one, tailored to his own specifications. He would have won, if he only trusted his own spell.

In the end, everyone played themselves. Stanley didn't trust himself. Charlie outsmarted himself.

And Ansom? Well yes Ansom's overconfidence was his undoing but so was his trust in Jillian. If Jillian and Vinny had stayed...ah that's the hard part. If Jillian and Vinny stayed then Ansom would not have made his final mistake.

But if Stanley had stayed as well, would Parson have been able to pull of his Phyrric victory?

[Tensu]

But if Stanley had stayed as well, would Parson have been able to pull of his Phyrric victory?

Would he have needed to might be the better question. With Dwagons and a master foolamancer, Parson could probably have set up another hit-and-run routine, taking out those pesky Archons fist, then the rest of the siege, then anything else that has range or can fly, and then finally moving to melee troops.

[Manga Shoggoth]

Stanley leaving was not an act of cowardice but a loss of faith...

Stanley said Ansom was bringing him the arkenpliers. And he was right, if only he had stayed and trusted his instinct.

...

But if Stanley had stayed as well, would Parson have been able to pull of his Phyrric victory?

An interesting slant on the decision.

You are a little unfair on Parson, though. This isn't a Phyrric Victory (where you win, but at an excessive cost that erases any benefits to the victory). Parson was in a losing situation from the start.

[BillyJimBoBob]

Don't ask for [proof] what you can't do yourself to prove your point.
[...]
Your entire argument is speculative without definitive proof.

As is yours. Why shouldn't I ask you for proof? Why is it unfair for me to ask you to prove that archons can't teleport using citations from the strip, while it's also apparently unfair for me to say that I think that they can and support that with citations from the strip? At least I do have some citations to provide, you have nothing but a dislike for the theory.

Not so much a guess. Remember, Charlie is smart so you will never see a single example of Archons facing their weakness.
[...]
Charlie is smart enough to not let a unit under his employ face units it is weak against, so no, I don't think I'll ever have evidence of Archon vulnerabilities, and certainly not soon. But I know they are vulnerable, because they must be.

Completely false. We've seen 2 archons die to more ordinary combat than a volcano erupting, so it's not just a given that Charlie will never put his archons in harms way or never take any losses. Plus, we know that Charlie hires out the archons for missions like "escort", where the dangers faced can not be known.

And "I know they are vulnerable, because they must be" is hardly a valid argument, as it is purely speculative and based upon your desires rather than any facts. We've already discussed other things which might offset the archons potency: A long production cycle, a high upkeep, etc. Don't claim that they have to have a specific weakness, because there are plenty of TBS games where high powered units are well rounded in their potency but have exactly the drawbacks I just listed. I have a precedent to cite in the genre, you have what? Bombers being vulnerable to fighters? Rock/paper/scissors is a nice theory, but it has no backing. I'll ask again, what is the paper to the archons rock? Point to the strip which shows it. There isn't one, which makes your r/p/s theory unsupportable.

This [30 archons being able to beat GK, Parson, the 3 mancers, and the remainder of the GK troops in a single turn] is not evidence of anything.

But it is. It's evidence of exactly that. This force can do in 1 turn what the RCC needed a great many turns to even begin to make progress. A hypothetical but unknown cost balancing factor is not relevant to the discussion of their demonstrated potency.

When did I say they were weak? I said they have undemonstrated weaknesses, not that they weren't powerful.

You realize that those two sentences are self-contradictory? "When did I say they were weak?" Well, you said it when you said that they have undemonstrated weaknesses, naturally. And in your post before this one, as well.

And you are assuming [archons] are not [vulnerable to something]. Big whoop.

The difference is that I'm limiting myself to what the strip has shown, while you are just assuming that it must be so because you wish it to be so. Big difference.

Asking for [you to point out a demonstration that archons are not potent in all circumstances] is just as absurd as me asking you to prove the Archons are powerful in every circumstance.

Not so. I can prove that the archons are powerful in all circumstances by pointing to those circumstances shown in the strip. I listed a large number of these demonstrations in my prior post. You have nothing but a burning desire, no citation, no support.

Most of [the long list of archon abilities] is weak relative to other casters.

This makes no point. GK had 5 casters. Other sides have been shown to have less (not proven, shown, there is a difference you miss often). Archons come in groups of 30+. And the archons main energy blasts have been shown to be just as potent as Maggie's "KI" or other casters direct attacks. And the archons are able to keep a running battle movie relaying to Charlie, while Maggie could cast only 2 communication spells in a single turn. Aside from trimancer linking, I'm not seeing a single archons potency level as being much less than a single casters, if you take Maggie as the comparison. Maggy hasn't been described as being master-class, and her flavor of magic seems to be the same as the archons. Any other comparison is apples to oranges.

Nobody is going to start a war over [the mathamancy artifact]. [While presumably they would over an archentool]

Both are speculative, and unsupported. Only Stanley seems interested in going to war for an archentool. Ansom parades his 'Pliers around in front of every side in the RCC and never mentioned that any other side might want to take it from him. And Sizemore said that a side might pay 500k schmuckers for the mathamancy artifact, maybe more. We have Stanley's reaction on the cost of the Warlord summoning spell to show just how much that is worth. Sure, nothing set in stone, but that's what makes your insistence that:
1) Charley didn't want the 'Pliers;
2) If Charley got the 'Pliers other sides would go to war with him;
3) If Charlie got the mathamancy bracer no one would care;
All unsupported within the strip.
Charlie agreed to (maybe) sit out the turn because Parson told him that GK would have the pliers, and backed it with a mathamancy prediction of GKs odds of lasting the turn, and also reminded Charlie that GK would be weaker after they and the RCC fought it out this turn. Charlie's plan was to take GK and the mathamancy artifact, and maybe capture Parson. If GK had the 'Pliers when Charlie took it, why would Charlie even hesitate to take them also on his way out with the bracer and (maybe) Parson? Cite strips, not your pet theory on the cold war.

Here's the reason for the coalition here: 83.4.

That strip says nothing about the formation of the RCC. This strip (34) makes it very clear. Vinny is confused as to why Ansom is leading this fight. He asks Ansom straight up: "Your beef is that he's not royal, right?" And Ansom replies "That he isn't noble, Vinny."
All of Stanley's other offenses are written off as trivial by Vinny, and Ansom does not argue at all. It all comes down to Stanley's lack of nobility.

One way teleport means you have to fly your way out, past the targets guards. Useful, sure, but not incredibly so.

The sole case we have of this is when the archons teleported around the GK tower (flew, if you prefer), and in enough strength to "take the garrison in a single turn". Has Charlie not ended turn and attacked, this would not have been an "assassination", and there would have been no guards left to have to fly past on the way out. Charlie would have taken the city, his troops would be the only ones left alive. Not that flying past the vast majority of troops isn't perfectly safe in any event...

Uhm, you're missing something -- [t]hey aren't stuck in GK. After capturing GK, Charlie owns it. Now he gets free movement inside the city. If he knows Ansom is coming, he takes the city, grabs what he wants, and retreats to Airspace. Of course, if they are not out of move they can fly away and abandon the city. He's not planning on losing a single Archon to RCC... he'll give them the city once he has what he wants.

All of which simply supports my point that the archons would not be, as you said, vulnerable, once they took GK or any other city. Thanks!

No, not really [I'm not assuming much that is simply not known.]

I hate to reply with "yes you are", but yes, you are. You cite nothing but your theories, and have no support from the strip for those theories. All we know of Erf is what is shown in the strips. If you want to claim that you're not assuming much that isn't know, cite your supporting strips.

[BillyJimBoBob]

Any teleportation theory now has to explain why the Archons didn't teleport out when the volcano blew up.

No, it doesn't. There are still plenty of Erf mechanics the readers are unaware of. This will just have to be another, until it is revealed one way or another for certain.

The "support" for the teleport theory is really non-existant. The assumption that Charlie is so far away that he would need to teleport any support troops to bolster his existing mercenaries is rendered false with his command to "proceed" not teleport to Ansom's location.

I've allowed that there is not absolute certainty on the subject, although the strip supports the theory in two places. But to claim that using the word "proceed" is clear evidence that archons can't teleport is just absurd.

[Oslecamo]

3. If Archons can simply fly a really great distance in one turn (see #1 above), they're just too powerful.

They are too powerfull. But they probably can only be controled by someone with the arkendish. Attuned arkentools are suposed to be something to be feared, and what's more fearsome that gaining acess to imba units?

They have a vast array ot utility thinkmancer powers, ridiculous maneuverability, excellent combat skill and the titans know what else.

Dwagons in comparison are big bruisers. Very strong in combat, but with limited other capacities.

My take on that is that Stanley still hasn't fully understood the powers of his arkenhammer. The comic starts after all with Stanley discovering he can turn orlies in nuts. The arkenhammer won't reveal his full capcities untill

But, back on the main topic.

The coalition has shatered, and it seems to be all thanks to the whole uncroacked volcano nuke. The royals are afraid, they've never seen anythig like that.

If Stanley had stayed and broken the link and listened to Hamster he may had come out victorious.

But he wouldn't have inspired such fear in the royals. The coalition would retreat and come back with more forces. And they wouldn't fall on the same tricks again.

Plus, the old coalition members turning on each other is a great result. Blames will be thrown around to who's fault it was. And we discover that Jillian has been manipulated, and we all know how Jillian gets when she's angry. Stanley will have a golden time window to start rebuilding his side.

[Kreistor]

As is yours. Why shouldn't I ask you for proof?

First, let me request that you hit "return" before or after every quote. When I Quote you, all the paragraphs are blurring together. They aren't separating, so I often can't tell where one ends and another begins.

I'm not trying to prove anything, only disprove you. I succeed by casting doubt on your hypothesis. I don't think I need to prove they can fly, do I? They could have flown and done everything you claim. I've achieved all I need to prove. I don't need to disprove they can't teleport, only demonstrate that they could do what they did without teleporting.

Why is it unfair for me to ask you to prove that archons can't teleport using citations from the strip, while it's also apparently unfair for me to say that I think that they can and support that with citations from the strip?

Because I'm not trying to add an ability not mentioned in the strip to the Archons. The burden of proof is on the man with the hypothesis, not the one trying to defeat the hypothesis.

At least I do have some citations to provide, you have nothing but a dislike for the theory.

Have you even been paying attention? I cast dubt on your timeline by interpreting your sunset as a sunrise. That's the same proof you used. I cast doubt that the Archons began in Charlescomm by pointing out that there are mountains near GK, close enough for them to fly to. (Interception of Stanley.) I pointed out that 104, there are 18 archons in about 10 degrees of sky (further, Parson has to look behind himself to see them approach, in a room of 360 degree visibility), and later they surround the tower, which tells us they approached GK ffrom a single direction, and did not teleport into a surrounding formation, and given the long range.

Additionally, the Archons did not teleport out of GK, despite Pclips telling us they could now cast during RCC turn due to the new alliance. That forces you to create exceptions for the Teleportation spell/ability to make it unavailable. Who's speculating?

Okay, I found a new one in support of Archon flight into GK. 94 and 104 Carefully observe where the desk is in both situations. Jillian's group and the Archon group both approach GK from the exact same direction. Obviously, I dont' think that's coincidence.

I have proven my case as far as it needs to be. I've cast doubt on all of your evidence, demonstrating how flight explains all of it. You don't actually have anything that has no doubt associated with it. They could have flown, so the suggestion that they need teleportation is contra-indicated.

Completely false. We've seen 2 archons die to more ordinary combat than a volcano erupting, so it's not just a given that Charlie will never put his archons in harms way or never take any losses. Plus, we know that Charlie hires out the archons for missions like "escort", where the dangers faced can not be known.

There will always be some losses in war, but I wouldn't call air defenses normal. Those were some extraordinary spells. I want to see them fighting archers, gwiffons, or the flying centaur things (can never remember the name). Or even a 1-on-1 with an uninjured dwagon. Nothing we have seen is of them fighting against normal units in normal combat.

There isn't one, which makes your r/p/s theory unsupportable.

You go ahead and assume the game is broken. I'll assume the author has that covered. After all, that's what you are trying to do. You're trying to prove the author is incompetent. He's the one that invents all of these things. By saying Charlie is unbalanced, you're saying the author unbalanced Charlie. This is a pretty simple balance issue, and hardly beyond Rob. Now, I don't inherently trust any author, but in this case, I'm pretty certain Rob is fully capable of dealing with a balance issue of this sort. He hasn't screwed up balance as far as I've seen yet with any other unit: he's only kept rules hidden so that we are incapable of seeing the true balance, sometimes, instead becoming confused by hints and incomplete knowledge.

But it is. It's evidence of exactly that. This force can do in 1 turn what the RCC needed a great many turns to even begin to make progress. A hypothetical but unknown cost balancing factor is not relevant to the discussion of their demonstrated potency.

Are you kidding me? You're going to arbitrarily declare cost a non-issue because we can't know what it is? Every single unit must therefore be balanced against every other single unit. Oh, no! Bogroll is unbalanced! He could clearly survive a fall that killed Ansom, and he has infinite move, so Twolls must be overpowered! Puh-lease. Cost is always a balancing factor. A twoll is more powerful than uncroaked because the uncroaked cost only spell power. Without knowing cost, you can't know how powerful an Archon is vs. another unit of similar cost. You are the one that thinks Charlie is unbalanced, and if you base that on Archons costing the same as a Piker, your argument is clearly flawed.

You realize that those two sentences are self-contradictory? "When did I say they were weak?" Well, you said it when you said that they have undemonstrated weaknesses, naturally. And in your post before this one, as well.

I'll refer you back to Rock Paper Scissors. Rock is weak vs. Paper. Does that make it weaker than paper? No, it wins as often as Paper, because of the existence of Scissors. It only appears weak if you ignore the rest of the system. I said that Archons have weaknesses, but that doesn't make them weak. Ansom was clearly weak to long falls, where Bogroll was not thanks to regeneration (note he's burned after he lands). Does that make Bogroll unbalanced? No, Bogroll was merely in terrain chosen to advantage his abilities. Unit analysis without considering terrain and costs is incomplete. That means we can never come to a conclusion on how powerful an Archon relative to other similarly priced units, because we will never know the relative unit cost.

It's Schrodinger's Cat. We can't draw a conclusion in the lack of vital knowledge. The cat is both alive and dead. The Archon is both overpowered and underpowered. Until we open that box and look, we just don't know, and so basing our conclusions on the unknown comes down to probability mathematics. DO you think it is probably that Rob screwed up? That's the answer: Rob has opened the box. He knows. So, do you believe he screwed the comic up? Or simply hasn't shown the full range of abilities of the unit in question? I chose the latter. You're welcome to question Rob's competence all you want, but simply by asking, Rob may manipulate the comic to ensure he's competent. That's happened in the past. If you watched BAttlestar Gallactica, when determining the identity of the last Cylon, the authors did check the fan forums, and rejected anyone that had a strong following. By speculating on who was the Cylon, they ensured they were wrong.

The difference is that I'm limiting myself to what the strip has shown, while you are just assuming that it must be so because you wish it to be so. Big difference.

*shakes head* No, you're the one bringing in a theory of an ability not mentioned in the strip. You're inventing that ability, and trying to demonstrate its existence. The burden of proof is on you. I have demonstrated that all of your examples can be explained reasonably without that ability. (See a repeat above.) I'm not inventing anything. I can explain everything without adding unmentioned abilities to the Archons.

Now, I know this response was concernign my thoughts on Charlie being attacked if he grew too powerful. I am indeed speculating on what would be "too powerful". But I don't need to win that fight. The fact is that Charlie never professes interest in the Arkentool... not once does he mention any interest in it. I may specualte on why, but I don't need to win that fight. The fact is that only Parson thinks he has an interest, and we see the entire conversation he based that on. It's without foundation. He, like you, think Charlie wants the Pliers because he doesn't say, "I don't want the Pliers." Frankly, I'm surprised that with you thinking Charlie si so powerful, you don't think he's capable of hiding his true motives.

Not so. I can prove that the archons are powerful in all circumstances by pointing to those circumstances shown in the strip.

You make out like there are a lot of these circumstances. Three. We've seen three cases of Archons fighting -- an attack with melee support on wounded dwagons in which we only see them cast a single spell each, an attack on GK Airspace, and a surprise attack against Jillian's flying uncroaked. There's a fourth potential attack that didn't happen -- 30 archons taking GK garrison. That is hardly a large enough smaple space to use the word "all crcumstances". You could say, "all circumstances so far in the comic", bu that's not all possible circumstances. Like I said, I want to see Arhcons fighting undamaged untis capable of hitting fliers before I make any judgements as to their defensive abilities.

BTW, let me remind you of Parson's own beliefs. He thinks that something may have been acting to cheat against him. Always remember that anywhere Parson loses big, it may be the world cheating against him. In the face of the world cheating, it makes any conclusions questionable.

This makes no point. GK had 5 casters. Other sides have been shown to have less (not proven, shown, there is a difference you miss often). Archons come in groups of 30+. And the archons main energy blasts have been shown to be just as potent as Maggie's "KI" or other casters direct attacks. And the archons are able to keep a running battle movie relaying to Charlie, while Maggie could cast only 2 communication spells in a single turn. Aside from trimancer linking, I'm not seeing a single archons potency level as being much less than a single casters, if you take Maggie as the comparison. Maggy hasn't been described as being master-class, and her flavor of magic seems to be the same as the archons. Any other comparison is apples to oranges.

Maggie is a Thinkamancer. We know that for certain, since only Thinkamancers can form a link,a nd Parson calls her by function, "Thinkamancer". It isn't possible for a Thinkamancer to link four casters, and Maggie links three, which is described as rare, so Maggie is in fact very powerful as a Thinkamancer.

Okay, let's start with Communications. Charlie has unmatched mastery of Thinkamancy. We've seen him have a long communication with Parson without any effort. You're probably giving credit to the Archons for the basic ability of the Arkendish.

Next up is offensive spell casting. Maggie is a Thinkamancer, but casts Hoboken. We know that different casters have different ability outside their primary discipline, with Wanda talented in many schools, but Sizemore restricted to Dirtamancy, so this might not be Thinkamancy. IF it is, then THinkamancy is a very weak offensive school. Let's see what Sizemore can do, shall we? Oh dear... he can explode his crap golems and take out many targets, and that's no scroll: that's what an offensive school of magic can do, when in the hands of someone in their primary discipline. Even the shockamancy spell off the scroll the frame before the crap golem is clearly far more powerful than Maggie's wimpy little Hoboken.

The Archons cast three different spells with different effects, but the same result. They each kill one already wounded dwagon. How much damage does it do? Dunno. How many hits did the dwagons have left? Again, unknown. Fact is, we don't know how many hits the targets of the scroll, crap golem, or Hoboken had, either. How can you draw a conclusion based solely on the appearance of the spell? You can't. It looks impressive, but I can show you invisible air that will burn you (the alcohol used in racing cars burns with no visible flame), or brilliant fire that you'll barely feel warm in (some substances burn at very low temperatures). Flash and bang do not mean power.

Nobody is going to start a war over [the mathamancy artifact]. [While presumably they would over an archentool]

Both are speculative, and unsupported. [snip]
1) Charley didn't want the 'Pliers;
2) If Charley got the 'Pliers other sides would go to war with him;
3) If Charlie got the mathamancy bracer no one would care;
All unsupported within the strip.

On 1, Charlie never states he wanted the pliers. Hard to quote that, since it's a negative. If you can find anywhere that Charlie states that he wants the PLiers, then please point it out. Only Parson seems to think he does, but we have that entire conversation in 105. Charlie indicates he is intrigued, but never states anything about the pliers. Parson is interpreting Charlie's interest in him as interest in the pliers. If you have anything that actually demonstrates Charlie is interested in the Pliers, please, feel free to add. Maybe I overlooked something.

On 3, I am not saying that no one would care, if they knew about the bracer, but no oe except Charlie does know about it. They can't care about something they don't know about. Would they care if Charlie got it? Maybe somewhat, but in the end, if they knew what it did, it's unlikely to concern them overmuch. It's expensive, in the same way Parosn was expensive, but Ansom was fine with Charlie getting a 350K Chief Warlord. A 500K artefact shouldn't bother him too much more.

On 2, the Arkentools are not on the same order. They are creations of the Titans, and thus are viewed as religious relics as well as powerful combat devices. That's what makes a second object of this type in a non-Royal's hand a concern. That's not speculation. Wanda tells us that it wasn't until after Stanley started questing for the Arkentools that they began losing. Even though they were no longer succeeding, the RCC forms and moves to destroy Stanley.

Charlie agreed to (maybe) sit out the turn because Parson told him that GK would have the pliers, and backed it with a mathamancy prediction of GKs odds of lasting the turn, and also reminded Charlie that GK would be weaker after they and the RCC fought it out this turn.

Charlie's words were, "The fact that I know you aren't lying makes it even more imperative that I get you working for me. However... who could resist a show like that! I won't leave your airspace. But I'll end turn and wait for a winner." Nowhere in there does he acknoledge the Pliers have been offered to him. What he does say is that he has great interest in Parson. We know that other sides wouldn't be interested in Parson: capturing is usually reserved for valuable casters. Charlie's interest is exceptional, because of that tradition. Further, here is blatant proof that Charlie wants Parson more than the Arkentool. Charlie had a choice. Do nothing, watch Ansom die, and receive the Arkenpliers from Parson. Or help Ansom, save Parson's life, and receive him as booty from the siege, but lose the Pliers. He chose Parson. His interest in the Arkenpliers were, then, minimal. Actions speka louder than worrd, and when it came to action, Charlie denied interest in the Pliers.

Charlie's plan was to take GK and the mathamancy artifact, and maybe capture Parson.

Given the offer to Ansom, I suspect a bluff. Parson's first suspicion was right: Charlie wasn't interested in the knife fight for GK. Given that attacking GK for Parson would have netted the same result as offering Ansom the deal, there was no reason not to take GK himself, except that it would cost him casulaties to achieve.

If GK had the 'Pliers when Charlie took it, why would Charlie even hesitate to take them also on his way out with the bracer and (maybe) Parson? Cite strips, not your pet theory on the cold war.

Cite a strip where Charlie professes interest in the Pliers. Don't ask for what you can't prove, either.

That strip says nothing about the formation of the RCC. This strip (34) makes it very clear. Vinny is confused as to why Ansom is leading this fight. He asks Ansom straight up: "Your beef is that he's not royal, right?" And Ansom replies "That he isn't noble, Vinny."

Funny... Charlie isn't noble, either: he's mercenary and businesslike. Don't read too much into someone's self-analysis. Few people can accurately judge their own capacities and reasoning. Ansom's strength is that He Knows What He Wants. That doesn't mean he knows why he wants it. Or that he'd tell Vinnie the truth, if that truth were embarrassing: Vinnie is a friend, clearly, but also from another side and so not to be told everything. Do you really believe that Ansom's King would allow him to form and lead a coalition because Ansom personally dislikes an Overlord that has done little to harm Jetstone? Ansom participating in the fight, sure... a few troops, in the same way Transylvito sends a little to help. But to provide the backbone of the army because of Ansom's hang-ups over Stanley's attitude? Vinnie is right: it makes no sense. Something is missing.

I've posted elsewhere some of my suspicions of why Ansom is after Stanley. And yes, it is pure speculation, based on hints and unexplained conversations. Take it up in the Wanda/Pliers thread, if you care about my opinion. It's too big to add to this discussion.

All of Stanley's other offenses are written off as trivial by Vinny, and Ansom does not argue at all.

Kinda like Vinnie is hitting him wher it hurts, isn't it? Why does Ansom seem to lose confidence under Vinnie's scrutiny, but when Parson pokes him on royalty, Ansom gets huffy and angry? That's a rhetorical question... I'm just pointing out an inconsistency you might want to seriously think on.

The sole case we have of this is when the archons teleported around the GK tower (flew, if you prefer), and in enough strength to "take the garrison in a single turn". Has Charlie not ended turn and attacked, this would not have been an "assassination", and there would have been no guards left to have to fly past on the way out.

No, it's not the assassination I was talking about. That would have involved flying a single Archon in, presenting the offer to Parson, which pinpoints him, teleporting the Archons to him, kidnapping him, and then flying off. A couple losses to air defenses, and done, instead of more losses trying to take all of GK. But, as I say elsewhere, I think it was a bluff and Charlie never intended to take GK. I don't think he wanted to suffer the losses, nor get in RCC's way and raising their suspicions on how powerful he was.

Charlie would have taken the city, his troops would be the only ones left alive.

And how many Archons would he lose? He would have taken casualties: it seems to me it was always a bluff, hoping to get Parson to jump to the net based on what Charlie could do, not would do. Like I said, his actions with Ansom only netted him what he would have gotten with the "capture garrison" plan. He'd have gotten the hance to loot the scity solo, and could have left it and lost no one to RCC.

All of which simply supports my point that the archons would not be, as you said, vulnerable, once they took GK or any other city. Thanks!

Hunh? I was talking about vulnerability to enemy abilities. That they can escape before RCC arrives doesn't mean an arrow doesn't kill them. It only means that they can avoid fights that they don't want to have to fight. In fact, Parson already did this with the dwagons, so it's hardly unique. He hit siege and then retreated them over a lake: now he was unaware that Jillian had move or the luck to find him, so it didn't quite work out, but that was what he was trying to do. That's no different, since the retreating Archons might get hit by a fleet of 30 dwagons (Stanley hadn't been hit by RCC yet), had Stanley changed his mind and returned to GK.

I hate to reply with "yes you are", but yes, you are. You cite nothing but your theories,

I repeated the counter proofs a second time for you already. You can distract all you want with these other side issues that have nothing to do with the core teleportation theory, but I don't forget my own arguments. Feel free to forget again. I can repeat them a third time.

See, you're starting with a theory... the same kind of theory you seem to be convinced I am limited to. Teleportation is a theory: it isn't mentioned in the strip, so it isn't a fact, and that makes it a theory. Sure, I have theories about many things. And the further you get from your core point, the more of those theories you'll stumble onto. Sure, I have theories, but that I have them doesn't validate your own. All theories are theories because they are unproven. The burden of proof is on the person with the theory: those arguing against do not need to have a theory of their own to prove. I do that myself, in my own threads about my theories. It's fun. I stick my neck out. I argue to the best of my ability. Sometimes somene has a fact that defeats them... not a hint, but a solid fact that I missed. I'm not infallible. In that, I'm no different from you. I'm not really treating you any differently from the way others treat me. You seem to think, though, that you are basing things on facts, but you have admitted that you have no solid proof. So what is this thing with accusations that I base nothing on facts? It's harmful to your reputation, especially when you know it isn't true. That I don't cite evidence? I regularly link more threads than anyone else that participates in these discussions. Accusing me of things that are readily observable to even the casual reader only makes others think you're arrogant, or a liar. You need to be careful of things like that. Readers arecapable of drawing their own conclusions, and I of course will never agree with you. So such accusations only serve to inflate yourself to yourself, while others can never take it at face value. If I have done what you say, the readers will know it: you don't need to point out what they already know. When you face someone that does do those things, let them continue unannounced, at least until you find an endgame move. (Rare in online debates... most end in stalemate during the midgame.) The opponent is embarrassing himiself, why give him the opportunity to stop and clean up his act?

[ishnar]

But it is. It's evidence of exactly that. This force can do in 1 turn what the RCC needed a great many turns to even begin to make progress.

An army traveles at the speed of its slowest unit, and the RCC had a seige train. The difference in speeds between an army guarding a seige train and independent units does not support teleportation.

No, it doesn't. There are still plenty of Erf mechanics the readers are unaware of. This will just have to be another, until it is revealed one way or another for certain.

So what you are REALLY saying is you have to assume a rule that has not been mentioned to support teleportation, where no new rule is required for flight to achieve the same results. I take back what I said earlier. The teleportation hypothesis now requires THREE basic assumptions to explain where flight requires none.

I've allowed that there is not absolute certainty on the subject, although the strip supports the theory in two places. But to claim that using the word "proceed" is clear evidence that archons can't teleport is just absurd.

On the contrary. If there are multiple ways to accomplish a task, then a millitary commander will direct how that task is to be accomplished. If flight were insufficient, then he would have directed them to use a different method. He also made no mention about a need for speed, so there is not even an implication that flying would take too long. Flight is obviously archons primary method of movement, so there is no reason to assume an order to proceed means anything other than go by the standard means.

[BillyJimBoBob]

So what you are REALLY saying is you have to assume a rule that has not been mentioned to support teleportation, where no new rule is required for flight to achieve the same results.

I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that I think the archons can either teleport or be teleported, and that we don't know all of the rules of Erfworld. It's quite simple.

On the contrary. If there are multiple ways to accomplish a task, then a millitary commander will direct how that task is to be accomplished. If flight were insufficient, then he would have directed them to use a different method. He also made no mention about a need for speed, so there is not even an implication that flying would take too long.

That is preposterous. If the Sgt orders the Private to move a pile of dirt from one place to another, he doesn't specify that the Private may not use a spoon.

If there is a method to accomplish a task which is the method which accomplishes that task best, then that is the method which is understood by default, by any unit which is not deliberately trying to be insubordinate. In a fantasy realm where Duty is a rule and where the ruler of a side can disband a unit with a thought, you aren't going to see many units moving that pile of dirt with a spoon, or flying someplace far away when they can get there faster by teleporting.

Flight is obviously archons primary method of movement, so there is no reason to assume an order to proceed means anything other than go by the standard means.

Obviously? I happen to think that teleportation is their primary means of covering large distances instantaneously. Flight is a very potent ability, but it takes far too long when the distance to travel is greater than the rate of flight per day.

I'll be happy to be proven wrong. I hope that a future strip (or note from the authors in the bloopers thread perhaps) makes the issue quite clear in either one way or the other.

[Kreistor]

[QUOTE=BillyJimBoBob;5952596]That is preposterous. If the Sgt orders the Private to move a pile of dirt from one place to another, he doesn't specify that the Private may not use a spoon.

If there is a method to accomplish a task which is the method which accomplishes that task best, then that is the method which is understood by default, by any unit which is not deliberately trying to be insubordinate. In a fantasy realm where Duty is a rule and where the ruler of a side can disband a unit with a thought, you aren't going to see many units moving that pile of dirt with a spoon, or flying someplace far away when they can get there faster by teleporting.[quote]

It's not preposterous at all. Flight is a natural ability for the Archons. As such, it costs only Move.

Teleportation would be a spell, and would cost resources. Using it when not absolutely necessary reduces offensive spell casting, making for a poorer escort. Sometimes, subordinates have to be told these things, especially when cool and fun options are available to complete the task. Without indication of how important or what kind of enemies they will be facing, the Archons cannot determine if it is okay to use up a resource like that. Of course, if they do know GK has dwagons, I highly doubt they'd use up any unnecessary resources.

[BillyJimBoBob]

Teleportation would be a spell, and would cost resources.

You do love to speculate without any backup in the source material, don't you? The author has come out and said that the DDR and flight of the archons is "natural magic." If the archons can teleport themselves, it is also natural magic. Point to a place where natural magic is shown to require any resources, will you? And if Charlie can teleport the archons using the Archendish, we have no clue if this requires any resources or not, but we have not seen either Ansom or Stanley bemoaning the fact that they used their Tools up for the day and needed to await refreshment of their abilities.

"Oy, I've turned too many walnuts into pigeons. Have to wait until tomorrow now!"

"Durn, I've dusted too many undead today. Now I'll have to fight the rest straight up!"

Right.

[Kreistor]

You do love to speculate without any backup in the source material, don't you? The author has come out and said that the DDR and flight of the archons is "natural magic."

*BEEP* Wrong answer. Thanks for playing.

Why could the Archons cast the DDR spell? They were part of the Coalition and it was now technically their turn. But they could not move because all of Charlescomm's units' move went to zero when Charlie ended turn. Move and hits are restored to full at the beginning of a side's turn, and (re)forming an alliance does not count as starting a new turn.

DDR is a spell, not a natural ability, and that's no speculation. Flight had to be natural, because uncroaked Jaclyn flew. Pclips didn't have to tell us that: we knew that long ago. (Could thread necromancy to find it, but not going to bother. You go looking if you want to call me on it. It was some debate about whether all Archons were casters. Can't remember the name)

The contract was a natural ability.

The two natural abilities we've seen appear to have no limitations to how often they are used. If Teleportation were the same, it could have saved them from the volcano. Nope, they go boom. Unless, of course, you want to add exceptions to this ability, but you don't like specualations, do you? Hey, wait a sec... you are speculating that Teleportation even exists.

What's your problem with me speculating when you seem to do it, too?

[BillyJimBoBob]

DDR is a spell, not a natural ability, and that's no speculation.

Maybe. But if the archons can do it all turn long without expending any "juice", then it has no functional difference from a natural magic which appears to be infinite in use or repetition. And we have no evidence that they can't cast infinite contracts or lead infinite dance fights using DDR. It isn't clear, even after re-reading pclip's post in the bloopers thread, because he isn't precise enough in what he says and how he says it. Sometimes it's "cast", and sometimes it's just cast. I'll await evidence or further notes from the author. Until then, my belief is that archons are not casters of the same classification as Wanda, et al, and all of their abilities are due to natural magic.

What's your problem with me speculating when you seem to do it, too?

You've misquoted me. Speculating is fine, but if you want credibility you need some basis. I've provided my basis for teleportation. You don't have to agree, it's clear that you do not. But most of your speculation comes sans basis, or in rare cases you've used a basis which is directly contradicted elsewhere as your only support.

(BTW, we've never seen Archons melee. Ever. Suggesting they don't need to dance fight when meleeing requires evidence that they can melee at all. Note they don't carry weapons.)

You've misquoted me yet again. Or maybe you just misunderstood. I made no such suggestion. I said that archons are apparently so awesome that even though they have the ability to dance fight they have never used it in any combat we've seen them in. Bringing up melee is irrelevant, as is bringing up the fact that archons don't carry weapons (but don't forget the net!). I'll refer you here for a wonderful picture of archons dance fighting. Apparently when it comes down to a fight that actually takes place they are so overpowered that stacking another bonus just isn't important to these smart units and their smart ruler.

[Oslecamo]

If Teleportation were the same, it could have saved them from the volcano. Nope, they go boom. Unless, of course, you want to add exceptions to this ability, but you don't like specualations, do you? Hey, wait a sec... you are speculating that Teleportation even exists.

You're sure of that?

Earlier in the comic one archon was killed by the GK airdefenses. Wich were activated by Wanda, wich still took some time to activate it. The archons saw it coming. And they had move left. They could have flied the hell out of there.

But they didn't. They stayed and they got badly hurt.

And that was from something that hapened right in front of them.

Remember it is a turn based game. You make your move, and then your enemy makes his move and you have to suck it up untill it's your turn again.

So if you step in a hex, and your oponent activates super-uncroacked volcano trap, you can't answer by using a natural ability. You can't answer with anything untill the damage has been dealt.

It's no exception. Unless you have any proof that units can jump out of the way when a spell/trap goes boom over them, then the archons could perfectly have teleport powers and simply be unable to use them fast enough before the volcano exploded in their face.

[Kreistor]

Earlier in the comic one archon was killed by the GK airdefenses. Wich were activated by Wanda, wich still took some time to activate it. The archons saw it coming. And they had move left. They could have flied the hell out of there.

I don't mind a second example that teleportation doesn't exist. Sure.

But they didn't. They stayed and they got badly hurt.

And didn't even put up any obvious defenses. Defenses don't exist? Check Wanda... look at that shiny bubble reflect everything those marvelous Archons of yours could throw at her. Wanda took nothing from the beams, and was only injured by the fall. Gee... Archons are so overpoweringly unbalanced... That's what a real caster can do against Archons.

And that was from something that happened right in front of them.

Remember it is a turn based game. You make your move, and then your enemy makes his move and you have to suck it up untill it's your turn again.

Not exactly. You can attack back if attacked, including with spellcraft. You just can't leave the hex to escape on someone else's turn. Charlie knew the mountain was being a problem. Parson said TPK, said two more short sentences, and then ran out. That's more time than most of the spells cast in this system. Even if Teleportation were one of the slowest, it shoudl still have been castable if Charlie had gotten to his people right away, and he has unmatched communications, which are Thinkamancy.

So if you step in a hex, and your oponent activates super-uncroacked volcano trap, you can't answer by using a natural ability. You can't answer with anything untill the damage has been dealt.

Sorry, see Wanda above. Some spells are fast (Hoboken) and others are slow (Aggro). When Charlie asks about the mountain, the Archons are already useless in the fight. Why not pull them out, and then ask Parson? It's safer, and Charlie is nothing if not safe.

It's no exception. Unless you have any proof that units can jump out of the way when a spell/trap goes boom over them, then the archons could perfectly have teleport powers and simply be unable to use them fast enough before the volcano exploded in their face.

Yeah, see Wanda above. Nice little reflective bubble. We see Stanley use his Hammer's lighting (activated with Van de Graaff) in response to a melee attack, which is faster than Aggro by far. Hoboken was in response to melee. Spells can be fast, and cast in response to faster events than spells. And that volcano exploded slowly enough for Parson to talk with Charlie and get out. There's was time for the vast majority of spells to be cast, and maybe even Aggro.

[Oslecamo]

I don't mind a second example that teleportation doesn't exist. Sure.

I must say we have quite diferent views of what the examples show and don't show. By your interpretation, basic movement also doesn't exist, since the fliers sit there and take the nuke to their faces. Or perhaps it's just that you can't change positions when your oponent triggers his super trap.

And didn't even put up any obvious defenses. Defenses don't exist? Check Wanda... look at that shiny bubble reflect everything those marvelous Archons of yours could throw at her. Wanda took nothing from the beams, and was only injured by the fall. Gee... Archons are so overpoweringly unbalanced... That's what a real caster can do against Archons.

Wanda doesn't say anythings, so the shield was a spell cast before hand, wich automatically triggered and discharged when Wanda would suffer damage.

And she still got pwned. Whitout scratching the archons. I don't really understand what you mean in "That's what a real caster can do against Archons." The real caster rolling over and almost dying when facing archons? That's hardly impressive.

Not exactly. You can attack back if attacked, including with spellcraft. You just can't leave the hex to escape on someone else's turn.

There. You admited it. The volcano covered the whole city. For all we know the archons tried to run away as far as possible, but it simply wasn't enough.

Charlie knew the mountain was being a problem. Parson said TPK, said two more short sentences, and then ran out. That's more time than most of the spells cast in this system. Even if Teleportation were one of the slowest, it shoudl still have been castable if Charlie had gotten to his people right away, and he has unmatched communications, which are Thinkamancy.

The summoning spell for Parson took a good deal of time. Also the books work at the speed of tought, not speech, wich is pretty darn fast. There could be just a few seconds between Hamster claiming he's going to blow everything up and entering the portal. Not enough time to use teleport.

Besides, there's this thing called "suprise". How could Charlie ever imagine that Hamster had the power to nuke several hexes in one go? It's techincally impossible! And Charlie is the kind of carefull planner. He doesn't like to rush things. A few more seconds of hesitation in ordering the archons to retreat would be enough. Hamster just caught him with his pants down. Charlie isn't used to be the suprised one.

Sorry, see Wanda above. Some spells are fast (Hoboken) and others are slow (Aggro).

Luckily for me, it wasn't a combat situation! It was a trap! Traps would be all but useless if you could easily react to them once they triggered.

When Charlie asks about the mountain, the Archons are already useless in the fight. Why not pull them out, and then ask Parson?

Because Charlie was still following his contract. Retreating in front of all of the coalition while still working for them for no aparent reason would be a really bad stain on his name. It was much more probable that Hamster was just bluffing, or had just another "normal" trap wich wouldn't harm the archons.

Again, how could he imagine that Hamster was going to pull such a devastating move? Charlie hesitates for a moment to think if Hamster if bluffing or not, and that hesitation is enough for the volcano to go boom.

Charlie wanted to capture Hamster and his toy at all costs(he even told Ansom to capture Hamster). He tought he could still manipulate the situation in achieving this(we can still talck!). Charlie gambled. And he lost. He's not perfect. Nobody in Efworld is.

It's safer, and Charlie is nothing if not safe.

You're sure of that?
http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0117.html

"Who could resist a show like that?"-<Charlie the not-so-safe, before having his troops nuked to oblivion by said show.

Here's Charlie taking risks for personal amusement and profit. He could have played it safe and captured Hamster+artifact and run away laughing. But he choose to stay and watch, and it costed him dearly.

Yeah, see Wanda above. Nice little reflective bubble. We see Stanley use his Hammer's lighting (activated with Van de Graaff) in response to a melee attack, which is faster than Aggro by far.

Van de Graaf isn't a spell. And it was charged before entering melee with all the fancy dance fighting. Surely not something instant. The hammer is glowing at the end of the strip.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0123.html

It isn't even in response to a melee attack. It is THE melee attack itself. Stanley just had higher iniative and striked first. When he delivers his first hit it's automatically discharged. Since Stanley hasn't got enough time to charge it again he doesn't get to use it against Jillian and her small fleet. Notice how the arkenhammer stops glowing after hiting Caesar.

Hoboken was in response to melee. Spells can be fast, and cast in response to faster events than spells. And that volcano exploded slowly enough for Parson to talk with Charlie and get out. There's was time for the vast majority of spells to be cast, and maybe even Aggro.

Hmm, no. All of these spells were charged before the event took place. The shield is something you would expect a mage would put in herself before going to play melee in the skies, during the same time she donned the fancy armor. Maggie started charging her Hadoken after the other guy burst spent his action taking down the wall. The fastest we've seen, yes, but also a very minor spell, nothing compared to what we have seen so far.

Those examples are actually suporting my point. They're stuff you can charge up ahead of time and they discharge when a certain something happens. And when they discharge there's no geting out of the way unless you have a discharge effect for their discharge effect.

[Kreistor]

I must say we have quite diferent views of what the examples show and don't show. By your interpretation, basic movement also doesn't exist, since the fliers sit there and take the nuke to their faces. Or perhaps it's just that you can't change positions when your oponent triggers his super trap.

Noooo... the Blooper thread tells us that Charlescomm forces did not get their move restored, so they couldn't move out of the hex. We know for certain that flight obeys basic move laws because Jillian can't follow Stanley out of the trap hex. Since the volcano was a multi-hex trap, and all RCC forces were destroyed, even those shown outside teh hex, there was nowhere inside tehir one hex that the Archons could fly to in order to escape.

Wanda doesn't say anythings, so the shield was a spell cast before hand, wich automatically triggered and discharged when Wanda would suffer damage

Or it was a natural ability. Notice that lovely armour she wears into battle, instead of dance fighting? We don't see her cast, including scrolls. We don't know where it came from. The point is, there are defensive abilities. They can be used to prevent spell casting..

And she still got pwned. Whitout scratching the archons. I don't really understand what you mean in "That's what a real caster can do against Archons." The real caster rolling over and almost dying when facing archons? That's hardly impressive.

You'll notice her mount was vaporized: the bubble didn't protect it. She wasn't "pwned", she fell a long ways. (Besides, you need to learn what that term means before using it.)

There. You admited it. The volcano covered the whole city. For all we know the archons tried to run away as far as possible, but it simply wasn't enough

They are in a zone in a city. No matter how many hexes the zone takes up, the Archons can't fly out of that zone with 0 move. The Archons cannot leave city Airspace.

The summoning spell for Parson took a good deal of time. Also the books work at the speed of tought, not speech, wich is pretty darn fast. There could be just a few seconds between Hamster claiming he's going to blow everything up and entering the portal. Not enough time to use teleport.

Which makes an assumption on your part that teleportation takes a long time to cast.

Besides, there's this thing called "suprise". How could Charlie ever imagine that Hamster had the power to nuke several hexes in one go? It's techincally impossible! And Charlie is the kind of carefull planner. He doesn't like to rush things. A few more seconds of hesitation in ordering the archons to retreat would be enough. Hamster just caught him with his pants down. Charlie isn't used to be the suprised one.

No, Charlie leaves it to his commanders in the field to decide how to implement his orders. His forces can rush things if they wish. They have the authority to sell their own services, as they did by convincing Jillian to call Ansom. Charlie does not micromanage. But he does not allow for his forces to have a chance of losing. Don't confuse that with careful planning. He plans where he can, but he is not present at most situations, so his Archons decide tehir own risks. Charlie errs on the side of less loss, and there was no gain from leaving the Archons in Airspace if the mountain was rumbling. He could only lose nothing ro a lot: he could not gain sice the Archons could not participate.

But, you know, there's something more. The Archons tell Ansom that they could not assist him because they could not cross zones. If Teleportation exists, it cannot be used on-turn with 0 move (since at this point they are technically on-turn with zero move, not off-turn).

Luckily for me, it wasn't a combat situation! It was a trap! Traps would be all but useless if you could easily react to them once they triggered.

So would attacks with daggers. If a dagger could be blocked, it would be all but useless. Well, oops, daggers can be blocked. Your argument is not consistent with any reality. Traps do not need to have a 100% kill rate to be effective. They tend to be cheap and plentiful. Look at landmines, for instance. They could be found, destroyed by flail tanks, or fail to do the intended harm. They sometimes worked, and that's all you needed to force the enemy into wasting manpower hunting them. Bullets are teh same way. Most bullets fired by troops hit nothing, but still theyare used. Just because a bullet has a 1/100 chance (guessed at number... I could go hunt down how many bullets were fired vs. casualties from gunfire in WW2, but it's not necessary) of creating a casualty, that doesn't mean we switch to swords.

Because Charlie was still following his contract. Retreating in front of all of the coalition while still working for them for no aparent reason would be a really bad stain on his name. It was much more probable that Hamster was just bluffing, or had just another "normal" trap wich wouldn't harm the archons.

If they could have teleported, Ansom would have had them teleport to Outer Wall or Courtyard to help with more offense. They couldn't (means unable to, not didn't want to) cross zones.

Charlie wanted to capture Hamster and his toy at all costs(he even told Ansom to capture Hamster).

Not at all costs. He did not attack GK to capture Parson. Whatever that would have cost him, he wasn't willing to pay it. Didn't want to lose too many Archons? Didn't want to get the RCC angry at him? We simply do not know, but we do not he wouldn't pay that cost for Parson.

He tought he could still manipulate the situation in achieving this(we can still talck!). Charlie gambled. And he lost. He's not perfect. Nobody in Efworld is.

Charlie didn't think he could lose. No one else predicted the volcano could be caused to erupt. Multiple hex traps are impossible according to Jillian and Caesar, and people never consider the impossible, just the improbable, Sides now have to start considering the impossible...

It's only gambling if you take a risk. Charlie wasn't taking a risk. I am sitting here in my apartment. Do I think I am taking a risk that my bed is going to fall on my head? Certainly not, The probability is as low as walking down the street and a stray bullet falling out of the sky killing me. We are always, 100% of the time, in a situation where some abnormal event could kill us. That means we are either constantly taking a gamble (in which case that is no different for Charlie than anyone else), or its not gambling, because we can't choose not to take the gamble. When we voluntarily place ourselves in a position were we know (or should know) that risk of death increases, then that is a gamble. When the fight moved to Dungeon, the risk to the Archons diminished vs. when the fight was in Courtyard. There was no one to cast spells at them anymore. Charlie reduced his risk when victory seemed assured. Destruction by the volcano? Simply not possible, unless it was act of god, and that could happen anywhere anytime, so that's not a gamble.

It's safer, and Charlie is nothing if not safe.

You're sure of that?
http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0117.html
"Who could resist a show like that?"-<Charlie the not-so-safe, before having his troops nuked to oblivion by said show.

Yes, I am. You are not taking a gamble when placing yourself at risk of act of god, because acts of god can occur anywhere, anytime. Tornados. Sudden thunderstorms. Meteors. Tsunamis. A volcano exploding of its own accord. That was a risk he was taking, but it s one we inherently take by existing, and not something anyone would say we should consider when living. Taking residence on a volcano with signs of activity, or known to have been active in the past, like Vesuvius, that's a risk, because we are now fairly certain that Vesuvius will erupt again, like it has fairly regularly for known history. And yet, there's a city that is in place to be destroyed with the next eruption. That's risk taking. The chance of an act of god is so low that you would paralyze your own side by never taking a risk on something that unlikely happening. Since it is impossible to create a multi-hex Dirtamancy Trap, it is simply not reasonable to count that risk as a gamble. A 0% chance of occurance is a 0% chance of risk.

Van de Graaf isn't a spell. And it was charged before entering melee with all the fancy dance fighting. Surely not something instant. The hammer is glowing at the end of the strip.

Prove it wasn't a spell. How do you know what it was? I can say it was a spell because it had a verbal activation like a spell. The only Natural Ability we've seen cast is the contract, and theres no words creating that effect. So, it's a spell.

We know that the Arkenpliers are tied to Fate magic. And Ansom has no talent with it, but he has to say that. It is possible for Warlords to have talent with magic, or Ansom would have said, "But I'm a warlord, and can't cast." instead. Being a Warlord does not make it impossible for Stanley to cast spells.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0123.html

It isn't even in response to a melee attack. It is THE melee attack itself. Stanley just had higher iniative and striked first. When he delivers his first hit it's automatically discharged. Since Stanley hasn't got enough time to charge it again he doesn't get to use it against Jillian and her small fleet. Notice how the arkenhammer stops glowing after hiting Caesar.

Or the spell is intended to time to the hammer swing. It might be an activation word, it might be a spell. Point is, that a spell like Hoboken can be used in the same time Van de Graaff was. If an activation ability times to counter a melee attack, so can a spell.

Just going to stick some comments right into the next paragraph.

Hmm, no. All of these spells were charged before the event took place. (No evidence.) The shield is something you would expect a mage would put in herself before going to play melee in the skies, during the same time she donned the fancy armor (no evidence). Maggie started charging her Hadoken after the other guy burst spent his action taking down the wall (same preparation time for Parson to raise his sword, making it able to hit someone casting a slower spell, knocking him back without killing, which stops the sword swing and is reasonable to assume would disrupt someone else's spell). The fastest we've seen, yes, but also a very minor spell, nothing compared to what we have seen so far.

Magic Missile was the great anti-casting spell in DnD early editions, where being hit in a round prevented spell casting for the entire round. Low damage, but automatic hit against anyone not surrounded by a Shield, like a Cleric. My low level wizard shut down a wizard for five rounds, before my wand was destroyed. Weak does not mean ineffective.

Those examples are actually suporting my point. They're stuff you can charge up ahead of time and they discharge when a certain something happens. And when they discharge there's no geting out of the way unless you have a discharge effect for their discharge effect.

You mean like a teleportation spell? Charge it up, and then you can use it as a contingency later? Or do you not realize you need to create an exception for teleportation now, too? It can't be charged up like other spells.

But you still have to prove that, anyway. If defensive spells can be charged and released at will, why did Jaclyn die? Why did any Archons die to Air defenses? Why could the Archons casting DDR be disrupted? They didn't bother to cast their defensives?

Or something I like: they don't have any defensive spells. There's their vulnerability I was looking for. They can't pre-cast a defense and stop any offensive spells from hitting them. They are now very vulnerable to enemy casters. I don't know if it is traditional for armies to not have casters in he field, but you can bet Parson will change that now that he can see what they can do. A croakamancer anywhere but near the front line makes no sense, really. What good does a Croakamancer do a city, except provide a realatively few workers from the local dead (rhetorical... it's a relative thing... there will be a lot of corpses on the front line, so that really is where a Croakamancer would be best situated)? A Dirtamancer mining to provide funds to replace units? Sure, that makes some sense. But considering that they can be used to kill enemy leadership in the field, by tunneling underneath? Ansom took no casters with him, or at the very least, we never see any except Archons. That's the Archons' strength: they're the only casters on the battlefield, and that provides a service unmatched. That explains Charlie's usefulness, and his high prices.

Anyway, obviously, I am perfectly happy with spells being Chargable. It forces you to make another exception for Teleportation, and it gives the Archons obvious vulnerabilities. That's really all i needed to prove in order to balance them. I found my paper to the Archon rock.

[MadScientistMat]

But if Stanley had stayed as well, would Parson have been able to pull of his Phyrric victory?

In some ways, it seems like Stanley was getting in the way. He often has no clue how to use his units correctly. For example, he tends to take a, "If you really were the perfect warlord, you'd know all this" mentality with regards to Parson. Without Stanley in the way, Parson can finally demand a proper briefing on their full capabilities. Stanley's use of other units isn't much better - for example, ordering Wanda to cast a spell way outside her specialty, can't seem to think of any uses for Sizemore besides animating crap golums as opposed to, say, creating defensive earthenworks, arbitrarily picking the best looking soldiers to be his Warlords, etc.

Having Stanley stay behind would most likely be a liability, because he'd want final approval over everything Parson did. It's likely that if Stanley had stayed behind, he would have thought that it was possible to preserve the city of Gobwin Knob, and it's not likely he would have signed off on a plan to have Sizemore collapse the walls. Parson, on the other hand, realizes his only choices are "Surrender, have the RCC croak all the other units except the casters, and maybe have the loyalty spell croak me," or "Croak as many RCC units as it takes to make them stop, even if I have to turn Gobwin Knob and all the land for hexes around into a smoking pile of basalt."

Stanley may give a leadership bonus in combat rolls, but he's a leadership penalty when it comes to tactics.

[BillyJimBoBob]

[Oslecamo: Traps would be all but useless if you could easily react to them once they triggered.]
So would attacks with daggers. If a dagger could be blocked, it would be all but useless. Well, oops, daggers can be blocked. Your argument is not consistent with any reality. Traps do not need to have a 100% kill rate to be effective. They tend to be cheap and plentiful. Look at landmines, for instance. They could be found, destroyed by flail tanks, or fail to do the intended harm.

You tend to try to use real world analogies to support RTS game mechanics. There is a basis, since a RTS game which uses no familiar terms will leave the players less likely to easily grasp the rules, but you can easily go to far by projecting things such as "bombers are weak to fighter craft" or "[Traps] ten to be cheap and plentiful." Neither case is born out by the strip, as we've seen no "fighter" to the archons "bomber" and we've seen very little trap use, and all of it that we've seen has been due to Parson commanding it done.

"Trap" is most likely a game mechanic of the Erfworld RTS, as this is both how Ceasar refers to the volcano and presumably how the Thinkamancers chatting back and forth between the RCC sides referred to it. Natural events such as volvanos, hurricanes and tornadoes are probably not within theErf mechanics, as no one used the word "volcano" and many RTS games have no rules for weather events.

The previous strip tells us something else we didn't know for sure: The mechanics of magic are well known. When Jillian exclaims that a multiple hex trap is impossible, not a single warlord present says anything like "Well, maybe it's possible", instead the only thing spoken is agreement. This would not happen if all the warlords present were unfamiliar with the extent of abilities available to casters.

[Oslecamo: Charlie wanted to capture Hamster and his toy at all costs [...]]
Not at all costs. He did not attack GK to capture Parson. Whatever that would have cost him, he wasn't willing to pay it. Didn't want to lose too many Archons? Didn't want to get the RCC angry at him? We simply do not know, but we do not he wouldn't pay that cost for Parson.

Not at all costs, agreed. He was willing to go forward with the attack at whatever cost in archons he would pay the turn he ported them to GK, but Parson pointed out some advantages of waiting: GK had a decent chance to last the turn, GK's forces would be weakened leading to fewer losses to Charlie during an attack on the next turn, and Parson said he would have the Archenpliers. This, plus the possibility of the RCC renewing a lucrative contract, made waiting the best option for Charlie.

Prove [Van de Graff] wasn't a spell. How do you know what it was? I can say it was a spell because it had a verbal activation like a spell. The only Natural Ability we've seen cast is the contract, and theres no words creating that effect. So, it's a spell.

I prefer to believe that it is an ability of the Archenhammer, and Stanley merely spoke the activation phrase. We have seen Stanley cast no other spells, so it fits better as an ability of the 'Hammer than as a spell cast by Stanley.

We know that the Arkenpliers are tied to Fate magic. And Ansom has no talent with it, but he has to say that. It is possible for Warlords to have talent with magic, or Ansom would have said, "But I'm a warlord, and can't cast." instead. Being a Warlord does not make it impossible for Stanley to cast spells.

Not impossible, but I think you're reading much into the words used. "Fate magic is powerless in my case; I cannot unlock their secrets" does not mean that Ansom is a caster. We have never seen him cast a spell, nor have we seen any warlord cast a spell.

Or something I like: they don't have any defensive spells. There's their vulnerability I was looking for. They can't pre-cast a defense and stop any offensive spells from hitting them. They are now very vulnerable to enemy casters.
[...]
I found my paper to the Archon rock.

Um, how about no? Let's list the things we've seen archons vulnerable to:
1) Air defenses - Either expensive to set up, take a long time to set up, or at the very least require some resource (caster attention, perhaps) which GK could not afford to spare. Or they would have been replaced. So, effectively single use, and limited circumstance i.e. city fighting.
2) A combination of air defenses and/or Maggy expending scrolls - Again, limited use and application. Scrolls are either expensive or available in limited quantities or all of the casters would have had their own private stash. Wanda is the de facto head caster of GK, perhaps she receives a higher personal salary or is allowed some discretionary spending of GK funds. Again, single use and limited circumstance i.e. city fighting, against an opponent with scrolls.
3) Volcano eruption - Unheard of on Erf, said to be "impossible", so once again single use and limited circumstance i.e. must be out of move over a volcano and have pissed off a trimancer link of Think-Croak-Dirt with a portal handy or just suicidal. Shall we say a highly situational application?

Archons don't have any special defense against casters, and neither does any other unit we've seen. This is not the presence of a weakness or a "paper" to the archons "rock" because it isn't a unique weakness. Bombers are specifically vulnerable to fighters, but AA batteries are not, nor are other fighters. Archons being vulnerable to casters isn't a "paper", it's the status quo.

[Kreistor]

You tend to try to use real world analogies to support RTS game mechanics. There is a basis, since a RTS game which uses no familiar terms will leave the players less likely to easily grasp the rules, but you can easily go to far by projecting things such as "bombers are weak to fighter craft" or "[Traps] ten to be cheap and plentiful." Neither case is born out by the strip, as we've seen no "fighter" to the archons "bomber" and we've seen very little trap use, and all of it that we've seen has been due to Parson commanding it done.

Using the real world also makes things easier on the author. Any time you add or alter a vital aspect of our reality, you have a ripple effect that causes other things to change. Let's say that you change the laws of gravity, for instance. Does that result in a change in how light works, which is influenced by gravity? Or flight? Lower gravity allows for things to fly with smaller wings, and is an explanation for some dragons, but it also allows arrows to fly further, men to jump higher and further, and beyond that, our own bone strength is set by gravity. Weaker gravity, weaker bones, and increased vulnerability to striking force. Just how far do you go when you alter something?

"Trap" is most likely a game mechanic of the Erfworld RTS, as this is both how Ceasar refers to the volcano and presumably how the Thinkamancers chatting back and forth between the RCC sides referred to it.

I wouldn't read that much into it yet. They may have assumed it was a preset trap from the sheer scale of the event. Since it is impossible, maybe a lot of little spells set over a long time set off at once did it? Anyway, I think "trap" is the best explanation anyone can come up with, so that's what they're assuming for now. That detail doesn't really matter, since they'll likely never know how it was done. And given that Parson's thoughts are that there was cheating involved, there may not be any other trio that could replicate the feat, anyway. Still a lot up in the air at the moment. We might get an explanation if we get a epilogue for Wanda et al.

Parson pointed out some advantages of waiting: GK had a decent chance to last the turn, GK's forces would be weakened leading to fewer losses to Charlie during an attack on the next turn, and Parson said he would have the Archenpliers. This, plus the possibility of the RCC renewing a lucrative contract, made waiting the best option for Charlie.

Maybe. We could find out, yet. I expect an epilogue for Charlie, and that would be an appropriate topic for him to discuss with his Chief Warlord, since it was fundamental to losing everything.

I prefer to believe that it is an ability of the Archenhammer, and Stanley merely spoke the activation phrase. We have seen Stanley cast no other spells, so it fits better as an ability of the 'Hammer than as a spell cast by Stanley.Not impossible, but I think you're reading much into the words used.

Just playing the spoiler. It could be an activated ability, or the hammer may confer to him the ability to use a particular spell, or it may have had something to do with "Your lightning's all I need."

"Fate magic is powerless in my case; I cannot unlock their secrets" does not mean that Ansom is a caster. We have never seen him cast a spell, nor have we seen any warlord cast a spell.Um, how about no? Let's list the things we've seen archons vulnerable to:

What makes a caster? If it's training, then anyone might become one. Sizemore was popped, but was he popped as a caster, or did he pull pike duty first? If anyone can be trained to be a caster, then everyone has some inate ability with something (even talent with nothing is Clevermancy).

Archons don't have any special defense against casters, and neither does any other unit we've seen. This is not the presence of a weakness or a "paper" to the archons "rock" because it isn't a unique weakness. Bombers are specifically vulnerable to fighters, but AA batteries are not, nor are other fighters. Archons being vulnerable to casters isn't a "paper", it's the status quo.

Wanda did. Her mount is vaped, but anything fired at her bounces off the bubble. And she took a lot of beams. There are defenses, whether from a pre-cast spell, a spell with no verbal component, or an ability of her armour. And it's powerful enough to stop not just one Archon, but many.

It's hardly surprising that we see little caster-caster combat. Ansom only brought Archons, and they've been unutilized many turns. And we wouldn't see much in Erfworld history, either, if rulers keep their casters in home cities. They don't get much practice at it, so they may not be that good at it either. Fighting well takes practice, and I can't imagine that doesn't hold true for casters in combat.

[BillyJimBoBob]

Using the real world also makes things easier on the author.
[...]
Just how far do you go when you alter something?

Agreed that straying from the real world can both make things harder on the author and on the player. But stray you must in a fantasy based RTS such as Erfworld. And it's not much of a "stray" to, say, not have cheap traps such as mines, or to not have a r/p/s relationship between all of the units in the game.

I wouldn't read that much into it yet. They may have assumed it was a preset trap from the sheer scale of the event. Since it is impossible, maybe a lot of little spells set over a long time set off at once did it? Anyway, I think "trap" is the best explanation anyone can come up with, so that's what they're assuming for now.

Agreed. It's not really a trap, and the readers know that. But this is how the Efrers refer to effects of this nature, because it best matches known Erf mechanics, theoretically. Which is why they refer to it as a trap, that's the comfortable label.

I expect an epilogue for Charlie, and that would be an appropriate topic for him to discuss with his Chief Warlord, since it was fundamental to losing everything.

Does Charlie even have a chief warlord? Maybe one of the archons fills that role? We know only a single unit type for Charlie's forces, and he seems to be doing all the commanding via the finger TVs.

Just playing the spoiler [re: Van de Graff]. It could be an activated ability, or the hammer may confer to him the ability to use a particular spell, or it may have had something to do with "Your lightning's all I need."

The cast of characters lists "Heaving lightning" as a strength of the Archenhammer. But.... It lists "Taming Dwagons" for both Stanley and the Archenhammer. It's a shame the authors seem to make mistakes of context like this so often. The strip seems to make it clear that it's only his attunement to the 'Hammer that lets Stanley tame dwagons, and the cast of characters should not be listing this as a strength of both Stanley and the 'Hammer.

What makes a caster? If it's training, then anyone might become one. Sizemore was popped, but was he popped as a caster, or did he pull pike duty first?

All indications are that casters pop as casters, and other units pop as their unit type. Humans, or perhaps any talented martial unit although we haven't seen any non-human warlords unless that woodsy elf (Tarfu?) qualifies as a warlord, can be promoted to a better martial unit type (Stanley is the best example we have of this), and a caster can becomes a better caster including the possibility of learning magic outside of their area of specialization.

Wanda did.[defend against a spell-like effect] Her mount is vaped, but anything fired at her bounces off the bubble.

Sure, but we were talking about archons having no specific weakness. Shoving a piece of wood into the heart is fatal to mortals and vampires alike, but it is a special weakness of vampires only because they are for the most part invulnerable. A stake to the heart is the "paper" to the vampires "rock." Archons seem to be generally strong, with no specific weakness. Things that kill other units may also kill them, but there has been no demonstrated specific weakness to any attack form which isn't also effective against other units.

It's hardly surprising that we see little caster-caster combat. Ansom only brought Archons, and they've been unutilized many turns. And we wouldn't see much in Erfworld history, either, if rulers keep their casters in home cities. They don't get much practice at it, so they may not be that good at it either. Fighting well takes practice, and I can't imagine that doesn't hold true for casters in combat.

It makes one wonder how casters manage to level, because most of their action would be in defending a city. We've only seen Wanda and Sizemore leave GK. Wanda to go collect and uncroak Manpower, and she and Sizemore on a trip to the Magic Kingdom. The MK appears to be a kind of neutral caster-only territory, so aside from buying scrolls or studying other forms of magic there's probably little to do there which can give levels.

[Oslecamo]

Noooo... the Blooper thread tells us that Charlescomm forces did not get their move restored, so they couldn't move out of the hex. We know for certain that flight obeys basic move laws because Jillian can't follow Stanley out of the trap hex. Since the volcano was a multi-hex trap, and all RCC forces were destroyed, even those shown outside teh hex, there was nowhere inside tehir one hex that the Archons could fly to in order to escape.

I was refering to the air-defense trap earlier, but nevermind now.

Or it was a natural ability. Notice that lovely armour she wears into battle, instead of dance fighting? We don't see her cast, including scrolls. We don't know where it came from. The point is, there are defensive abilities. They can be used to prevent spell casting..

We don't see Wanda cast a lot of stuff she casted. We didn't see how she animated the killed archon. We don't see how she mind raped Jillian.

Plus from my view the natural ability there is the archon's laser beams. I don't remember they using any specific words when using them.

You'll notice her mount was vaporized: the bubble didn't protect it. She wasn't "pwned", she fell a long ways. (Besides, you need to learn what that term means before using it.)

Oh so she can take laser beams to the face but can't handle a middle fall(wich Ansom managed to take and keep going). Or perhaps the shield was simply expended by the laser beam.

They are in a zone in a city. No matter how many hexes the zone takes up, the Archons can't fly out of that zone with 0 move. The Archons cannot leave city Airspace.

They still had move remaining since they would need it to take the garrison if Charlie had decided to go trough with the attack. However they ended their turn and then later . The game probably has a contigency that if you moved during your turn then you can't move any more for the remaining of the day, even if you make a new alliance, to prevent cheesy tricks like the archons sudenly being able to attack togheter with the coaliton forces.

Which makes an assumption on your part that teleportation takes a long time to cast.

Stronger spells need more time as far as we've seen. The super summoning spell took lots. Proper mind raping demands a prolonged sessions. Uncroackify dead troops is slow enough that it can't be done during battle. Otherwise mancers would indeed be invincible.

No, Charlie leaves it to his commanders in the field to decide how to implement his orders. His forces can rush things if they wish. They have the authority to sell their own services, as they did by convincing Jillian to call Ansom. Charlie does not micromanage. But he does not allow for his forces to have a chance of losing. Don't confuse that with careful planning. He plans where he can, but he is not present at most situations, so his Archons decide tehir own risks. Charlie errs on the side of less loss, and there was no gain from leaving the Archons in Airspace if the mountain was rumbling. He could only lose nothing ro a lot: he could not gain sice the Archons could not participate.

But as we see, either by rules or teleport taking too long or they having zero movement they simply don't have a choice. They have to stay there.

But, you know, there's something more. The Archons tell Ansom that they could not assist him because they could not cross zones. If Teleportation exists, it cannot be used on-turn with 0 move (since at this point they are technically on-turn with zero move, not off-turn).

And like I already said, they had already taken their turn and ended it. They then allied with the coaliton, but the game's rules prevents them from moving anymore because technically they already ended their turns. Remember most turn based games have rules to prevent abusive movement.

So would attacks with daggers. If a dagger could be blocked, it would be all but useless. Well, oops, daggers can be blocked. Your argument is not consistent with any reality.

Because it isn't reality. It's a game! And we already know that normal attacks can be parried as we saw from Wanda and Ansom's fight. But a trap isn't combat. You can't parry it.

If they could have teleported, Ansom would have had them teleport to Outer Wall or Courtyard to help with more offense. They couldn't (means unable to, not didn't want to) cross zones.

Or perhaps it's simply a 1 per day spell/ability. You never saw any game with units with a special ability/spell wich they can use only once per turn but doesn't drain other resources?

Not at all costs. He did not attack GK to capture Parson. Whatever that would have cost him, he wasn't willing to pay it. Didn't want to lose too many Archons? Didn't want to get the RCC angry at him? We simply do not know, but we do not he wouldn't pay that cost for Parson.

Well he still was pretty much interested, to the point in sending a really big number of archons to try to get the job done.

Charlie didn't think he could lose. No one else predicted the volcano could be caused to erupt. Multiple hex traps are impossible according to Jillian and Caesar, and people never consider the impossible, just the improbable, Sides now have to start considering the impossible...

Yep. Hamster will revolutionize combat in Efworld.

Charlie reduced his risk when victory seemed assured. Destruction by the volcano? Simply not possible, unless it was act of god, and that could happen anywhere anytime, so that's not a gamble.

He knew Hamster had 2/3 chances of standing against the coaliton. That should be the impossible since he was so badly outnumbered. Charlie being a smart guy should have understood that Hamster wasn't your typical warlord, and if he tried to play too much time with him he would get burned.

The chance of an act of god is so low that you would paralyze your own side by never taking a risk on something that unlikely happening. Since it is impossible to create a multi-hex Dirtamancy Trap, it is simply not reasonable to count that risk as a gamble. A 0% chance of occurance is a 0% chance of risk.

Prove it wasn't a spell. How do you know what it was? I can say it was a spell because it had a verbal activation like a spell. The only Natural Ability we've seen cast is the contract, and theres no words creating that effect. So, it's a spell.

Stanley is arrogant enough to just scream the name of the attack because he likes it. He likes to show off, and even dresses like KISS. Who said mancers were the only ones who got to talk fancy during battles?

Plus it's an arkentool! If anything in Efworld has natural abilities it's that giant hammer.

We know that the Arkenpliers are tied to Fate magic. And Ansom has no talent with it, but he has to say that. It is possible for Warlords to have talent with magic, or Ansom would have said, "But I'm a warlord, and can't cast." instead. Being a Warlord does not make it impossible for Stanley to cast spells.

Then it's the pliers wich grant them the power. Warlords also shouldn't be able to control dwagons but Stanley can do it because of his arkentool.

Or the spell is intended to time to the hammer swing. It might be an activation word, it might be a spell. Point is, that a spell like Hoboken can be used in the same time Van de Graaff was. If an activation ability times to counter a melee attack, so can a spell.

No it can't, because the hammer took the dance fighting of 3 cosplaying hobgobwins to charge up the hammer. Decidely not instant.

Specially because if it was a fast casting spell then Stanley would've used it in Jillian also! How do you explain that?

Magic Missile was the great anti-casting spell in DnD early editions, where being hit in a round prevented spell casting for the entire round. Low damage, but automatic hit against anyone not surrounded by a Shield, like a Cleric. My low level wizard shut down a wizard for five rounds, before my wand was destroyed. Weak does not mean ineffective.

This isn't D&D. We have nothing to suport it works that way. Move on.

You mean like a teleportation spell? Charge it up, and then you can use it as a contingency later? Or do you not realize you need to create an exception for teleportation now, too? It can't be charged up like other spells.

I never said all spells are charged up. Uncroack people, creating crap golems, taking cities down, tunneling, offensive shockmancy, summon perfect warlod and several others clearly can't be charged as they're unleashed when the mancer chooses.

But you still have to prove that, anyway. If defensive spells can be charged and released at will, why did Jaclyn die? Why did any Archons die to Air defenses? Why could the Archons casting DDR be disrupted? They didn't bother to cast their defensives?

Who says they have any? They had to run out of tricks somewhere.

Or something I like: they don't have any defensive spells. There's their vulnerability I was looking for. They can't pre-cast a defense and stop any offensive spells from hitting them. They are now very vulnerable to enemy casters. I don't know if it is traditional for armies to not have casters in he field, but you can bet Parson will change that now that he can see what they can do. A croakamancer anywhere but near the front line makes no sense, really. What good does a Croakamancer do a city, except provide a realatively few workers from the local dead (rhetorical... it's a relative thing... there will be a lot of corpses on the front line, so that really is where a Croakamancer would be best situated)?

In the beggining of the comic Wanda is called by Stanley to animate the last deceased warlod, showing that aparently you can choose to carry corpses from the frontline to your citadel where your croackamancer can turn them into more troops whitout leaving the safety of the base.

Plus remember the more corspes you reanimate in one turn the weaker they are and the fewer time they last. In the long run it pays more to just animate some elite units. If you go around spamming quick zombies they'll all rot to nothingness in a few days.

A Dirtamancer mining to provide funds to replace units? Sure, that makes some sense. But considering that they can be used to kill enemy leadership in the field, by tunneling underneath?

They can be used to kill enemy leadership when you combine them with golems and give them shockmancy scrolls to keep the other enemies away. And who can create the golems? The dirtmancer. So it probably pays more to keep your dirtmancer at home spamming more golems instead of risking him in the frontline. Plus he would never get flying warlords.

Ansom took no casters with him, or at the very least, we never see any except Archons. That's the Archons' strength: they're the only casters on the battlefield, and that provides a service unmatched. That explains Charlie's usefulness, and his high prices.

It also helps they have sick mobility and fire super laser beams of death. Indeed Charlie's high fees are a further proof of the archon's great(but not unlimited) power.

Anyway, obviously, I am perfectly happy with spells being Chargable. It forces you to make another exception for Teleportation, and it gives the Archons obvious vulnerabilities. That's really all i needed to prove in order to balance them. I found my paper to the Archon rock.

I don't need to make any exception. I said some spells were chargable, not all of them. Otherwise just send Wanda with a charged uncroack and turn all the killed guys from the coaltion in her toys during battle instead of just at the end of it.

[Kreistor]

BJBB! Seriously, put in a carriage return once in a while. Go back to your last and QUOTE it, and then try to figure out the paragraph edges. It's annoying! All those paragraphs combined into a single one.

Charlie even have a chief warlord? Maybe one of the archons fills that role? We know only a single unit type for Charlie's forces, and he seems to be doing all the commanding via the finger TVs.

Vinnie lists the advantages of a Chief Warlord in terms of bonuses to units alone. No, I don't think a Chief Warlord went to GK, but I think there's one sitting back in Charlescomm. To go without those bonuses seems a problem. And further, it looks to me like only the RUler and Chief Warlord can take a Turn. Without a CW, only Charlie could do that. It would be too much if Charlie had units in two different theatres at once.

The cast of characters lists "Heaving lightning" as a strength of the Archenhammer. But.... It lists "Taming Dwagons" for both Stanley and the Archenhammer. It's a shame the authors seem to make mistakes of context like this so often. The strip seems to make it clear that it's only his attunement to the 'Hammer that lets Stanley tame dwagons, and the cast of characters should not be listing this as a strength of both Stanley and the 'Hammer.

Hmmm... well, not necessarily. If taming dwagons still takes great effort and risks death, then no, it is also a skill. The Hammer permits it, but he has to best the dwagon himself. How much the hammer helps depends on how much better than the next better weapon available to him would be. IF the combat bonus from the Hammer isn't a lot better, then the hammer permits the taming, but it's Stanley doing the taming.

All indications are that casters pop as casters, and other units pop as their unit type.

No, Warlords can be raised or popped. Wanda dodged about herself, so maybe she didn't talk about Casters at all. Are casters popped, or do they run tests when looking to spend money on training a new one, finding the best of the untis already popped? We just don't know.

Sure, but we were talking about archons having no specific weakness. Shoving a piece of wood into the heart is fatal to mortals and vampires alike, but it is a special weakness of vampires only because they are for the most part invulnerable. A stake to the heart is the "paper" to the vampires "rock." Archons seem to be generally strong, with no specific weakness. Things that kill other units may also kill them, but there has been no demonstrated specific weakness to any attack form which isn't also effective against other units.

Please, let's not get into redefining vulnerability and weakness. Bogroll has a vulnerability to fire, even though other units die to fire. Why that word? Because a word had to be chosen. He's no more vulnerable than anyone else to fire, but it kills him where other things don't. Convention says vulnerability applies to fire used on trolls, so I'm sticking with the convention. Weakness the same argument.

It makes one wonder how casters manage to level, because most of their action would be in defending a city.

*shrug* If it matters, it will come up. That's a triviality I don't care about.

Oslecamo, I refuse to respond to you when you use that language.

[BillyJimBoBob]

We don't see how she mind raped Jillian.

We saw her cast from a scroll at the start of her "session." It was my take that the scroll was the influence spell, and the BDSM was their fun and games together repeating earlier fun and games they have shared.

They still had move remaining since they would need it to take the garrison if Charlie had decided to go trough with the attack. However they ended their turn and then later . The game probably has a contigency that if you moved during your turn then you can't move any more for the remaining of the day, even if you make a new alliance, to prevent cheesy tricks like the archons sudenly being able to attack togheter with the coaliton forces.

It does. You regain move at the start of your turn, and lose all remaining move when you end turn. So joining an alliance leaves you without move until your new alliance begins its turn on the following day.

Stronger spells need more time as far as we've seen. The super summoning spell took lots. Proper mind raping demands a prolonged sessions. Uncroackify dead troops is slow enough that it can't be done during battle. Otherwise mancers would indeed be invincible.

I can't agree here. Awakening the volcano was done on the RCC turn, and didn't seem to take much time. This is arguably the most potent work of magic we've seen in the strip. And casting the scroll on Jillian (or any scroll use) didn't seem to take much time, not that this was a particularly potent effect in any case.

Stanley is arrogant enough to just scream the name of the attack because he likes it. He likes to show off, and even dresses like KISS. Who said mancers were the only ones who got to talk fancy during battles?

Dressing the part seems to be a prerequisite of gaining a dace fight bonus. Stanley wasn't indulging his cosplay fetish or showing off, he was looking to stack combat bonuses.

[...] the hammer took the dance fighting of 3 cosplaying hobgobwins to charge up the hammer. Decidely not instant.

Specially because if it was a fast casting spell then Stanley would've used it in Jillian also! How do you explain that?

I'm not sure I agree that the dance fight is what charger the VdG, but it is true that potent abilities of several different units have not been used consistently.

BJBB! Seriously, put in a carriage return once in a while. Go back to your last and QUOTE it, and then try to figure out the paragraph edges. It's annoying! All those paragraphs combined into a single one.

The server is quite slow. I eliminate useless whitespace where I can. I write in the same format that you respond, I'm sorry if it's bothersome to you but I manage fine.

Vinnie lists the advantages of a Chief Warlord in terms of bonuses to units alone. No, I don't think a Chief Warlord went to GK, but I think there's one sitting back in Charlescomm.

Yeah, he's kinda got to have one, unless Charlie laid it off to cut costs. Or maybe it can't fly or teleport.

The Hammer permits it, but he has to best the dwagon himself.

Perhaps, but it taming dwagons isn't an innate ability of Stanleys then it shouldn't be listed as one of his strengths. Take away the hammer and he isn't taming anything.

No, Warlords can be raised or popped. Wanda dodged about herself, so maybe she didn't talk about Casters at all. Are casters popped, or do they run tests when looking to spend money on training a new one, finding the best of the untis already popped? We just don't know.

We know that Sizemore popped under Saline IV. You could speculate that Sizemore is a troop who was given magic training, but that wouldn't follow the RTS genre as well as just popping as a caster does.

Please, let's not get into redefining vulnerability and weakness. Bogroll has a vulnerability to fire, even though other units die to fire. Why that word? Because a word had to be chosen. He's no more vulnerable than anyone else to fire, but it kills him where other things don't. Convention says vulnerability applies to fire used on trolls, so I'm sticking with the convention. Weakness the same argument.

Um, this is supporting my definition. Bog roll doesn't have a "vulnerability" to fire, at least as shown in his stats. His weakness are "guile, comprehension, personal hygene." Fire just happens to be the paper to his rock.

[Kreistor]

The server is quite slow. I eliminate useless whitespace where I can. I write in the same format that you respond, I'm sorry if it's bothersome to you but I manage fine.

Ten CR's wouldn't even increase the bandwidth used by 1%. There's a lot of overhead beyond just our typing when someoone reads this. Cutting out huge chunks of text, yeah, that cuts down on bandwidth, but cutting out CXR's that are useful for those oyu are communicating with? That costs us 10x or more time than it costs you.

Perhaps, but it taming dwagons isn't an innate ability of Stanleys then it shouldn't be listed as one of his strengths. Take away the hammer and he isn't taming anything.

If the hammer attuned to Sizemore, would he be able to tame dwagons?Yes. Could he? No.

By your logic, humans have no unique strengths or weaknesses, for the most part. Michael Phelps, for instance, can't include "Swimming" as a strength because he actually learned how to swim well: it's not all innate. Sorry, that's clearly wrong. You can learn how to do something well and people will call it a strength. Or you can ignore something and it will become a weakness.

Um, this is supporting my definition. Bog roll doesn't have a "vulnerability" to fire, at least as shown in his stats. His weakness are "guile, comprehension, personal hygene." Fire just happens to be the paper to his rock.

Okay, so we'll call everything that can kill someone "paper", and we'll all understand what we mean. Until someone new comes along and we have to explain it to them, because they have no clue what you're talking about. When I'm in battle, I will call out, "THe twoll is vulnerable to fire," or "The twoll is weak to fire,", not "The twoll is rock to fire!"

Point is, we need a word to explain what can kill someone that is normally immune to everything else. We use vulnerable, because that's the word commonly understood to mean that. Just to make the point:

capable of or susceptible to being wounded or hurt, as by a weapon

Is Bagroll capable of being wounded by fire? Gee, yes. Does it mattert to the definition of vulnerable that he's not more damaged by fire than a human? No. Vulnerable is the correct word.