Schlock Mercenary III: One million years of crowdsourced kitten videos

[Coidzor]

I'm the opposite there...don't mind the coins existing in real life; heck, Howard makes his living off his webcomic and he's perfectly at liberty to do so in any way he sees fit. I just found it smacked a bit of greed to include them in the comic as well, particularly since the Kickstarter for the coins had already made its target many times over by the time they were introduced.

I should clarify that I'm embarrassed at them having existed in real life military history rather than them being part of his merch.

[Fjolnir]

Methinks para is a little higher in rank than we previously thought.

[NEO|Phyte]

Methinks para is a little higher in rank than we previously thought.

What part of "This gunboat is hers. Her word here is law." was unclear?

[The Glyphstone]

Unless Fjolnir was talking about her actual (former) rank, in IntAffInt. It sounds like she's got command experience, or else spent enough time around people who did to fake it accurately and competently - moreso than she would have gotten the chance to around the Toughs.

[Fjolnir]

Glyphstone is right on the money there, I was talking actual, classified rank rather than her nebulous position within the company here.

[Cikomyr]

... man Para suddenly becomes sexier when she stops being a little girl.

[sihnfahl]

... man Para suddenly becomes sexier when she stops being a little girl.

Which, of course, was her cover. She has no need for her 'cover' now. Secret's out. And she's been pressed to duty.

[Coidzor]

... man Para suddenly becomes sexier when she stops being a little girl.

Never could stand grown-ass women putting on that facade myself, haha.

[BRC]

You know, I think Bristlecone has been the only time the Tough's have been pressed for space.

Normally the Toughs are a small company with a disproportionately powerful Warship. Even the Serial Peacemaker (Which, mind you, was a LONGBOAT of the PDCL) had more than enough room for everybody.

The Bristlecone does not have enough bunksfor a fraction of the Company. And it's a Gunship, not a proper Battleship like the Touch-And-Go.

So, I doubt we'll be seeing TAGII-style Orbital Artillery support. We're not sure if the Bristlecone has a Fabber onboard (my guess is no). They do have a Robotics Bay, so it's possible Para might be able to rig up some sort of heavy equipment.
Now, lets look at the command structure.
Para is joining as a Coxswain, which is more like a job than a rank. The Bristlecone listens to her, and "On this ship her word is law".

I very much doubt Karl Tagon is going to be assuming Command anytime soon, this is Kaff's circus. Karl will end up somewhere in the Chain of Command, perhaps filling the role vacated by Thurl.

[Cikomyr]

Which, of course, was her cover. She has no need for her 'cover' now. Secret's out. And she's been pressed to duty.

Do we know how old she really is?

And I don't think the part where she got scared in the middle of a firefight was part of the cover.

[factotum]

And I don't think the part where she got scared in the middle of a firefight was part of the cover.

Given she's in the middle of an anxiety attack in the current strip, I don't think it was part of her cover either. I think she actually *is* very young, barely more than a girl, and she's not temperamentally suited to being a field agent. Presumably IntAffInt only chose her to be one because of her genius with computers and robots.

[NEO|Phyte]

They've admittedly been shown to not be the brightest batch of knives in the toolshed, but I suspect that anxiety attacks would be one of those things that would get you disqualified for field work.

[The Glyphstone]

Well, so much for that theory. She was just cheating again.

[HandofShadows]

Well as an agent Para was not supposed to do much of anything. Just gather intel on what the Toughs were up to. And really she was helping the Toughs more than she was spying on them. It was this expansion of what she was doing that got her in trouble. And PTSD is not something that you can antisipate happening.

[BRC]

Well as an agent Para was not supposed to do much of anything. Just gather intel on what the Toughs were up to. And really she was helping the Toughs more than she was spying on them. It was this expansion of what she was doing that got her in trouble. And PTSD is not something that you can antisipate happening.

Yeah.

Remember, Para's job was supposed to be to stay on the Warship in the Robotics bay and occasionally send in reports.It's a low-cost, low-risk assignment as benefits a low-priority target like the Toughs. Para probably wasn't even properly trained by UNS Int-Aff-Int (besides apparently getting some fancy dental work and learning a few codes), since all she had to do was do her job for the Toughs and occasionally send off some encrypted emails.

It's not even like she was really betraying the Toughs (She was in that she was reporting to somebody else). UNS Int-Aff-Int was not their enemy, so there was no real conflict of interest. And if she DID get caught, UNS IAI does not lose very much. As has been established, she has no information worth giving up about her Employers (They'll kill her on general principle). If she gets taken down all they lose is a plant in a tiny mercenary company with a disproportionate impact on galactic events.

She's not a hardboiled secret agent superspy. She's an engineer with a side job.

[Squark]

As I understand it, the process went;

1) Fan suggests idea for merchandise.
2) Howard does research, and gets excited about the idea
3) Howard has an idea for how to use them as a plot point

I will agree the execution here probably could have been better; As is, this has seemed less like characterization for Murtgah and setting up a plot point and more like product placement. Browsing around their forums, though, that doesn't seem to have been his intent, though.

[guttering flame]

I forget, who is this old, bald fellow

[factotum]

I forget, who is this old, bald fellow

The chap in front is a member of the urbana parkatsu troupe that (until recently) were performing at Mall-One. The one behind is General Karl Tagon.

[HandofShadows]

I wonder what she is up to though.

[factotum]

You know, I'm beginning to wonder if the Toughs are actually ever going to run into something that DOESN'T turn out to be an ancient artifact hidden as something else...

[HandofShadows]

I wonder if the ship knows the truth about how old it is? Or maybe the ship might be really old, but the AI isn't.

[Cikomyr]

Oh man, I just did a complete archive trawl since the first moon mission (yes, before they even got Petey). Big story...


I think, after a YEAR of discovering Ventura's background, I finally understood the ramifications of her assignment with the Toughs.

But first, look at this strip, you learn USN Int agents use a Aunt Amy Uncle Bob code.

Easy to miss on the first reading, this strip forebodes something about Ventura

And here, Ventura arranged compensation for the creation of Tarnation and the liberation of Brinecone. No idea where she got the money..


Anyway. Going back to my initial point; the ramifications. Ventura is part of Internal Affair Intelligence; which is meant to investigate USN's executive branches for potential sedition.

Question: Thus, why was she appointed with the Toughs?

Answer: Because IAI suspected USN Fleet of seditious activity; like the Laz'R'us project, and they also suspected the Toughs of being more involved in this than the USN Fleet initially reported (especially since the Toughs have had dealings with EVERYBODY involved in the Laz'R'us project). Having an agent in the Toughs provided a different angle of Intel Gathering on the Fleet.

[guttering flame]

And here, Ventura arranged compensation for the creation of Tarnation and the liberation of Brinecone.

It's more likely it's Petey

[NEO|Phyte]

It's more likely it's Petey

Unless Bristlecone was mislead, we know it was intaffint that provided the cash.

[guttering flame]

Unless Bristlecone was mislead, we know it was intaffint that provided the cash.

So why would they do it?

[NEO|Phyte]

So why would they do it?

Because someone with the authority to authorize a funds transfer owed Para a favor.

[guttering flame]

Because someone with the authority to authorize a funds transfer owed Para a favor.

Maybe they figured they needed people (and ships!) who owed them favors in Tagon's Toughs. I don't really buy the Para angle. She's not that high in the organization and how charitable is she anyway. This looks like a cover story to me.

[Lizard Lord]

Maybe they figured they needed people (and ships!) who owed them favors in Tagon's Toughs. I don't really buy the Para angle. She's not that high in the organization and how charitable is she anyway. This looks like a cover story to me.

Para gets a warship that is devoted to her and has someone use cash so she can keep it without being hounded by the authorities. What's charitable about that?

IntAffInt most likely paid for it becuase the process of Para being hounded by the authorities could reveal their secret. Also it is possible that, after he hack, Para can't return Bristlecone because it won't take orders from anyone else.

[Wayson]

I thought it was made relatively clear that it was IntAffInt who bought Bristlecone.

Back when we were still debating whether Para was a plant or not, I noted here that she had 'friends with lots of regulatory and fiscal authority' (see link in post). That was in reference to the Tarbots, but apparently the 'generous compensation' was enough to raise both Murtagh's eyebrows and prompt some strong language. Stands to reason that if Para had access to funds of that scale, it wouldn't be a great stretch to buy a 600-year-old gunship.

[Cikomyr]

With today's comic, I am starting to think I understand the whole company coin thing.

Methink Howard got himself a military consultant so the characters in his comic have behavior more in line with the military's.

Think about the increase of genuine military lingo we've been introduced to recently:

- Company coin
- Coxswain
- Adjutant
- Squad names