Schlock Mercenary VII: A T.A.D. Too Much Dialogue These Days

[factotum]

He knows Petey can do it

He *thinks* Petey can do it. He's probably wrong on that front--we've already seen from other strips that Petey is having trouble fighting the dark matter beasties from Andromeda since they've set up their own core generator now, and Petey's comment in today's strip reinforces that.

[tonberrian]

I think we're about to see why having the core mind of an AI gestalt be one that was originally totally insane is a bad idea.

[ryuplaneswalker]

I think we're about to see why having the core mind of an AI gestalt be one that was originally totally insane is a bad idea.

Alternatively Petey is angry, I don't think we have seen Petey truly angry ever have we? it is understandable why he is angry too because he put himself in a position where he couldn't save one of his best friends because he was saving a bunch of children who were unable to share and are about to make that sacrifice completely pointless..by not being able to share again.

[eschmenk]

I think we're about to see why having the core mind of an AI gestalt be one that was originally totally insane is a bad idea.

If you are talking about Petey, I don't. I'm not even seeing signs that Petey is going beyond acting annoyed. Given that Admiral Needsacomb was apparently endangering the lives of many people in addition to himself by being both stupid and obstinate and Petey had already tried begging, I can't blame him for showing a little annoyance. It was appropriate for the situation and apparently necessary, too. At the moment, Petey seems to be getting what he was after, after all.

I think Petey's apparent emotional response would have been perfectly appropriate even if Kaff hadn't been killed.

[Wayson]

Alternatively Petey is angry, I don't think we have seen Petey truly angry ever have we? it is understandable why he is angry too because he put himself in a position where he couldn't save one of his best friends because he was saving a bunch of children who were unable to share and are about to make that sacrifice completely pointless..by not being able to share again.

I'm wondering if this might be the tipping point that pushes Petey from being a benevolent deity concerned with minimizing casualties into becoming... something else. I'm not going to say 'omnicidal' yet, because it'll probably take a while to work up to that point, but I could see him deciding that the galaxy needs a firm hand at the helm, and since none of the slow organics are up to the task, they'll all bend the knee to him.

[eschmenk]

He *thinks* Petey can do it. He's probably wrong on that front--we've already seen from other strips that Petey is having trouble fighting the dark matter beasties from Andromeda since they've set up their own core generator now, and Petey's comment in today's strip reinforces that.

Nah, it would be trivial for Petey to meddle with the UNS. Just as an example Admiral Needsacomb was already angry because Petey had infiltrated his TAC room and was bothering him, so imagine how upset he would be if Petey started broadcasting the conversation over the hypernet so everyone in the galaxy could join in. Petey wouldn't need to do something on the scale of moving ORSI to make the Admiral's day be even worse than it already was.

Since Admiral Needsacomb thinks that Petey is annoying even when Petey isn't trying to be annoying, it would have been stupid of him to sarcastically challenge Petey to do things that would annoy him even more.

[ryuplaneswalker]

I'm wondering if this might be the tipping point that pushes Petey from being a benevolent deity concerned with minimizing casualties into becoming... something else. I'm not going to say 'omnicidal' yet, because it'll probably take a while to work up to that point, but I could see him deciding that the galaxy needs a firm hand at the helm, and since none of the slow organics are up to the task, they'll all bend the knee to him.

Na, if anything Petey would just pack it up say "You crazy nutters are on your own."

[The Glyphstone]

Probably not coincidental, but the last time Kevyn was in charge, Tagon was also dead. I guess 'Chief Mad Scientist' translates to 'First Officer' in the Tough's chain of command.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Probably not coincidental, but the last time Kevyn was in charge, Tagon was also dead. I guess 'Chief Mad Scientist' translates to 'First Officer' in the Tough's chain of command.

Seniority. Also, last time he hated the job so much he broke physics to get Tagon back in command, so here's hoping.

GW

[eschmenk]

New comic

Did Broken Wind not bother keeping Cindercone informed, or did Cindercone withhold the information from Kevyn? It would be a good idea for the senior officer for the company to know that he's now the senior officer and needs to start making the big decisions! And when will Kevyn learn that Broken Wind has no crew on board? If no one bothered to tell Kevyn that Karl was unfit for duty and that he needed to take over, I doubt they would have told Kevyn about the other stuff.

Nice way to start off being in charge of the entire company. "Because I kind of want to pack up and go home." That should really help Flinders with her confidence.

One more thing, why the hell was Flinders surprised that Kevyn was highest ranking officer remaining and he would take charge of the company for now? She used to be competent.

[NEO|Phyte]

Not sure how many people in this thread threw money at the Planet Mercenary kickstarter, but looks like backer PDFs on the 70 maxims book got sent out. Looking forward to the dead tree edition, though reading through the version with in-universe annotations is making me kinda sad that they couldn't find a way to make it work and opted to remove them for the final product.

[factotum]

Not sure how many people in this thread threw money at the Planet Mercenary kickstarter, but looks like backer PDFs on the 70 maxims book got sent out. Looking forward to the dead tree edition, though reading through the version with in-universe annotations is making me kinda sad that they couldn't find a way to make it work and opted to remove them for the final product.

My concern is that the dead tree version is going to be, well, a bit skimpy without the handwritten annotations. The maxims themselves aren't very long, and the "scholarly" analysis at the bottom of each page is barely a paragraph at best. The handwritten notes are what really make the book, IMHO.

[ryuplaneswalker]

Probably not coincidental, but the last time Kevyn was in charge, Tagon was also dead. I guess 'Chief Mad Scientist' translates to 'First Officer' in the Tough's chain of command.

Who else is crazy enough to be in charge of Schlock, It takes a Badass like Tagon, someone crazy enough to shell his own position like Tagon Sr..or someone crazy enough to wear anti matter grenades on his shoulders.

[eschmenk]

Who else is crazy enough to be in charge of Schlock, It takes a Badass like Tagon, someone crazy enough to shell his own position like Tagon Sr..or someone crazy enough to wear anti matter grenades on his shoulders.

Murtaugh just bribed Schlock to obey her. (I thought that was pretty weak.) That was the time when the Toughs accompanied they balloons to Earth as security and a civil war almost broke out. Karl, Kaff and Kevyn didn't go, so Murtaugh was in charge of Schlock. Yes, she would have been under Karl at the time, but Murtaugh seemed to be operating very independently, rather than Karl being involved.

[factotum]

You know, I'm not really convinced about this plan of Petey's. For a start, if he's going to blast Uli-Oa into expensive gravel with relativistic impactors, a lot of said expensive gravel will be either vapourised or travelling out of the system at high speed and thus quite hard to recover.

[HandofShadows]

Making it harder to recover might be the point. They would be out all over the place picking up the expensive gravel is still easier than getting killed fighting.

[eschmenk]

You know, I'm not really convinced about this plan of Petey's. For a start, if he's going to blast Uli-Oa into expensive gravel with relativistic impactors, a lot of said expensive gravel will be either vapourised or travelling out of the system at high speed and thus quite hard to recover.

If you change "easier" to "more rewarding," I would agree with HandofShadows. That said, I'm beginning to wonder about Petey. He already knew Kaff was dead and given the jokes about how fast he processes things, he should have been through all the stages of grief already. Has he been dumbed-down, too?

In any case, I think that Petey is probably making a mistake. The control unit is probably too valuable to be destroyed. It's possible that Petey is just playing dumb and has plans to make off with the control unit when everyone is gone and no one is looking, but I doubt it.

[ryuplaneswalker]

You know, I'm not really convinced about this plan of Petey's. For a start, if he's going to blast Uli-Oa into expensive gravel with relativistic impactors, a lot of said expensive gravel will be either vapourised or travelling out of the system at high speed and thus quite hard to recover.

I think he just wants to throw more rocks at the people who killed Tagon.

[eschmenk]

I think he just wants to throw more rocks at the people who killed Tagon.

His aim is way off then.

(OK, at least one of them was left behind.)

[smuchmuch]

And here I though it was "publish or perish"

[McDouggal]

Went through a black hole.

Or a sun.

I'm not sure which, but black hole seems more likely.

[memnarch]

I bet it's the DMEs again.

[eschmenk]

I'm not sure which, but black hole seems more likely.

Even though it would have had to come back out again?

I stopped reading SM for a while, so I don't know the answer to this: Was a DME attack ruled out for some reason? A DME attack would be the first thing I would think of. Unless it was ruled out, it should be the first thing Dana and Foxworthy should have thought of, too, of course. But they didn't say that they assumed it was a DME attack. Why not?

Another idea would be some sort of an accident.

Added: memnarch Ninja'ed me a bit.

[factotum]

I'm not sure DMEs can actually *create* massive gravitational gradients, can they? They'd surely be a lot less sensitive to other people using gravy around them if they could do it themselves.

[guttering flame]

I stopped reading SM for a while, so I don't know the answer to this: Was a DME attack ruled out for some reason? A DME attack would be the first thing I would think of. Unless it was ruled out, it should be the first thing Dana and Foxworthy should have thought of, too, of course. But they didn't say that they assumed it was a DME attack. Why not?

The baloonoid culture devoted vast efforts to hide from the DME from what I recall. That's why they made so much trasuranic material. Maybe they also had a pact of mutual nonaggression with them?

My pet theory: faulty engineering made the structure collapse when overstressed.

They'd surely be a lot less sensitive to other people using gravy around them if they could do it themselves.

It's wormholes they're sensitive to. It's a weaponized acupuncture to them

[eschmenk]

I'm not sure DMEs can actually *create* massive gravitational gradients, can they? They'd surely be a lot less sensitive to other people using gravy around them if they could do it themselves.

That's how they fight. And as guttering flame said, they seem to be hurt by wormholes. That's why TADs and teraporting hurt them.

The baloonoid culture devoted vast efforts to hide from the DME from what I recall. That's why they made so much trasuranic material. Maybe they also had a pact of mutual nonaggression with them?

They were at war with them. If there was a treaty of nonaggression, why would they need to hide from them?

[HandofShadows]

Well, now we have a very good guess at what happened to Uli-Oa. Dark Matter Beasties. And that comes as zero surprise to me. The Offans build the Can Full of Sky with the clear intent of hiding from the DME and if you notice even the Robo Faries are "built" in a way to avoid detection from the DME's (and "programed" not to use Annie Plant's).

[Kornaki]

Another audience insert in the comic. Howard, you know she's talking to you, right?

[eschmenk]

and if you notice even the Robo Faries are "built" in a way to avoid detection from the DME's (and "programed" not to use Annie Plant's).

The robo-faries are from the Pereri system, not Uli-Oa. One clan of them happened to find and colonize Uli-Oa presumably long after the DMEs destroyed it. How could they be relevant to the DMEs attacking Uli-Oa so much earlier?

The Wing Commander tried to steal Broken Wind, Cindercone and Gift Horse and take them to the Pereri system -- the home of the Esspies. He was successful with Gift Horse. That's why it's no longer there.

I stopped reading SM for a while, so I don't know the answer to this: Was a DME attack ruled out for some reason? A DME attack would be the first thing I would think of. Unless it was ruled out, it should be the first thing Dana and Foxworthy should have thought of, too, of course. But they didn't say that they assumed it was a DME attack. Why not?

We have our answer: They were just acting stupid, like so many other characters.

Another audience insert in the comic. Howard, you know she's talking to you, right?

Yeah, that was especially ironic after all the big x is big updates.

[tonberrian]

And now we know why this is unusual.