GrrlPower III: Crisis Of Infinite Filler Comics

[Traab]

I suppose but we also know max hasnt gone all out against her shield yet, which means we still cant be sure if it DOES have to be someone as strong as her to break it. I mean, she tanked an angry vehemence hit, but that was before he achieved his ultimate form AND he didnt want to kill anyone. (Until max blew his arm off) We dont know how close or far her shield was from breaking. All they know is what its survived so far and that again, so far sydney cant feel anything from her shield denoting strain. Does that mean that its like an mma fighter blocking hits from a 5 year old in that it would take something truly MASSIVE to push her limits there? Is her shield a nonsentient achilles, and totally unbreakable? or does she just not know how to scan her shield strength and know how close to failue it is? For all we know, it can tank say... ten shots. Any ten hits of any magnitude, then it needs to be refreshed.

Of course, if we go with the space ship analogy they were working with before, this may be a shield meant to tank micrometeors at potentially near relativistic speeds. So yeah anything short of a tunguska incident is unlikely to breach it.

[lord_khaine]

That was the point, Max did give the shield a decent workout, enough i would say to let her eventually work in the field alongside the rest of the team. When Max, Hiro or Stalvart jumps down to soak an attack they also have to hope they are actually tough enough to handle it. Since they cant stress test their down defence.. and since attacks usually dont come with a practical power labeling anyway.

New comic
Bwahaah! omg.. "Hey Look, Succubi!! guys i think i know why we were summoned!"
Dam the fact the tentacles were sapient kinda cracked me up..

[fionabell]

I will definitely join these discussions)

[Spamotron]

That's pretty clever of Wyrmil. What kind of barrier could Maxima just not blast through in a couple of seconds? A sapient non-hostile one. It also reflects well on Max that she didn't just judge by appearances and took a moment to check.

[Leewei]

ARC is called in to help when Sciona breaks into a vault containing a large number of nasty magical artifacts. So far, so good.

Sciona backstabs Wyrmril and Coot (and multiple others?) to get the item she wants.

Deus shows up, twirls his imaginary moustache, then picks through what's left after Sciona gets the item she wants and restores herself.

So far, so good.

ARC's agents investigate a room where the walls are spattered with gore with no biohazard precautions taken. Sidney will eventually blunder into a pool of "scab oatmeal", getting it into her eyes and mouth, as well as other exposure. This one is entirely on Maxima. It is entirely foreseeable.

The Twilight Council recognizes bits of Wyrmril in the room. Sydney discovers Coot, an apparently normal human, alive and unharmed in the room. Naturally, the Council and ARC see fit to put this guy alone in a room with Dabbler to pump him for information (yes, a double entendre; ya got me). Dabbler ends up nearly embedded in the room's observation glass. Why did nobody immediately suspect that Coot was something other than human?!

WyrmCoot gets away due to a chatty wall of tentacles. This is admittedly funny, but it also illustrates the problem with GrrlPower. Plot always takes the back seat to humor to the point where plotlines stretch needlessly out over several months. We now have three loose ends, ignoring Sydney's likely exposure to hepatitis and other blood-borne diseases. Sciona is running free, Deus has a bunch of artifacts, and WyrmCoot is at large.

[lord_khaine]

That's pretty clever of Wyrmil. What kind of barrier could Maxima just not blast through in a couple of seconds? A sapient non-hostile one. It also reflects well on Max that she didn't just judge by appearances and took a moment to check.

Well its just as much a question of Max being wisely cautious with any of the stuff found down in the vault. She were in a really sensitive location. And did not know what blasting the weird thing would even do.

ARC's agents investigate a room where the walls are spattered with gore with no biohazard precautions taken. Sidney will eventually blunder into a pool of "scab oatmeal", getting it into her eyes and mouth, as well as other exposure. This one is entirely on Maxima. It is entirely foreseeable.

It is gore though, not radioactive waste. And they are a 1000 meter beneath the ocean, how long do you think it would take to get hold of biohazard suits? As such, take care to clean your boots after your done walking on it is entirely reasonable, and no it is not foreseable that Sydney will fall into a crack in the floor thats filled with blood.

The Twilight Council recognizes bits of Wyrmril in the room. Sydney discovers Coot, an apparently normal human, alive and unharmed in the room. Naturally, the Council and ARC see fit to put this guy alone in a room with Dabbler to pump him for information (yes, a double entendre; ya got me). Dabbler ends up nearly embedded in the room's observation glass. Why did nobody immediately suspect that Coot was something other than human?!

Why should they do so? Wyrmil looked very death for a start, and Coot were very obviously a completely normal human. All the same they took a row of very reasonable precations, like strapping him to the chair, or leaving him under the eyes of Archons 2nd most powerful member.

WyrmCoot gets away due to a chatty wall of tentacles. This is admittedly funny, but it also illustrates the problem with GrrlPower. Plot always takes the back seat to humor to the point where plotlines stretch needlessly out over several months. We now have three loose ends, ignoring Sydney's likely exposure to hepatitis and other blood-borne diseases. Sciona is running free, Deus has a bunch of artifacts, and WyrmCoot is at large.

And of course the comic regularly needs to spawn off side plots. If it does not then it runs the risk of getting liniar and boring.

[Celestia]

And of course the comic regularly needs to spawn off side plots. If it does not then it runs the risk of getting liniar and boring.

Lolwat? This isn't a video game. Unless your argument is that it should be a choose your own adventure comic, then it is necessarily linear. In a story format, you can't follow multiple threads without it becoming bloated and/or confusing.

[Traab]

ARC is called in to help when Sciona breaks into a vault containing a large number of nasty magical artifacts. So far, so good.

Sciona backstabs Wyrmril and Coot (and multiple others?) to get the item she wants.

Deus shows up, twirls his imaginary moustache, then picks through what's left after Sciona gets the item she wants and restores herself.

So far, so good.

ARC's agents investigate a room where the walls are spattered with gore with no biohazard precautions taken. Sidney will eventually blunder into a pool of "scab oatmeal", getting it into her eyes and mouth, as well as other exposure. This one is entirely on Maxima. It is entirely foreseeable.

The Twilight Council recognizes bits of Wyrmril in the room. Sydney discovers Coot, an apparently normal human, alive and unharmed in the room. Naturally, the Council and ARC see fit to put this guy alone in a room with Dabbler to pump him for information (yes, a double entendre; ya got me). Dabbler ends up nearly embedded in the room's observation glass. Why did nobody immediately suspect that Coot was something other than human?!

WyrmCoot gets away due to a chatty wall of tentacles. This is admittedly funny, but it also illustrates the problem with GrrlPower. Plot always takes the back seat to humor to the point where plotlines stretch needlessly out over several months. We now have three loose ends, ignoring Sydney's likely exposure to hepatitis and other blood-borne diseases. Sciona is running free, Deus has a bunch of artifacts, and WyrmCoot is at large.

How is a portal of blood in the floor for her to fall into totally foreseeable? Im pretty sure her instructions, which she has followed, involved, "Dont touch anything" She didnt touch anything, she was being silly with her noooope move and fell into something NOONE realized until then was more than a big blood puddle. At worst she should have had to wipe off her shoes. Not fallen into the deep end of the blood slurry pool.

As far as coot goes, as was said, they restrained him and put him up against the second strongest member of the team. There really wasnt a safer way to interrogate him quickly. Which they kinda needed to do because they dont really have time to waste.

If nothing but story advancing stuff took place, it wouldnt be much of a comic. Its pretty obvious this is meant to be a humorous webcomic as well as an interesting twist on the superhero genre. As far as loose ends goes, you kinda need those if a story is supposed to be more than a star trek tng episode a day show where nothing matters past the end of the chapter because nothing changes. So you cant just wrap everything up in a neat package otherwise there is nothing to link to the next chapter. Wyroot (That is his new name, so it is declared) will likely go on a revenge bender against sciona since they both got screwed over. Deus is clearly a long term plot line since archon has no freaking clue he is even on the board as a bad guy instead of being an annoying rich backer of the group. As for sydney, meh, they have a super healer back home. Im sure she will be fine. So really you only have ONE dangling plot line, the deus one, while the sciona one is just continuing the main story arc for this chapter. And unless sydney develops some magical super disease, thats not going to take more than a handful of comics to deal with at best. Her getting healed and whatever humor gets included as its already established she tends to set off the doc really easy.

[halfeye]

I'm still not seeing why Maxima didn't just push through these tentacles, they may be gross, but she'd be in contact with them for a tenth of a second or so.

[lord_khaine]

Lolwat? This isn't a video game. Unless your argument is that it should be a choose your own adventure comic, then it is necessarily linear. In a story format, you can't follow multiple threads without it becoming bloated and/or confusing.

Yes. This is not a video game. Its something thats really easy to tell for most people. The lack of control over what happens in the story is the main clue. I dont see any relevance towards my comment though.
And it can be that you find multiple plot threads confusing, but thats not a general rule. Its just your preference. I find a story boring when it dont have more than one thing going on beneath the surface.

I'm still not seeing why Maxima didn't just push through these tentacles, they may be gross, but she'd be in contact with them for a tenth of a second or so.

Because Maxima is smart. She knew those tentacles were from a unknown place. She had no idea about how dangerous they are. Its the same way you dont touch a live wire to see how much power there is running though it, if you can avoid it.

[Leewei]

How is a portal of blood in the floor for her to fall into totally foreseeable?

This is Sydney we're talking about. She can't be trusted to keep a spicy noodle out of her eye, let alone the gore dripping from the ceiling of a room. Another poster mentioned a hazmat suit. Sydney had no business being inside that vault, even with one. She should have been using the tele-orb.

Putting Dabbler with Coot wasn't a complete blunder, but why was anyone the slightest bit surprised when the tentacle arm happened?

If nothing but story advancing stuff took place, it wouldnt be much of a comic

We're at the other extreme, though. The fight with Vehemence took around a year of real time to resolve. We're working through the aftermath of a heist being plotted in June 1 of this year -- six real months ago!

[Traab]

This is Sydney we're talking about. She can't be trusted to keep a spicy noodle out of her eye, let alone the gore dripping from the ceiling of a room. Another poster mentioned a hazmat suit. Sydney had no business being inside that vault, even with one. She should have been using the tele-orb.

Putting Dabbler with Coot wasn't a complete blunder, but why was anyone the slightest bit surprised when the tentacle arm happened?


We're at the other extreme, though. The fight with Vehemence took around a year of real time to resolve. We're working through the aftermath of a heist being plotted in June 1 of this year -- six real months ago!

Teleorb from where? If she had been separated from the archon/council crew its just as possible for her to fall into a trap or be captured while away from everyone else. Keeping her right there nearby maxima and everyone else at least provides SOME chance of stopping her from going "oooh shiny! and activating the vaults self destruct. Also, sydney is there because its the only way maxima could reach the vault without calling for favors from the council. Here is where we see max saying "Uh no recruit, you cant come" "Oh dangit, we need to let her come or else this political garbage will start up"

[BannedInSchool]

I've got no problem with the "plot" here being something that just happens along the way from gag to gag myself. *shrug*

[Leewei]

Teleorb from where? If she had been separated from the archon/council crew its just as possible for her to fall into a trap or be captured while away from everyone else.

From just outside the room, safe inside her forcefield.

[Forum Explorer]

From just outside the room, safe inside her forcefield.

What a waste of someone who has the most powerful Truesight that Dabbler, an intergalactic succubi illusionist, has ever seen.

For all her spazziness, Sydney is insanely useful in pretty much any situation. Did Sciona leave behind an assassin or trap? Sydney's shield can protect all of the non-combat VIPs easily. Is there a locked door in the way? Teleorb to look through it. A poisonous gas? Life Support Orb. Illusions/magical glyphs? True Sight Orb.

Not to mention that Sydney does pull her crap together when things get serious. She's already proven herself quite capable in a fight, and to have a reasonable sense of priorities. So really, there isn't a good reason to leave her behind.

[Leewei]

For all her spazziness, Sydney is insanely useful in pretty much any situation.

Sydney's a wild card. Most of the time, she just herps the derp. Sometimes, she herps the derp and stumbles upon a sinister plot. Rarely, Sydney herps no derps at all, and is very useful. I enjoy these moments a lot. The near-constant herpderping is the problem.

Did Sciona leave behind an assassin or trap? Sydney's shield can protect all of the non-combat VIPs easily. Is there a locked door in the way? Teleorb to look through it. A poisonous gas? Life Support Orb. Illusions/magical glyphs? True Sight Orb.

The VIPs should probably not have been there, either. Sciona had subverted a major defense of the vault. She could have conceivably done the same with other defenses. The VIPs could have been outside with Sydney, possibly enjoying the force orb's protection.

The rest of this just reinforces my point of Sydney scouting the room using the teleorb rather than risking personal exposure to biological agents, traps, or hidden enemies.

Not to mention that Sydney does pull her crap together when things get serious. She's already proven herself quite capable in a fight, and to have a reasonable sense of priorities. So really, there isn't a good reason to leave her behind.

Sciona got the drop on her once, very recently. (Sydney's orbs actually got her into that mess.) She is still barely a recruit, and is quite human with human frailties. She should have been instructed to stay out of that room and teleorb in, or else to keep her forcefield active at all times while in the room.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Or just fly so as not to be touching anything. Which would have at least kept her out of the bloodpool.

And now I have a name for the next villain in our street-level supers game. Bonus!

[-D-]

Can I just stop the Sydney derp discussion, to talk about the true derp of the series - crosseyed characters.


I mean, whenever I see them, I imagine they prefix their lines with a HERP or a DERP.

[Traab]

Sydney's a wild card. Most of the time, she just herps the derp. Sometimes, she herps the derp and stumbles upon a sinister plot. Rarely, Sydney herps no derps at all, and is very useful. I enjoy these moments a lot. The near-constant herpderping is the problem.

The VIPs should probably not have been there, either. Sciona had subverted a major defense of the vault. She could have conceivably done the same with other defenses. The VIPs could have been outside with Sydney, possibly enjoying the force orb's protection.

The rest of this just reinforces my point of Sydney scouting the room using the teleorb rather than risking personal exposure to biological agents, traps, or hidden enemies.

Sciona got the drop on her once, very recently. (Sydney's orbs actually got her into that mess.) She is still barely a recruit, and is quite human with human frailties. She should have been instructed to stay out of that room and teleorb in, or else to keep her forcefield active at all times while in the room.

She mainly only herp derps in scenarios where there isnt anything immediately dire going on. She does have the protag power of stumbling over huge discoveries. She is generally competent in any serious scenario or at the very least isnt in the way. Like here, she herp derped a bit with the blood pool because there was nothing for her to do so she was trying to keep herself amused in a charnel house. As for the vips, they kinda had to be there. They are the only ones who know anything about whats inside the vault. They are REALLY not stupid enough to open the door, provide maxima with a fully annotated list of whats inside and what they do and tell her to figure it out, they will be outside playing poker with sydney. They need to see whats missing, so they know what they can still keep secret from archon. Also need to make sure nothing else accidentally wanders off in her pockets if max goes in alone. Lets put mystical artifacts of doom aside, wells fargo isnt going to let an outside security force into their BANK VAULT alone without a manager or two being present to keep an eye on things, why would the council do anything less for something far more dangerous and valuable?

As for her orbs, keep in mind several things. One, the teleorb is supposed to be classified. She really shouldnt be using it at all in mixed company, certainly not giving away all its abilities. Secondly, she cant keep her shield up at all times. The air runs out. Therefore aside from perhaps walking into the room shielded, there is little benefit to keeping it up as full time as possible.

[Forum Explorer]

Sydney's a wild card. Most of the time, she just herps the derp. Sometimes, she herps the derp and stumbles upon a sinister plot. Rarely, Sydney herps no derps at all, and is very useful. I enjoy these moments a lot. The near-constant herpderping is the problem.

The VIPs should probably not have been there, either. Sciona had subverted a major defense of the vault. She could have conceivably done the same with other defenses. The VIPs could have been outside with Sydney, possibly enjoying the force orb's protection.

The rest of this just reinforces my point of Sydney scouting the room using the teleorb rather than risking personal exposure to biological agents, traps, or hidden enemies.

Sciona got the drop on her once, very recently. (Sydney's orbs actually got her into that mess.) She is still barely a recruit, and is quite human with human frailties. She should have been instructed to stay out of that room and teleorb in, or else to keep her forcefield active at all times while in the room.

I don't mind the constant help-derping, but I still stand by my thought that Sydney is a human kender.

Maybe they should have, but Maxima is not part of the council. They aren't going to let Archon take full control of this investigation, particularly when it's dealing with something that's very much theirs. They will accompany Maxima into the vault for the same reason Maxima had Sydney come along. Because while they might be allies with each other, political oneupmanship and shows of power are very much a thing for both groups.

Like Traab said, the Orb is classified. And like I was saying, the Council might be allies with Archon, but they aren't friends. Maxima doesn't want the Council knowing exactly what Sydney can do. Which in this case is very wise considering that there is at least one traitor on the Council.

[John Campbell]

Secondly, she cant keep her shield up at all times. The air runs out.

Not anymore.

[Forum Explorer]

Not anymore.

Maybe because it was Traab who said that and not me?

[HandofShadows]

Wha...

Ok, I just...

Spoiler

Show

Having it... er him hang out at the Archon HQ? I can see why they didn't attack though. Trent is sentient and decidedly non hostile.

[Leewei]

I don't mind the constant help-derping, but I still stand by my thought that Sydney is a human kender.

I agree with the Kender idea. In the original DragonLance Chronicles, the Kender were loathed by much of the fan base for their Chaotic Stupid tendencies. In case it isn't obvious, I'm in the "Kender Are Too Dumb to Live" camp.

As an aside, I hated Jar Jar in the Star Wars prequels. I can still accept that he was there for kids to enjoy and relate to. Similar ineptitude just doesn't work well in a webcomic featuring succubi and gore-drenched magical vaults.

Back to the teleorb: If Sydney cannot use this for any contrived reason, she simply should not enter a room soaking in biohazardous once-human jelly. Given her abilities, placing her nearby to help in an emergency is ideal.

[JeenLeen]

Can someone explain the "no unitasker' line at the end of the comic?
I don't really get who is supposed to be saying it or what it means, though I guess it's in contrast to 'multitaskers' like the tentacles would be.

[tyckspoon]

Can someone explain the "no unitasker' line at the end of the comic?
I don't really get who is supposed to be saying it or what it means, though I guess it's in contrast to 'multitaskers' like the tentacles would be.

It's a comment about the preferences of some cooking show hosts and common advice for de-cluttering your drawers - get rid of any gimmicky widget that only does one thing, especially if that one thing is something you don't do all that often and/or you can also do it effectively with a common kitchen tool like a knife or peeler (for example, you might have a thingy that removes sprouted eyes from potatoes. You can do that with a good paring knife or the tip of some designs of vegetable peelers.) I don't think it's meant to be relevant to the story or characters; that whole panel is a cutaway gag.

[Leewei]

Alton Brown in his Good Eats series liked to knock on unitaskers such as ice cream machines.

(If you aren't familiar with Good Eats, think Mr. Wizard meets Monty Python meets Julia Child.)

[DataNinja]

Alton Brown in his Good Eats series liked to knock on unitaskers such as ice cream machines.

(If you aren't familiar with Good Eats, think Mr. Wizard meets Monty Python meets Julia Child.)

That was pretty much what I thought of. (And that's also the show that got me into cooking shows in the first place.)

[Rogar Demonblud]

Aaand we're back to shower scenes.

[Ibrinar]

I agree with the Kender idea. In the original DragonLance Chronicles, the Kender were loathed by much of the fan base for their Chaotic Stupid tendencies. In case it isn't obvious, I'm in the "Kender Are Too Dumb to Live" camp.

As an aside, I hated Jar Jar in the Star Wars prequels. I can still accept that he was there for kids to enjoy and relate to. Similar ineptitude just doesn't work well in a webcomic featuring succubi and gore-drenched magical vaults.

Back to the teleorb: If Sydney cannot use this for any contrived reason, she simply should not enter a room soaking in biohazardous once-human jelly. Given her abilities, placing her nearby to help in an emergency is ideal.

Or at least float around in her shield. In fact that is what she should do most of the time when on a job no reason not to have ambush protection. Though I guess the author doesn't want her semi permanently in a flying bubble.