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  1. - Top - End - #211
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    Lizardfolk

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    What I don't understand is why you would have to give the homeowners the money you made while you lived there.

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Lizard Lord View Post
    What I don't understand is why you would have to give the homeowners the money you made while you lived there.
    The money you made by selling their silverware and TV and auctioning off settling space in their garden? Yes, why would you have to give that money back?
    That's the same argument that squatters make when rightful owners return to their vacation domicile and find it practically plundered, with new locks and dogs to keep them out, while the police tells you that you need to give them a month to move out. Which they do... with all your stuff. If you're lucky, they have not burned the floor in the fireplace. And as they are poor and homeless, you'll never get anything back.

    (Note: I hate squatters that disregard other people's property even more than I hate people who afford themselves vacation domiciles, or even multiple ones. But in this case, it is not the Oafan vacation domicile.)

    Although, in defense for the toughs I'd say the simile "the owners had been held prisoner in the cellar" is not fitting that good. Ennesby should reform it to "the owners have been lying in a hibernating coma on infinite life support for the last two thousand years, buried ten meters deep under the cellar - until yesterday when the near-perfectly preserved abandoned pyramid in the Sahara desert was found and occupied by said squatters who immediately started selling the silverware (after interviewing the crazy mummy who held guard in the pyramid)".

  3. - Top - End - #213
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Onyavar View Post
    "the owners have been lying in a hibernating coma on infinite life support for the last two thousand years, buried ten meters deep under the cellar - until yesterday when the near-perfectly preserved abandoned pyramid in the Sahara desert was found and occupied by said squatters who immediately started selling the silverware (after interviewing the crazy mummy who held guard in the pyramid)".
    Two thousand years? More like ten million...

  4. - Top - End - #214
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Onyavar View Post
    The money you made by selling their silverware and TV and auctioning off settling space in their garden? Yes, why would you have to give that money back?
    That's the same argument that squatters make when rightful owners return to their vacation domicile and find it practically plundered, with new locks and dogs to keep them out, while the police tells you that you need to give them a month to move out. Which they do... with all your stuff. If you're lucky, they have not burned the floor in the fireplace. And as they are poor and homeless, you'll never get anything back.

    (Note: I hate squatters that disregard other people's property even more than I hate people who afford themselves vacation domiciles, or even multiple ones. But in this case, it is not the Oafan vacation domicile.)

    Although, in defense for the toughs I'd say the simile "the owners had been held prisoner in the cellar" is not fitting that good. Ennesby should reform it to "the owners have been lying in a hibernating coma on infinite life support for the last two thousand years, buried ten meters deep under the cellar - until yesterday when the near-perfectly preserved abandoned pyramid in the Sahara desert was found and occupied by said squatters who immediately started selling the silverware (after interviewing the crazy mummy who held guard in the pyramid)".

    .....I actually forgot they made most of their money selling Oafan ships and thought it was made just doing mercenary jobs.

    With that said, what about the money that they made doing mercenary jobs?

  5. - Top - End - #215
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Lizard Lord View Post
    With that said, what about the money that they made doing mercenary jobs?
    Probably not directly the Oafans (even though they used the 'home' as a base of operations), but it's a drop in the bucket, and likely won't cover the damages/non-recoverable property charges they could incur.

    I mean, that's the biggest problem with the ongoing strip, and why HT is talking about focus-shifting -- the Toughs are bit players amongst the insanely rich and powerful beings whom they share screen time with. So they broke into what they thought was an abandoned house, knicked a vase and sold if for some new clothes, and had the owners come back and point out that it was a priceless antique.

  6. - Top - End - #216
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    Probably not directly the Oafans (even though they used the 'home' as a base of operations), but it's a drop in the bucket, and likely won't cover the damages/non-recoverable property charges they could incur.
    We already know that Oafan ships are made from super-expensive materials, that's why they could get a battleplate in exchange for 200 smashed-up ships! It was entirely unclear during that transaction who was making it, though--I thought it was the Neo-Oafans behind it with the Toughs just acting as guards and transport crew, so surely it's the Neo-Oafans who should be responsible for that? The Toughs only need to be responsible for the ships they "borrowed".

  7. - Top - End - #217
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    The thing about these squatter analogies is that the Oafa faked their own deaths. If you fake your own death, get declared legally dead, and have your estate handed off then you really have no business asking for all your stuff back when you show up again decades down the line, even if you faked your own death for the very good reason of not being murdered.
    I would really like to see a game made by Obryn, Kurald Galain, and Knaight from these forums.

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  8. - Top - End - #218
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Knaight View Post
    The thing about these squatter analogies is that the Oafa faked their own deaths. If you fake your own death, get declared legally dead, and have your estate handed off then you really have no business asking for all your stuff back when you show up again decades down the line, even if you faked your own death for the very good reason of not being murdered.
    Plus, the Toughs made a good-faith deal with the "new Oafans" who everyone was told were the rightful heirs of the place, and with the former "caretaker" of the place.
    It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.

    Verisimilitude -- n, the appearance or semblance of truth, likelihood, or probability.

    The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.

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  9. - Top - End - #219
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    Plus, the Toughs made a good-faith deal with the "new Oafans" who everyone was told were the rightful heirs of the place, and with the former "caretaker" of the place.
    I agree, the Toughs did nothing especially wrong. It now turns out there are living Oafans, and that changes things going forward. Where the bug swarms fit in, I'm not sure, they grew from the original wildlife and are owed by the Oafans more than owing I suspect.
    The end of what Son? The story? There is no end. There's just the point where the storytellers stop talking.

  10. - Top - End - #220
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    Two thousand years? More like ten million...
    In an analogy, things need to be scaled. Ten Million years ago, no humans built pyramids in the Sahara and installed infinite lifesupport systems and mummified butlers there...
    So I shortened the timeframe a bit to make it plausible.

    Also, I DO know that 2000 years ago, all pyramids were already built. It was just a pi##-poor analogy that is still more fitting than ennesby s.

  11. - Top - End - #221
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Aaaaand now Tagon is calling their lawful-at-the-time actions a robbery. I guess it is better than Taylor giving his band of mercenaries a free pass, but honestly, every forum I'm on, everyone seems more sympathetic to their plight than they are.

  12. - Top - End - #222
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    Aaaaand now Tagon is calling their lawful-at-the-time actions a robbery. I guess it is better than Taylor giving his band of mercenaries a free pass, but honestly, every forum I'm on, everyone seems more sympathetic to their plight than they are.
    I think Tagon is saying that he got robbed. Hopefully the cyberfans are paying good money for what they are hiring Tagon to do. It would be stupid and unreasonable for them to demand he work for free at this point. Frankly, they wouldn't be out of their cyber-jail if not for his actions.
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  13. - Top - End - #223
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Rockphed View Post
    I think Tagon is saying that he got robbed.
    No, he's going straight from Flinders' realisation that the missing stuff is what the Toughs took to "Yes, there was a robbery". Seems pretty clear the meaning is "We stole all that stuff". As far as I know, they did that with the permission of the descendants of the original Oafans, and they had no idea the original Oafans were actually still around (albeit locked up in cyberspace), so to retroactively call it robbery is ridiculous, IMHO.

    Seems to me Howard needed to figure out a way to (a) keep the Toughs going on missions and (b) depriving them of the near-unlimited funds they had supporting them, but he's picked a really strange way of doing it.

  14. - Top - End - #224
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    No, he's going straight from Flinders' realisation that the missing stuff is what the Toughs took to "Yes, there was a robbery". Seems pretty clear the meaning is "We stole all that stuff". As far as I know, they did that with the permission of the descendants of the original Oafans, and they had no idea the original Oafans were actually still around (albeit locked up in cyberspace), so to retroactively call it robbery is ridiculous, IMHO.

    Seems to me Howard needed to figure out a way to (a) keep the Toughs going on missions and (b) depriving them of the near-unlimited funds they had supporting them, but he's picked a really strange way of doing it.
    I suspect this isn't so much about 'taking all their toys' and more about 'giving them a reason to accept a mission they wouldn't accept otherwise', given that this is the second-to-last book there is not really any reason to reset them to the status-quo.
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  15. - Top - End - #225
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    My guess is that the oafans are somewhat thankful for being let out. But there is no way they are going to let the Toughs keep all their "unlimited money". The mercs now have probably just their necessary gear but are otherwise broke.

  16. - Top - End - #226
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    The "cyberofans" are basically engaged in might-makes-right.

    Under no worthwhile moral or legal system are the Toughs even remotely guilty of robbery.
    It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.

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    The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.

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  17. - Top - End - #227
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    The "cyberofans" are basically engaged in might-makes-right.

    Under no worthwhile moral or legal system are the Toughs even remotely guilty of robbery.
    Unless I skipped a strip, we've seen no exercising of any kind of might. For all we know, the cyberofans simply came out of hiding and stated, 'hi! We're alive! Uh, what happened to our stuff?' and everyone sheepishly said, 'oh, yeah, you probably want that, don't you?' If they have been exercising might, militarily or legally, we might learn about it in upcoming strips, but as of yet we can only guess.

    But that is kind of what I'm talking about. Taylor, at least through his characters, seems to be so clear on the idea that the toughs transgressed that once people think about it, their guilt seems to be a no brainer. And we the viewers seem to all be in agreement that no, that's not really the case.

  18. - Top - End - #228
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    Unless I skipped a strip, we've seen no exercising of any kind of might. For all we know, the cyberofans simply came out of hiding and stated, 'hi! We're alive! Uh, what happened to our stuff?' and everyone sheepishly said, 'oh, yeah, you probably want that, don't you?' If they have been exercising might, militarily or legally, we might learn about it in upcoming strips, but as of yet we can only guess.

    But that is kind of what I'm talking about. Taylor, at least through his characters, seems to be so clear on the idea that the toughs transgressed that once people think about it, their guilt seems to be a no brainer. And we the viewers seem to all be in agreement that no, that's not really the case.
    While not shown directly towards the Toughs, did you see what they did to Crazy-Chinook's remote longgun corvette?

    To me this implies that they've come out of hiding, taken control of a lot of the longgun network, and said "Hi, we'd like our stuff back now".
    It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.

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    The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.

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  19. - Top - End - #229
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    While not shown directly towards the Toughs, did you see what they did to Crazy-Chinook's remote longgun corvette?

    To me this implies that they've come out of hiding, taken control of a lot of the longgun network, and said "Hi, we'd like our stuff back now".
    I'm pretty sure what they did there was less "We want our stuff back" and more "We want you to stop shooting people because it's giving us a bad name".

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    I'm pretty sure what they did there was less "We want our stuff back" and more "We want you to stop shooting people because it's giving us a bad name".
    The point is that it demonstrates their ability to apply precise and overwhelming force.

    I can't really think of any reason why everyone else would be so ready to accept their claims without objection, other than their ability to do that sort of thing.
    It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.

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    The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.

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  21. - Top - End - #231
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
    The "cyberofans" are basically engaged in might-makes-right.

    Under no worthwhile moral or legal system are the Toughs even remotely guilty of robbery.
    If it was presented as that I would prefer it.

  22. - Top - End - #232
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    The toughs have been immortal for a few months, and now for some reason they are very interested in setting a long precedent on the matter of "How long does something have to be in storage before it counts as abandoned?".
    "The error is to be human"

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Spojaz View Post
    The toughs have been immortal for a few months, and now for some reason they are very interested in setting a long precedent on the matter of "How long does something have to be in storage before it counts as abandoned?".
    That's... actually a very good point. In some ways, this precedent would be in the interest of a lot of newly immortal people.
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  24. - Top - End - #234
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Letting people permanently reserve stuff without doing anything is imo a waste of resources. Even if I were immortal I would be against that. If I abandon something for millennia and don't at least get someone to take care of it I wouldn't expect to keep it. And honestly outside of fringe situations like getting stuck in a virtual world if you abandon something that long you probably won't miss it.

  25. - Top - End - #235
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Hang on a minute, what were they even uploaded into a computer to escape from anyway?

    The place is already an isolated, annie-plantless space station floating in the middle of a nebula. The pa'anuri can't find the place and being in a computer is no safer than being organic when long guns or other more conventional warfare is going on. Computer uploading only helps if the computer is more difficult to attack than the place the people were already living, but this computer is in the same place as they were living so it's no safer than living in the habitat.
    Sanity is nice to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.

  26. - Top - End - #236
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    BlackDragon

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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by Grim Portent View Post
    Hang on a minute, what were they even uploaded into a computer to escape from anyway?
    Iafa was so horrified at what he'd done (basically killed everyone and uploaded them to cyberspace) that he erased his memory of the events. That maybe suggests he realised that it wasn't actually necessary to do it, but only after the event.

  27. - Top - End - #237
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    This is really bugging me.

    The old Oafans should direct their issues towards the new Oafans.
    It is one thing to suspend your disbelief. It is another thing entirely to hang it by the neck until dead.

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    The concern is not realism in speculative fiction, but rather the sense that a setting or story could be real, fostered by internal consistency and coherence.

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  28. - Top - End - #238
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    wait. Was " crazy goddess with the long guns" just defeated off panel?
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  29. - Top - End - #239
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by PraetorDragoon View Post
    wait. Was " crazy goddess with the long guns" just defeated off panel?
    Yep.

    Hell, I think she's technically been beaten off panel twice in so many pages. We didn't see her defeated in Eina-Afa itself or the mobilisation of a fleet to hunt down her drones, just Putzho mentioning in one panel that he could track her drones based on targeting data and then an oafan ship shooting one of her long guns. We've seen none of the actual effort that went into beating her and it makes it seem like she just kind of stopped being a problem.

    I'm not sure if she even managed to kill anyone come to think of it.
    Last edited by Grim Portent; 2018-09-15 at 10:49 AM.
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    Default Re: Schlock Mercenary VIII: insAIne in the mAInfrAIme

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    Iafa was so horrified at what he'd done (basically killed everyone and uploaded them to cyberspace) that he erased his memory of the events. That maybe suggests he realised that it wasn't actually necessary to do it, but only after the event.
    Considering an that an ancient Ofan linked to Iafa and decided that Iafa was moving to slow in killing everyone, I don't think Iafa was wrong even in hindsight. I just think that Iafa couldn't take it despite it being the right/only thing to do. https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2018-07-28
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