Erfworld 77, page 71

[Lamech]

It seems that Jillian's sword can be dynamically resized like an eyebook, which is quite a handy power to have, although Jillian spends one panel clearly wishing that she didn't have to reduce it to dagger size against Manpower's sword.

I thought she dropped it when getting back on to the peep or when whe was hit by manpower's dwagon. Hope we get that cleared up soon.

[Wender]

Huh? I thought it was broken, or possibly stuck into the dwagon's lower jaw.

From the shape of the blade and the way she has her hand back and the pommel in an overhand grip, it looks like she has a dagger that she intends to use on the dwagon. She doesn't look happy about facing a warlord with a huge sword.

Then, when she first looks up at Ansom, she has the huge sword back. The wrap on the grip's the same as the one on her "dagger."

Consider that: Huge as it is, Jillian seems to be able to make the thing disappear, which would be much easier if it could be reduced in size; for her immediate purposes a dagger or knife would be much more useful than a giant sword that she couldn't wield effectively against the dwagon; until she sees herself against a warlord with a large weapon, at which point we see her wielding the big sword again.

Given that she is hanging by her arm with no scabbard in sight, and given that we know resizing is possible on Erf, the simplest explanation seems to be that she can will the thing to go from dagger-sized to man-sized as she requires.

I suppose that she could have a backup knife with a matching pommel, but that would require a lot of offscreen weapon-switching while hanging by one arm between weapons in invisible scabbards. It's not impossible, but it doesn't seem more obvious to me than a resizable weapon.

[Lamech]

I suppose that she could have a backup knife with a matching pommel, but that would require a lot of offscreen weapon-switching while hanging by one arm between weapons in invisible scabbards. It's not impossible, but it doesn't seem more obvious to me than a resizable weapon.

Well she can probably resize her sword because it is magical. (I don't know the page number, but Parson stated that enemies got to magic items dropped by Jillian.) Despite that the side view of the dagger/sword doesn't seem to look like her normal sword would. Plus when Stanley resized the book everything about it changed. Mabey Jillian had a hidden shrunk dagger.

On a unrelated note Jillian's eyes look grey again. I wonder why her eyes were blue in the thinkagram.

[Wender]

On a unrelated note Jillian's eyes look grey again. I wonder why her eyes were blue in the thinkagram.

We were seeing them through the blue magical field of the Archon's communication spell.

[SteveMB]

Well she can probably resize her sword because it is magical. (I don't know the page number, but Parson stated that enemies got to magic items dropped by Jillian.)

"Did you know your Overlord let the enemy get to those magic items out in the field?"

OK, so that would seem to establish that Jillian's weapon is some kind of magic item in addition to being a BFS.

[Lamech]

We were seeing them through the blue magical field of the Archon's communication spell.

The blue filter wouldn't have changed her eyes from gray to blue. Look at that black dwagons or her armor they didn't change as much as Jillian's eyes. Of course, her eyes could have just been made blue by the thinkagram spell.

[Wender]

The blue filter wouldn't have changed her eyes from gray to blue. Look at that black dwagons or her armor they didn't change as much as Jillian's eyes. Of course, her eyes could have just been made blue by the thinkagram spell.

The dark parts of her armor, which are roughly the same color as her eyes, turn roughly the same shade of blue. The other colors might have a more subtle effect just because grey will merely darken the color of any filter placed over it, and Jillian's eyes aren't a particularly dark grey.

[Lamech]

I suppose their pretty close in the thinkogram, and their pretty much exactly the same normaly so your probably right its just the thinkogram.

[Rhuna_Coppermane]

I don't know why but this feels like the end of Ansom.

I haven't made it through all the discussion yet, but I agree. I just don't trust that smile.

[ag30476]

It seems that Jillian's sword can be dynamically resized like an eyebook, which is quite a handy power to have, although Jillian spends one panel clearly wishing that she didn't have to reduce it to dagger size against Manpower's sword.

Huh? I thought it was broken, or possibly stuck into the dwagon's lower jaw.

No it's just in hammerspace where BFS's and McGuffin's go when you're not using them.

[Zelig the Liar]

No it's just in hammerspace where BFS's and McGuffin's go when you're not using them.

The final line of that definition is just awesome.

[galdon]

I rarely if ever talk on these boards, but this got me. I would assume Galdon that you are also the type of person that would abandon a multiplayer RTS game after your first wave was destroyed.

A game at any stage is very rarely unwinnable. In almost any situation you can find or use a strategy that is unexpected to give you a momentary upper hand. If you come up with enough of these sequentially you CAN win. Sometimes that strategy backfires like what's happening now for GK. So the following step would be to plan the next unexpected attack. For example, where are the tunnels they keep talking about, and could they take out the forest units in one turn from there?

The only time a loss is guaranteed is when one side gives up. I'm hoping that the comic doesn't move in that direction, because only then will if think of it as a disappointment.

the tunnels are under the mountian, the lead directly to gobwin knob, however, units within it will have location bonuses and the maze like qualities of the tunnels would give parson ample time to pick them all off before they get into gowbin knob

problem is, ansom has no reason to take the tunnel, not enough of his siege has been destroyed. parson would somehow have to tactically strike out all the siege, during the siege, while trying not to let his dwagons and warlords get destroyed by ansom's fliers, he does have air superiority already, and after killing nearly half of parson's dwagons, he has it even more so now.

[fendrin]

the tunnels are under the mountian, the lead directly to gobwin knob, however, units within it will have location bonuses and the maze like qualities of the tunnels would give parson ample time to pick them all off before they get into gowbin knob

problem is, ansom has no reason to take the tunnel, not enough of his siege has been destroyed. parson would somehow have to tactically strike out all the siege, during the siege, while trying not to let his dwagons and warlords get destroyed by ansom's fliers, he does have air superiority already, and after killing nearly half of parson's dwagons, he has it even more so now.

I see two ways that GK can pull out of this without resorting to a deus-ex-machina:

1) Take out Ansom. It has been implied that without Ansom the coalition would fall apart. as a plus, GK might get the arkenpliers.

2) Get a couple of warlords to the B dragons and take out more seige. Maybe not all, but hopefully enough. Ansom feinting through the tunnels implies he doesn't feel that is a good way to attack. He would rather surround the walls and look for an unknown and possibly non-existent weak point. He insists to Vinny that the seige is more important than almost anything else. By opting for the Hunt, he knowingly put himself, Vinny, and his forest-capable units in jeopardy. Therefore taking out the rest (or most of the rest) of the seige means that the coalition would need to go through the tunnels.

[galdon]

I see two ways that GK can pull out of this without resorting to a deus-ex-machina:

1) Take out Ansom. It has been implied that without Ansom the coalition would fall apart. as a plus, GK might get the arkenpliers.

2) Get a couple of warlords to the B dragons and take out more seige. Maybe not all, but hopefully enough. Ansom feinting through the tunnels implies he doesn't feel that is a good way to attack. He would rather surround the walls and look for an unknown and possibly non-existent weak point. He insists to Vinny that the seige is more important than almost anything else. By opting for the Hunt, he knowingly put himself, Vinny, and his forest-capable units in jeopardy. Therefore taking out the rest (or most of the rest) of the seige means that the coalition would need to go through the tunnels.

taking out the rest of the siege would mean most probrably losing his remaining dwagons, and even his two last warlords.

capturing/killing ansom would also be risky, he'd have half the dwagons as he thought he'd have and no warlord to give bonuses

[FoolishOwl]

No, we KNEW Parson wasn't the perfect warlord. Heck, he even admits it.

I put it badly. It was clear to everyone, including the readers, from the beginning, that Parson wasn't perfect. What I should have said was that the specific nature of Parson's imperfection was revealed by this strategem.

I'm not much of a strategist, myself. There's no alternative strategy that leaps to my mind -- nor have I read anyone propose an alternative. The strategem that Parson initiated made sense, for a lot of reasons. It doesn't follow, however, that the strategem Parson hit upon was the only viable option, nor that it was the best one. It strikes me as a very elaborate plan, one with a lot of potential points of failure.

My larger point was that this isn't just a blow-by-blow account of a war. This is a story, and in stories, the decisions of the characters should reveal their personalities.

Early on, Parson describes the battle as a no-win scenario, like the game he was designing. This reminds me of the Kobayashi Maru scenario from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. The point of the no-win scenario is to assess the testee's character.

I can think of two series of books I've read, which featured strategic thinkers imported into a sword-and-sorcery fantasy world through magic, both by Stephen Donaldson. One was the Thomas Covenant saga, in which the strategist was a consultant who worked for a civilian thinktank contracted by the Pentagon. In the other, the Mordant's Need saga, the strategist was a military officer (from a space opera setting, from the sounds of it). In both cases, the strategist was a professional military thinker.

Parson, by contrast, is not a professional. He does this stuff for fun. He's surprisingly unconcerned about the fact that he's apparently been uprooted from his friends and the life he's known, and is apparently in mortal danger, and is ordering the deaths of people with wills and desires. In an early Klog, he says that he still feels that none of this is really happening. Perhaps that will prove to be true. But for the moment, it seems to me that he's mostly treating this as a game, not as a real dilemma.

Speaking of the Thomas Covenant saga, there's a bit in the first book in the saga, before Covenant is transported to another world, in which he meets the enigmatic deity of that world, who presents him with an essay that asks how one would work out how to act ethically in a strange world with different rules. That's just the problem Parson's got, but with which he hasn't quite dealt. It's funny that when Stanley gave his speech on how there's no "Good" or "Evil" side, he missed that Parson said he liked playing the "bad guys" -- which is to say, he didn't really care who was "good" or "evil." Parson wasn't even thinking about real ethical questions, just about aesthetics and style.

[sihnfahl]

taking out the rest of the siege would mean most probrably losing his remaining dwagons, and even his two last warlords.

Back against wall. Not that many good options left. It's either siege or Ansom at this point...

capturing/killing ansom would also be risky, he'd have half the dwagons as he thought he'd have and no warlord to give bonuses

The more reasonable of the 2 options. Parson's first strike took out about 40% of Ansom's siege (what Parson calls around 50). That means that 24 dwagons need to take out 50 or more siege units with good defenses.

If all the gwiffons are croaked, except for Jillian's mount, and everyone else survives (but takes hits) the fight becomes 24 B-class dwagons at full health and move vs 3 Archons, 3 warlords and 1 gwiffon at medium to low hits and no/minimal move left.

Both tough choices, but... if capturing Ansom will collapse the Alliance (since it's intimated his charisma is what's keeping it together, due to the hardships it puts on the Alliance members...) then Parson may just well force a draw.

[R.I.P. Manpower]

There seems to be a lot of talk about Ansom winning & Parson switching sides. or about Ansom dying, or other seemingly 'main' characters dying.

As this is only Part I of Erfworld, has anyone else considered where this would go if the above happens?

What happens if Parson joins Ansom & they win the battle? ...where would it go in part II? Without Stanley 'the oppressor' there could be no sequal!

I would then conclude that the only possible outcome for 'the battle of Gobwin Knob' would be that there is some kind of victory for 'team tool'. I think Ansom must survuive such that there is some kind of progression for part II, maybe Ansom loses the pliers to Stanley (maybe Parson), discovers that this is what tool is really after and goes on his own quest for the next Arkentool...Part II - the Race for the Arken***insert name here***...Ansom may find this and find out the he is attuned to it, allowing for a big final battle in Part III - the Clash of the Titans!

From a trilogy point of view; and the fact that team evil has the protagonist, a victory for team good would really be setting it up nicely for a big final climatic battle in Part III. It would then be kind of like 'Empire Strikes Back' (Ansom Strikes Back?!) to have some kind of victory in Part II (assuming they lose Part I).

Spoiler

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Ansom will lose the battle for Gobwin Knob, he will also lose the Arkenpliers. The loss of Gobwin Knob for team tool would leave little place for the story to go in Part II

[Lamech]

taking out the rest of the siege would mean most probrably losing his remaining dwagons, and even his two last warlords.

Ansom implied (page 56) that the 27 B-dwagons were able to do more damage than as many as 24 A-dwagons. Im guesing that 24 B-dwagons should be able to do more damage than 19 A-dwagons. Finanly a bunch of the Archers that were told to cover the siege are off in a forest. If that is right Ansom would lose over 80% of his total siege. (Of course Parson would need a warlord to do that.)
I'm guessing GK has a higher siege to unit ratio than Ansom because GK wouldn't need as many units to move the siege around, also GK probably has inplace siege. Also I guessing that GK has siege is the long ranged missle kind, and is fortified, and would get free shots at Ansom's siege moving down the caldra, and would have the high ground because of the towers. Also GK siege wouldn't have to move very far so it could easily be heavier. Combine that with the fact that Ansom thinks he only had 4 times the forces to take the city, and Sizemore's "tricks". Parson could be able to selectivly target the siege in the big battle. Wipe it out, winning the battle for GK. I doubt Parson could get a warlord to the B-dwagons if they were wiped out though.

capturing/killing ansom would also be risky, he'd have half the dwagons as he thought he'd have and no warlord to give bonuses

If he can Ansom could survive 24 dwagons with out the elves. Which would happen if the gwiffions go down. Of course Ansom could run right know, but then a warlord would survive and that would be it for the siege.

[galdon]

ansom isnt implying that the B dwagons could deal more damage, he was saying that if they dont wipe out the generals, he could use ALL of his dwagons next turn and then go 'back to base' which would be a lot more damage.


this wave thats being hit right now is vinny, ansom, gwiffons, archons and jillian, hell if two gwiffons survive they can make a full stack of almost nothing but eletes!

they are beating 27 A dwagons right now, with 3 warlords in the hex. next turn, they will be slightly wounded, but the 24 B dwagons will not be nearly as strong without a leadership bonus and would likely get killed just as quickly as these A dwagons are. without any warlords left on the field and not enough move to go get one, he'd have no choice but to retreat the dwagons or have them slaughtered.

[Wender]

There seems to be a lot of talk about Ansom winning & Parson switching sides. or about Ansom dying, or other seemingly 'main' characters dying.

As this is only Part I of Erfworld, has anyone else considered where this would go if the above happens?

What happens if Parson joins Ansom & they win the battle? ...where would it go in part II?

Stanley has already told us that if Gobwin Knob falls, he bails. In his mind it's all about his destiny as master of the Arkentools; defeats and victories alike are just details. Even the loss of his last city doesn't really matter, because what is that loss against Fate Itself? Stanley escaping the ruin of Gobwin Knob would be like Darth Vader flying away from the destroyed Death Star, only cuter. Of course, if Stanley was destroyed, that would suck all the tension out of the story.

As for the lack of tension...

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What if the act of releasing Parson from the binding of his spell sends him back to his squatter hole, just as his players are leaving, and Act II consists of both sides rushing to grab warlords from around his gaming table, including Parson himself? Think about it: A game where the players really are pitted against the DM!

I'm not saying that I think this is even likely, but there are lots of factions, there are lots of things we still don't know, and Stanley without a city is still dangerous as long as he has the hammer and there are some dwagons about.

What do I think?

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I think the odds of a victory for Team Evil are good simply because in purely mathematical terms they're bad, and the overcoming of odds always makes for a good story. The fact that they have the protagonist bound to them as a master strategist is plot fodder for part II. It would not surprise me at all if certain of his players were popped into the world, actually.

[ShiningTed]

Jillian's dagger

I missed this completely. I thought she had drawn a dagger tucked inside her vambrace: but sure enough, she suddenly has the BFS next panel.

I am leaning to Hammerspace, because it would also explain where Manpower got his sword (falchion? Guillotine blade? Heavy scimitar?) from: I don't remember him waving that huge thing around previously. This is a game, and hammerspace is a pretty standard given in games.

Jillians grey eyes

Grey eyes are the best.

[Ganurath]

I haven't made it through all the discussion yet, but I agree. I just don't trust that smile.

It's worse when you add the angry faces on the Archons in the thinkagram. That smile is just plain wolfish. The only way Ansom survives this is if he gets something fun and angry off panel in the near future.

[Wender]

I am leaning to Hammerspace, because it would also explain where Manpower got his sword (falchion? Guillotine blade? Heavy scimitar?) from: I don't remember him waving that huge thing around previously.

He doesn't need hammerspace. He can strap the scabbard to the dwagon. That's not an uncommon tactic for mounted warriors.

[Krellen]

I missed this completely. I thought she had drawn a dagger tucked inside her vambrace: but sure enough, she suddenly has the BFS next panel.

I see no evidence she has the BFS in this comic at all. We see no blade - only pommel. And we don't see the back of the dagger's pommel either, so the pommel in panel 7 could easily be the dagger's pommel.

All this conjecture that she has her sword and it can change size has come completely out of left field.

[Kuinn]

It's worse when you add the angry faces on the Archons in the thinkagram. That smile is just plain wolfish. The only way Ansom survives this is if he gets something fun and angry off panel in the near future.

Its not over yet...

[insane conspiracy theory]
So, what if this is part of a larger Jill 'plan'. She's successfully saved Ansom by both getting him to leave the dangerously surrounded hex, and bringing him to the wounded stack that would wipe out the rest of his siege. He is effectively out of danger, for the moment, thanks to her. Which is great, you know, because she loves him.

However, she's now inches away from the arkenpliers. What is stopping her from snagging them and hightailing it back to GK? Ansom used the rest of his move to get there, how much does that griffon have? If she were to get the pliers to GK, it would certainly be of benefit to Wanda who is in tough shape at the moment. Stealing the arkenpliers doesn't hurt Ansom, because the siege is still in one piece, and the dwagons are less of a threat then they were a few moments ago. That last 'moment' Wanda and Jill had by the dragon could have been a command to get the pliers if an opportunity arose. The Tool, I'm sure would be willing to sacrifice a few warlords and dwagons to get his hands on another arkentool.
[/insane conspiracy theory]

But who knows, new page soon hopefully and popcorn at the ready...

*Apologies if this has been posted already, I was late to the thread this week >< If someone already brought this up, I'll buy you a coke!

[berrew]

I see no evidence she has the BFS in this comic at all. We see no blade - only pommel. And we don't see the back of the dagger's pommel either, so the pommel in panel 7 could easily be the dagger's pommel.

All this conjecture that she has her sword and it can change size has come completely out of left field.

Except that no one makes dagger pommels big enough to grip two handed. And even if there was some stupid smith somewhere that did, it's quite unlikely the dagger pommel would look exactly like the pommel on her BFS (see the last frame). Plus, the angle of that pommel at the end makes the attached blade aimed right into the dwagon who has Xed-out eyes on the last frame.

I think it was just an attempt at an odd perspective that for some reason didn't work out - but in any case, it does have to be the BFS in the next-to-last frame.

[fendrin]

I see no evidence she has the BFS in this comic at all. We see no blade - only pommel. And we don't see the back of the dagger's pommel either, so the pommel in panel 7 could easily be the dagger's pommel.

All this conjecture that she has her sword and it can change size has come completely out of left field.

There is no hard evidence, but there is evidence that it could be.
1)We know the sword is magical because
..a) we know wanda dropped two magical items from here
..b) that the two items are recovered by the coalition here
..c) and that Webinar and Dora get the sword and hat here
2) (at least some) magical items can be resized from here

points 1 and 2 taken together indicate that it is within the realm of possibility that the sword could be re-sized.

Given that, I would say that idea that the dagger is the sword resized came from third base, not left field, to stretch the metaphor.

[Lamech]

No it's just in hammerspace where BFS's and McGuffin's go when you're not using them.

I don't remember anytime in which the sword was in hammerspace. The sword is often hidden and off camera, but not really disappeared.

[Wender]

I see no evidence she has the BFS in this comic at all. We see no blade - only pommel. And we don't see the back of the dagger's pommel either, so the pommel in panel 7 could easily be the dagger's pommel.

She still has the overhand grip on the pommel in panel 7, which would only make sense with a dagger blade. So the BFS isn't there and she croaked the dwagon with a well-placed stab to the head. However...

All this conjecture that she has her sword and it can change size has come completely out of left field.

...have you ever seen a dagger whose pommel was longer than the blade? Given what we know--that it's a magical weapon, and that magical items exist that can be resized--it's not any more out of left field than hammerspace, or the idea that she's been sheathing and drawing multiple weapons off-panel while dangling from the mouth of a dwagon.

[R.I.P. Manpower]

If Jillians sword could be resized, as people are suggesting, I would expect that the scaling would be linear, that is that all proportions would be maintained.

As we can see in Panel 5 of Erf 77 the blade of her dagger tapers from the hilt to a point, whereas her sword (any example such as panel 1 Erf 75) has parallel edges for the most part of it, only tapering right at the very end in an icosoles triangle.

For the sword to resize to the dagger the blade would have to change shape quite significantly. Also given that Jiillian probably chose the shape of her BFS because it looked cool to her, she would probably make it resize to a similar shape. The simplest way to resize something is to alter the proportions, 1:1:1 goes to 0.1:0.1:0.1...a mere aspect ration...other changes would be more complicated to rationalise.

If I was a Barbarian warlord, I would certainly carry a spare weapon, you never know when you are going to get disarmed!