Erfworld 77, page 71

[ag30476]

But.. the thing I quoted wasn't spoilered. Why jump down my neck?

But fine, I'll change it. I can respect not wanting something to be spoiled, even if it is just speculation.

Jumped on your neck? This forum is becoming too sensitive. Next I'll be told to stop making V gender threads.

Seriously, Sorry if it felt like Boom! Headshot! I didn't mean it as un-friendly welcome. I was just trying to point out that the even though I agreed with your speculation, others may not want to accidentally read such spoilers especially spoiler as dramatic as yours.

If you look at my previous posts in the forum, you'll see I try to spoiler speculation. Of course, you can always choose to speak without self-censorship. Barbarian! Proudly!

[Eisen]

You know...I didn't read all seven pages here, but what I did read astounded me that no one's really thought of this. Let's go over some basic facts...

1) Tool and co. are "Ebil" (Erfworld is too cutesey to say evil)
2) For the better part of the series Jillian has expressed total and utter loathing for Ansom, whether or not she loved him.
3) Jillian, at no point, has been expressly shown as breaking the enchantment. She's been shown as taking actions that appear contrary to the laws of the enchantment, but we have no complete proof she's succeeded.

So, what if...

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This is all part of Jillian's plan? I know she cannot directly betray Ansom, but could hse put herself in a situation where he would force himself to expose himself, place himself at great risk? We know she would, since that was what the original plan to capture/croak Ansom hinged on. Is it possible she's just letting it happen in a different manner?

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If I were writing this, the next page would be a perfect time for a complete upset of everything we've recently seen to occur.

[ag30476]

I see a lot of assumptions being bandied about in this thread...

Well if you would have read my spoilers, you would have seen that I beat you to it. Hah!

But seriously, it's common courtesy, in this forum and others to put dramatic speculation or revealing information in spoiler tags.

[teratorn]

Darn it. She survived. Well, there's still hope she'll get croaked in the next strip or two.

Yay, I'm not the only one.

A bloodied dagger to the midsection during a kiss and snatching the pliers away from Ansom. His guard will be totally down.

Ansom would be wounded and left alive with a maelstrom of emotions that will hinder his strategic and tactical planning.

That would be awesome, and if Vinny croaks her in retaliation... warm fuzzies.

Parson?
Don't tell me our primary point-of-view character is an obese, unattractive loser with no ambition and filled with cynicism and sarcasm!

Huh? I feel insulted. What's so bad about being an unattractive loser with no ambition and filled with cynicism and sarcasm?

I don't know a lot about sports, but the complaint seems to me kind of like watching the first inning of a baseball game,

Oh, you're kidding! You almost got me there but then you called baseball a sport.

[mrocktor]

This did not happen to Parson because of a rule that he was not aware of.

Had he known that Ansom could reinforce Jillian that same turn, he would not have given any mind to the odds calculated by his mathmancy thingy. He would have said "as long as they don't reinforce" or "I hope he has no units with enough move to reinforce" or "I hope Jillian has no means to call for help" when quoting the odds.

So yeah, this is one more rule he was not aware of. Again. It gets old.

I disagree. I see nothing wrong with a TBS that allows the attacker to add in supporting stacks (perhaps only those with a leader?) to a fight between each combat "round", as long as they have move left.

There is nothing wrong, thats just not the way things usually work in the genre. Granted my experience is limited to computer games, but I have NEVER seen such a mechanic.

[ag30476]

That would be awesome, and if...

You too Barbarian?

*shrugs*

*shifts uncomfortably in seat*

Darn that stick. OK no more self-righteous corrections from me.

[SteveMB]

1) Tool and co. are "Ebil" (Erfworld is too cutesey to say evil)

Generally, yes, though things are a bit more nuanced than that (e.g. Sizemore and Bogroll, who seem to be generally nice people, are on the "evil" side).

2) For the better part of the series Jillian has expressed total and utter loathing for Ansom, whether or not she loved him.

I think "total and utter loathing" overstates things a bit. She argued bluntly with him, and shot down his passes (which we can add to GW's list of ways he's initially presented as unlikeable)... but OTOH she apparently did consider taking him up on his offer.

3) Jillian, at no point, has been expressly shown as breaking the enchantment. She's been shown as taking actions that appear contrary to the laws of the enchantment, but we have no complete proof she's succeeded.

I can think of ways to square Jillian's actions with the notion that she's still under the spell. (Admittedly, most of them require you to believe that "Occam's Razor" is the name of one of Wanda's interrogation tools.) However, booped if I can think of a way to explain Jillian's wish that Wanda could see "one of your dolls... get broken" if she's still under the suggestion.

[ag30476]

3) Jillian, at no point, has been expressly shown as breaking the enchantment. She's been shown as taking actions that appear contrary to the laws of the enchantment, but we have no complete proof she's succeeded.

So, what if...

Spoiler

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This is all part of Jillian's plan? I know she cannot directly betray Ansom, but could hse put herself in a situation where he would force himself to expose himself, place himself at great risk? We know she would, since that was what the original plan to capture/croak Ansom hinged on. Is it possible she's just letting it happen in a different manner?

Spoiler

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If I were writing this, the next page would be a perfect time for a complete upset of everything we've recently seen to occur.

Spoiler

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In page 72 we saw Jillian trying to find a way out of her dilemna, "Can't find dwagons - finding dwagons will hurt Wanda. Don't find dwagons - not finding dwagons will save Ansom."

In 73 we saw her unable to act because she was stuck in a loop, "Can't attack - attacking will hurt Wanda. Must attack - not attacking will Ansom. Repeat."

In 74 she got out of the loop but we can only speculate how. How about iif it was by thinking, ""Attack dwagons - and hurt Wanda. Attack Ansom - and hurt Ansom."

And thanks for the spoilers

[Girl Wonder]

You know...I didn't read all seven pages here, but what I did read astounded me that no one's really thought of this. Let's go over some basic facts...

1) Tool and co. are "Ebil" (Erfworld is too cutesey to say evil)
2) For the better part of the series Jillian has expressed total and utter loathing for Ansom, whether or not she loved him.
3) Jillian, at no point, has been expressly shown as breaking the enchantment. She's been shown as taking actions that appear contrary to the laws of the enchantment, but we have no complete proof she's succeeded.

To me it's pretty clear, but yes, it has not been expressly stated the enchantment has been broken. Still, Wanda's look at the bottom of page 70 is probably as close as we're going to get in a comic without thought balloons.

[Cadfan]

Eisen-

Precisely. The way Erfworld (the webcomic) works seems to be to establish a chess game in which we, the reader, are just one step behind the characters. This is a classical story telling structure, and it depends on there being solid rules which are known to the readers, but which, if done correctly, the readers won't use quite as well as the characters. That way, with each revelation, each move in the chess game, the reader smacks their forehead and says "Oh! Why didn't I think of that??"

Right now, one of the rules is

Spoiler

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that Jillian is under a spell which allows her freedom of action, but with the caveat that she won't do anything which directly and significantly harms Wanda. However, she can rationalize and avoid doing something which harms Wanda in any way necessary. She apparently loves Ansom, and wants him to win. The spell isn't strong enough to make her do something that harms Ansom.

Assume the spell is still active. Remember, her power of reasoning is functional. If she can figure out a way that attacking the dragons and saving Ansom (goal 1) can be performed without significantly harming Wanda (goal two), she'll take it. Remember, the spell just prevents her from harming Wanda, not from attacking the dragons!

There are a couple of ways this could be true. First, Wanda's true interests might not lie with Stanley winning. Second, some strategic option might be open to Parson that Jillian can see, but which Parson does not (yet). Third, Ansom's presence in that hex may be too dangerous to maintain, forcing them to withdraw after having croaked only a few dragons. If Ansom can only get home on a Griffon with Move remaining, he'll have to withdraw before too many Griffons die. There are probably more options I haven't thought of yet.

[DCR]

Boop.
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.
.
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[JazzManJim]

I'm working with "old rules", with very fast motion and requiring stacks to merge before they can attack jointly.

Ansom could enter from the backside while Parson was giving his orders and Ansom could order the merging while he was entering (just seconds before engagement). This may be standard practice when invading one hex if your first stack managed to win engagement.

Parson distracted by his plan to attack Jillian takes a few seconds to notice the changes in Jillian's stats but it's too late to block Ansom. Note that he sees Ansom before the tool. It's Parson first battle. He'll react faster in the next one. I prefer this instead of having a more complex game with reinforcements and such.

I'm not saying it couldn't be done. That was never my point. heck, at this point, anything can be done and we just have to accept it as Yet Another Quirky Little Erfworld Rule.

Are you okay with Parson not noticing that the most important enemy unit on the table moved three hexes to reinforce the very unit he was attacking and brought the third most important unit on the table with it when it moved? I'm sure as heck not okay with that. I can't suspend my disbelief long enough to accept that Parson would screw up that royally.

[SteveMB]

Are you okay with Parson not noticing that the most important enemy unit on the table moved three hexes to reinforce the very unit he was attacking and brought the third most important unit on the table with it when it moved?

Huh? I thought "Oh... boop. Go. Hurry!" meant that he had noticed precisely that (once I realized that it couldn't be a reaction to Jillian's efforts to get her sword free; the situation room table display is just too abstract to show that).

(And I think part of that "uncensored cuss word" would be "gee, thanks a lot for blurting that out now that I've already tried and failed to react to it".)

[Halfpunch]

...<snip> Are you okay with Parson not noticing that the most important enemy unit on the table moved three hexes to reinforce the very unit he was attacking and brought the third most important unit on the table with it when it moved? <snip>...

Parson noticed it. "Oh...boop. Go. Hurry!" is Parson noticing Ansom and Vinny moving. The dialog and visuals of the last comic are out of sync, with the conversation happening first. You'll notice in panel 4 Parson's dialog orders Manpower to close with Jillian, though the visual shows this has already occurred.

[GWvsJohn]

I'm not saying it couldn't be done. That was never my point. heck, at this point, anything can be done and we just have to accept it as Yet Another Quirky Little Erfworld Rule.

Are you okay with Parson not noticing that the most important enemy unit on the table moved three hexes to reinforce the very unit he was attacking and brought the third most important unit on the table with it when it moved? I'm sure as heck not okay with that. I can't suspend my disbelief long enough to accept that Parson would screw up that royally.

And what else was he supposed to do? He can't move as it's not his turn and, as far as we know, he can't retreat on Ansom's turn. He clearly notices before Ansom attacks, and croaking Jill is still the best option.

The timeline might be such:
Wanda insists Jill won't attack, Parson waits.
Jill send thinkagram without Parson knowing.
Jill attacks, Parson responds, Ansom begins moving.
Parson is momentarily distracted as Wanda voices opposition, short discussion ensues, Parson repeats order, Ansom enters hex.
Parson notices Ansom, tells Manpower to hurry, but Ansom is too fast/skilled/powerful.

What else was Parson supposed to do?

[JazzManJim]

Huh? I thought "Oh... boop. Go. Hurry!" meant that he had noticed precisely that (once I realized that it couldn't be a reaction to Jillian's efforts to get her sword free; the situation room table display is just too abstract to show that).

(And I think part of that "uncensored cuss word" would be "gee, thanks a lot for blurting that out now that I've already tried and failed to react to it".)

If I accept that, then I accept that Parson didn't bother to retask the entire task to the most important unit and let it have a free attack against his most valuable unit in the stack which was, by virtue of its attacking another unit, completely defenseless. Even though he saw it coming three hexes away.

Any explanation I come up with finishes with Parson just being dumb. I can't buy that.

[JazzManJim]

And what else was he supposed to do? He can't move as it's not his turn and, as far as we know, he can't retreat on Ansom's turn. He clearly notices before Ansom attacks, and croaking Jill is still the best option.

The timeline might be such:
Wanda insists Jill won't attack, Parson waits.
Jill send thinkagram without Parson knowing.
Jill attacks, Parson responds, Ansom begins moving.
Parson is momentarily distracted as Wanda voices opposition, short discussion ensues, Parson repeats order, Ansom enters hex.
Parson notices Ansom, tells Manpower to hurry, but Ansom is too fast/skilled/powerful.

What else was Parson supposed to do?

Retask the stack to Ansom. Ansom is clearly more valuable a target than any other unit on the battlefield. He has to enter the stack unjoined to the rest of the units except Vinny.

Anyone playing this game would have to keep an eye on Ansom no matter what. He's the prize. Heck, the reason he was three hexes away is because Parson effectively put him there. Why on Earth he would take his eye off of Ansom is completely beyond me.

[GWvsJohn]

Retask the stack to Ansom. Ansom is clearly more valuable a target than any other unit on the battlefield. He has to enter the stack unjoined to the rest of the units except Vinny.

Anyone playing this game would have to keep an eye on Ansom no matter what. He's the prize. Heck, the reason he was three hexes away is because Parson effectively put him there. Why on Earth he would take his eye off of Ansom is completely beyond me.

Because he doesn't know Ansom knows where the dwagons are.
Beacause he is genuinely surprised when Jill starts the combat and is forced to put all his attention to forming a plan to win that fight.
Because he is distracted by Wanda countermanding him and having to get the Tool's permission.

He isn't sitting at a board deciding whether to attack or not, with only his friends' complaints restricting his time. On some level the fight is real time.

Yet again, the only thing Parson has done wrong is trust Wanda's hold over Jill.

[kunou126]

Well... if anything, now Ansom is extremely vulnerable.

The trap he tried to supply earlier using Jillian as bait has essentially come to fruition. Ansom's move is exhausted, he's over a water tile, any arial unit within range is there, and his Gumps and Woodsy ground support team that are nearby will do him absolutely no good.

He's made a HUGE tactical error in that regards, once again being the hero coming to Jillian's rescue. He's now stranded, without cover, on a stack that is Vinny, Ansom, Jillian, and the 3 Archons, + whatever Gwiffins are with them while Parson has a very large number of healthy dragons within move range... just no warlords to speak of.

Not sure what the chances are that his healthy dragons that were in the hex are going to be able to do against that stack.

[Jasdoif]

That wouldn't have helped all that much if the fort had been in the same location -- fighting through four dwagons (the weakest hex in the original dwagon-ring plan) isn't that much harder than fighting through three of them. However, if he also backed it up a couple hexes (so that fewer forest units could reach), that might have worked.

Was considering this...but then, moving the stack back means each siege strike trip takes an additional two hexes of move. I remember way back, Ansom said there's up to five more moves before they reach the city, and while my counting may be in error I think we're three moves past that right now. There's two moves left: Parson doesn't have time to dilly-dally around with the siege if he needs to stop it before it reaches GK.

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I just realized how Parson could pull this off...all the clues are here.

• The listed forces include only the three warlords, meaning there may be leftover dwagons outside the taskforce.
• The dwagons can reach GK next turn...which means dwagons from GK could reach the stacks next turn.
• Warlords are switching dwagons, meaning that the warlord's movement isn't restricted to their personal move speed.

So, if Parson has two dwagons in reserve at GK...then he can take Toast and Ferdinand to the B-dwagon stacks on his turn, and work over Ansom's siege while Ansom's heavy hitters and their bonuses are hanging out over the lake.

And like the Klog says, the only distinguishing factor between the A and B groups is that the A-dwagons have more move. It's entirely possible, perhaps even likely, that some of the slower B-dwagons are also tougher then the A-dwagons.

[teratorn]

Are you okay with Parson not noticing that the most important enemy unit on the table moved three hexes to reinforce the very unit he was attacking and brought the third most important unit on the table with it when it moved?

We are talking about seconds here. It's different playing on a board or getting the real action.

As I see it, Ansom was not there at the time of first fight (Parson would see him in the stats). Even if Ansom tried to leave his hex and enter the lake the Game won't allow it until first fight is over. Then he is transported in seconds inside the hex and merges stacks. It takes a few seconds for Parson to see him (too late to send a dwagon to block him).

Why didn't Parson anticipate Ansom getting there? Well, he sees the hat is with Webinar so Jillian has no way to convey info (he may not know about the thinkagrams). Were it not for the thinkagrams Ansom would not know they were there.

[mrocktor]

Why on Earth he would take his eye off of Ansom is completely beyond me.

Besides, if the thing is turn based, he does not have to react fast, he gets to task his defense once all attackers are arrayed against him.

We have gone from turn based to strategically turn based tactically real time to completely real time (since Ansom is moving on the map during combat and Parson has to react "fast").

As I said before, I don't like it and let's see where it goes from here.

[JazzManJim]

Because he doesn't know Ansom knows where the dwagons are.
Beacause he is genuinely surprised when Jill starts the combat and is forced to put all his attention to forming a plan to win that fight.
Because he is distracted by Wanda countermanding him and having to get the Tool's permission.

He isn't sitting at a board deciding whether to attack or not, with only his friends' complaints restricting his time. On some level the fight is real time.

Yet again, the only thing Parson has done wrong is trust Wanda's hold over Jill.

Yes, but he can see Ansom heading right at his Dwagon stack. He doens't need to know what Ansom knows. He just needs to see where Ansom is headed, just as he saw where Jillian was headed when she moved in on the Dwagon stack.

Which he does instantly. It doesn't take a lot of brain power to come up with "dogpile the strongest unit in the hex". In fact, it's exactly the same strategy you'd use when Ansom enters your Dwagon Hex.

Which he does nearly-instantly (and the Dwagons don't actually stop moving in on Jillian at that point anyhow, so he didn't lost any time with that).

And he can't talk and keep one eye on the big gold star at the same time?What sort of wargamer is he, anyhow, that he can't track the most important unit on the table while holding a brief conversation or giving a battle order? You and I can do that, I'm sure, and I dare say that if some other *world were to summon a Perfect Warlord, we'd be way down on the PLOT List.

I disagree strongly. Parson had every reason to believe that Wanda was trustworthy in that she's been able to back up her reputation to this point. There's not been an indication that her spell wouldn't work as advertised.

On the other hand, taking your eye off...well...heck, how much more plainly can I put it?

[JazzManJim]

We are talking about seconds here. It's different playing on a board or getting the real action.

As I see it, Ansom was not there at the time of first fight (Parson would see him in the stats). Even if Ansom tried to leave his hex and enter the lake the Game won't allow it until first fight is over. Then he is transported in seconds inside the hex and merges stacks. It takes a few seconds for Parson to see him (too late to send a dwagon to block him).

Why didn't Parson anticipate Ansom getting there? Well, he sees the hat is with Webinar so Jillian has no way to convey info (he may not know about the thinkagrams). Were it not for the thinkagrams Ansom would not know they were there.

Then we've seen Yet Another Improbable Rule Change (or maybe two, since we'd also have to discover that the Big Board doesn't show real-time movement, but is time-delayed a few seconds), and that's pool just as dirty as Parson turning out to be a complete incompetent at real-time war gaming.

[Surfing HalfOrc]

Well... if anything, now Ansom is extremely vulnerable.

The trap he tried to supply earlier using Jillian as bait has essentially come to fruition. Ansom's move is exhausted, he's over a water tile, any arial unit within range is there, and his Gumps and Woodsy ground support team that are nearby will do him absolutely no good.

He's made a HUGE tactical error in that regards, once again being the hero coming to Jillian's rescue. He's now stranded, without cover, on a stack that is Vinny, Ansom, Jillian, and the 3 Archons, + whatever Gwiffins are with them while Parson has a very large number of healthy dragons within move range... just no warlords to speak of.

Not sure what the chances are that his healthy dragons that were in the hex are going to be able to do against that stack.

Um... One Warlord, at the moment: Lady Phat Singh. (Of course, she might not last much longer...)

But having a big a batch of B-dwagons going all auto-attack? Vinny knew he and Ansom were in deep kim-chee earlier in the turn, just because the A-dwagons are about to take a beating doesn't mean that the B's won't be getting payback.

Vinny said that they were evenly matched even with Jillian, the Archons, and all the gwiffins (and orlys?) against the remaining B's. Against the wounded A's, Lady PS, and all the B's doesn't make it any better, especially once the remaining A's heal. It makes it worse.

Ansom might look all heroic right now, but his turn is rapidly coming to an end, and there is a massive boat-load of dwagons about to lay the smackdown on his candy-boop.

CAN YOU SMELL WHAT THE PARSON'S COOKIN'???

[teratorn]

Maybe we should ask Rob to write a klog about this.

Then we've seen Yet Another Improbable Rule Change (or maybe two, since we'd also have to discover that the Big Board doesn't show real-time movement, but is time-delayed a few seconds), and that's pool just as dirty as Parson turning out to be a complete incompetent at real-time war gaming.

????????? What are you talking about. I didn't include any new rule there.

There's no delay, during those seconds Parson is looking at his battle against Jillian. He isn't expecting visitors so he's probably looking at Jill and arranging dwagons to block the Archons. He doesn't know Ansom knows about the lake.

If he doesn't know about the thinkagrams there is no reason for him to expect Ansom (Ansom has no move to risk a guess).

I think Parson "sees" Ansom in the stats before seeing him there.

[ZeroBurn]

Hmm losing interest in the comic.

Funny I don't believe you. Because if you were really loosing interest why would you post? You may be disgusted, annoyed, or something else, but loosing interest you are not.

[berrew]

Then we've seen Yet Another Improbable Rule Change (or maybe two, since we'd also have to discover that the Big Board doesn't show real-time movement, but is time-delayed a few seconds), and that's pool just as dirty as Parson turning out to be a complete incompetent at real-time war gaming.

You are confused. As I mentioned already, this is NOT an RTS. This is a TBS. Pieces have a movement allotment that takes them wherever they wish to be, not because they take less REAL TIME to move from point A to point B, but because they have a given number of move points. Units don't have to start out at daybreak to utilize their movement allotment. They can move 3 hexes in the blink of an eye or over 4 hours. Stop thinking in terms of realtime Earth. I'ts not an "improbable rule", it's the way movement works in any TBS. The only wrinkle here is that it's clear that units in disparate starting hexes (or at least, stacks with leaders) can reinforce each other during combat, though I wager that they only receive leader bonuses from any leaders they are with as they enter the hex.

[Furin_Mirado]

Fortunately for Tool and co., Ansom is still in serious trouble. IF they still have enough gwiffons so Ansom and Vinnie can switch mounts then they also need to be healthy enough after this battle to fly through the hex of B dwagons to get back to the column. Punching through that hex would be too risky and even passing through is going to be tough if Ansom and co. are too wounded from their current struggle. If they don't rejoin the column for defensive support then they're looking at a lot of B dwagons coming down on them and I don't think Ansom's group can handle that after fighting to finish off the A dwagons.

In other words, I'm still holding out a lot of hope for Parson to get his decisive win at Gobwin Knob.

[Bongos]

Wanda uncroaks the dwagons like Xykon! Do it!