Book 2 – Text Updates 024

[Welf von Ehrwald]

Poor Wrigley, so his story ends. At least he was happy and could insert his spear into a woman once.

[ftl]

It seems to me that the Uncwoaked troops are handling being leaderless better than normal troops. They have a natural fanaticism, a fearless nature. Does this mean that Tramenis will have a harder time rolling over them than he thinks? It could be kind of a nasty surprise.

No, decrypted troops seem to be handling being leaderless about the same way that normal troops would.

Remember what we've always heard - unled troops automatically engage in combat. That's exactly what happened. As long as there were commanders around, the troops could be kept around in reserve. Once all the warlords croaked, unled stacks automatically attacked. That's not specific to uncroaked or decrypted.

[Dante]

One wonders if the enemy leader that Wrigley speared was named Mint.

Nah. The joke, as before, is that Wrigley has never used his spear. Therefore, Wrigley's spear is mint.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Wow.

For a moment there I almost thought Wrigley had done Tremmennis in. Now THAT would've been a shocker.

Wrigley rules!

Rob, you just found your diamond character, the one nobody expected to mean much, but everyone loves.

Yeah, and it's amazing how regular this pattern is (Sammy, Wrigley, You Know Who ...)*. Is this just a usual "rooting for the underdog" bias or does it speak more about this specific audience? Liking characters that are mere pawns caught adrift amidst irresistible and often incomprehensible historical flows ... do they remind us of anyone?

Then they are quite reliably killed off. Makes for good story economy.

And, amazingly, drama.

*: one exception- Slately. Some people like 'im but that's not the usual reaction. I suppose that by being a king, Slately can't claim with conviction to be a mere pawn of history.

[KiltedNinja]

d'aaw, makes me all warm and fuzzy, in a morbid sort of way.

My sentiments exactly


It's nice to see yet another example of how Rob's writing takes you to various different places ; some moments really funny and silly, some moments epic and explosive, some moments dark and sorrowful... Some moments just "wtf?" And then moments like this where it's seemingly mutually explusive concepts of sad and happy at the same time..... All these moments seem very nicely fused and flow really well. Respect to ya Mr Erfworld Man *tips hat*

[oslecamo2]

Yeah, and it's amazing how regular this pattern is (Sammy, Wrigley, You Know Who ...)*. Is this just a usual "rooting for the underdog" bias or does it speak more about this specific audience? Liking characters that are mere pawns caught adrift amidst irresistible and often incomprehensible historical flows ... do they remind us of anyone?

Then they are quite reliably killed off. Makes for good story economy.

Actualy, I believe it's one of the main points of the story. This is war and people die even tough everything is cuty-fuzzy.

And those people dying aren't just faceless mooks. They each have their own dreams and mind and ambition. But that doesn't stop the cruel erfworld from taking them.

It's not about introducing interesting characters and them discarding them. It's about showing that people are dying in the middle of all this conflict, not just mindless game miniatures.

Unless your name is Jillian of course, in wich case you can do pretty much everything you want and you won't die no matter how foolish it is.

[zilfallon]

Unless your name is Jillian of course, in wich case you can do pretty much everything you want and you won't die no matter how foolish it is.

I totally agree with that

[Dr Pepper]

One wonders if the enemy leader that Wrigley speared was named Mint.

Heh.

[Lawd]

Wrigley came back, and he was no less free in his second life as an Uncroaked, than he was in his first life as a regular unit.

Yes, I thought exactly the same thing. He still has the same goals and single-mindedness.

EDIT: Oh, and great art with all the chaos-filled battle.

[Dancing Cthulhu]

Alas, Wrigley, the Titans have taken you again far to soon. Every named character shall have a resolution of some sort, for the writers are truly great. Excellent update. It does seem a fitting close for Wrigley, and it was nice seeing into his head again, although it was "the more things change the more they stay the same" for him (other then being happier this time).

I wonder if he got the nameless, 1st lv Jetstone Warlord. I couldn't tell for sure if it was implying he used his spear to kill her or just kill someone, anyone (just have to use that spear once). It looks he succeeded either way.

I do wonder who that good 1st lv warlord was. Perhaps she was the one we saw mourning the loss of Oss. I'm going to assume so. Now that just leaves the fate of I. Brows (my personal Scarlet of book two) - until it is shown otherwise I'm going to believe it was he who chopped off Ford's leg.

Nice to see some more detail on the battle -Ford tried to rush at Trem but got taken out by another Jetstone stack. Sounds like the whole battle went pretty much Jetstone's way from the word go and they few men and women, a good result.

Well, that's an interesting insight into unlead stacks. Also, looks like ford took an enemy warlord with him after all.

I don't know, that seems like something Wrigley would mention/think on - more important and inspiring then the fact he stabbed and failed to kill the LFN that squashed him, since it would be the one success to come out of Ford's action (charge stopped before getting anywhere near the target, getting his leg cut off and then getting dusted).

Trammenis is very much a warlord and has no cape. Duncan too.

I don't think they count as normal warlords - chief warlords/princes/princesses tend to have very individualistic looks, while the rest of the Jetstone warlords we have seen have a very similar uniforme. Which isn't to say I disagree - though as I say above I'm not fully sure what the result was. I'm assuming after this battle we'll see Trem getting a report on the losses.

So we see a lowly stabber kill a level 1 warlord. We knew this battle was going to be over fast and it was interesting to see that the forces that where left at the bridge knew that after loosing all their leadership. Nice to see the battle wrap up here but how well everyone react to the return of Parson, the man who brought down Ansom? I feel that everyone but Charlie is going to take this decision worth a grain of salt until it is to late.

They might not even know the significance, unless Parson makes a habit of telling them. We don't know if Ansom communicated with his father and brothers that GK had a strange CW by the name of Parson.

And those people dying aren't just faceless mooks. They each have their own dreams and mind and ambition. But that doesn't stop the cruel erfworld from taking them.

It's not about introducing interesting characters and them discarding them. It's about showing that people are dying in the middle of all this conflict, not just mindless game miniatures.

Well said.

[splintermute]

I was hoping Wrigley would survive to some future battle, and eventually confront the Dittomancer, only to fall to an elaborate Doublemint spell.

At least he died happy.

[HandofShadows]

I suspected Wrigley would be showing up some time or another in the arc. Nice to know he got to use his spear this time around, but it's still sad to the little stabber go. The vib I am getting from this text update is the Wanda is not the one putting the fanatical loyalty in their Decypted minds. I reall think the Arkenpliers is doing it on it's own.

[The Black Hand]

Wrigley rules!

Rob, you just found your diamond character, the one nobody expected to mean much, but everyone loves.

Kind'a like the Barneys (the Black Mesa security guards) from the original Half-Life.

They were meant to be disposable - somewhat capable fighters, but mainly sponges for enemy fire.

Valve/Sierra never expected the players to get attached to the Barneys, but a lot of them did . . .

[oslecamo2]

Trammenis is very much a warlord and has no cape. Duncan too.

I don't think they count as normal warlords - chief warlords/princes/princesses tend to have very individualistic looks, while the rest of the Jetstone warlords we have seen have a very similar uniforme. Which isn't to say I disagree - though as I say above I'm not fully sure what the result was. I'm assuming after this battle we'll see Trem getting a report on the losses.

In book 1 Webinar and her girlfriend don't have capes either. I support the theory that capes=high level warlords/units. Ossomer for example had a cape, as well as Ansom, both being the strongest princes of Jetstone, while Tramenis the diplomat probably sees little frontline action and thus must be just medium level.

Also there's the smile of the stabber. That's not the smile of just killing a random enemy mook. That's the smile of someone who managed to kill a much more valuable unit than himself. For a basic soldier in Erfworld, killing an enemy leader must indeed feel like the Titans are smiling upon you, even if you're doomed to get croacked next.

Kinda reminds me of Bogroll, wich seemed specialy enthusiastic when he performs the suicide attack on Ansom. He knew he wouldn't make out of it alive, but being able to take down the biggest unit of the enemy felt like a great honor to him.

[Oxuma]

I've been following Erfworld since page 1, book 1. Yet, it was this text upade that made me sing in just to say: that was beautiful.

[DevilDan]

Wonderful. What a perfect grace note of a vignette.

The vib I am getting from this text update is the Wanda is not the one putting the fanatical loyalty in their Decypted minds. I reall think the Arkenpliers is doing it on it's own.

It's been shown that the fanaticism of the Decrypted can be an inconvenience even to Wanda. If she were crafting their new mindset, wouldn't she just the Titans with herself in their pantheon?

[Salvage]

Graet Update and Im glad Wrigley got to stab something.

[Ichthus]

And that's what Wrigley's spear meant, by gum...

[danielkaplan123]

After reading Wrigley's account, though cloaked in bhakti "for the titans", from my perspective Rob is really fucking Zen or channeling such.

[KeiranHalcyon31]

Pretty sure we've seen Wrigley before in the summer updates. Too bad he didn't do better for himself. C'est la vie.

I fixed it for you (personal pet peeve).

Well, that's an interesting insight into unlead stacks. Also, looks like ford took an enemy warlord with him after all.

I don't know, that seems like something Wrigley would mention/think on - more important and inspiring then the fact he stabbed and failed to kill the LFN that squashed him, since it would be the one success to come out of Ford's action (charge stopped before getting anywhere near the target, getting his leg cut off and then getting dusted).

No no, he meant, assuming Wrigley managed to kill a warlord, that Ford's plan resulted in a warlord's death.