Book 2 – Page 39

[Oberon]

I'd say you're thinking like an earthling and not like an Erfworlder. I'd say it would likely be created with a thinka-looka-FOOLAmancer link.

They were created using exactly that combination. It may be possible to "re-tune" the existing eyebooks to perform encryption/decryption processing without needing the trimancer link re-established.

And when your best attempt at encryption is foiled by a veiled Archon floating nearby, then what?

[ftl]

I'd say you're thinking like an earthling and not like an Erfworlder. I'd say it would likely be created with a thinka-looka-FOOLAmancer link.

They were created using exactly that combination. It may be possible to "re-tune" the existing eyebooks to perform encryption/decryption processing without needing the trimancer link re-established.

And when your best attempt at encryption is foiled by a veiled Archon floating nearby, then what?

How would a veiled archon floating nearby foil the encryption? If the veiled archon is floating in your hex and can see your eyebook as you're communicating on it, you've got worse problems than lack of encryption.

[Hiai]

But, um, why wouldn't Charlie have cast Kingworld to end the GK turn before he lost all those Archons, the 'Pliers, Parson, and the mathamancy bracer? I mean, he had a dozen mathamancy results due, and he is presented as being oh, so calculating. Why did he end turn and thus lose all the Archons in the airspace?

Because he was unable to. Charlie has no turnamancers. He hired one, later on, AFTER Wanda came into the 'pliers and went on a rampage and killed Vanna's ruler, thus making her available for hire, then had to get her transported via Jillian to the spot she needed to be, all in secret while maintaining a link. Not exactly a spell one can pull out of one's ass, no?

Despite what you and Bland and a few others have been saying, it cost ALOT for Charlie to get Kingworld done. He had to ally with Jillian, he had to hire a Turnamancer (it's obvious there's not alot of them floating around without a ruler in the Magic Kingdom, or there'd be a whole lot more sides using them), he had to transport said Turnamancer all the way to where she was to be deployed while staying linked. And we have it from the Archon's point of view that while he was linked, there was a complete blackout.

So, not only did he have to come up with the idea first (probably only conceived after observing Parson's idea with the volcano), he had to then make all kinds of maneuvers to set it up to be used, including not only planning for each random factor in making it happen, but also for the exact correct time to deploy it. On top of that little "Hail Mary" he threw, to good effect, he had to stay essentially blind to his whole operation for an entire turn. That alone could prove disastrous to an operation like Charlie's, and would guarantee that he doesn't want to use it often, even if circumstances prove it possible to do again soon, and it would have the profound effect that it did this time. Unlikely scenarios abound.

The cost and opportunity for using Kingworld aside, Charlie has now come up with an alternative "escalation" of spells, as one might expect after viewing Parson's Big Bang. Like the initial bombing of Japanese cities by the Enola Gay, the battle, maybe even that portion of the war, was won. But it kicked off an arms race (should it be called spell race?) in the same way, as well. So we can naturally expect escalations galore, until Armageddon. As it is on Earth, so it is in Erfworld.

One might easily argue that Oppenheimer did an asspull when his team produced the atomic bomb. One could argue the same about the Gatling gun. Or mustard gas. Or gun powder. Or the longbow. Or cavalry. In any case, technology and innovation are often produced during times of war, because somehow, the need to survive the enemy's attacks tends to override any scruples one might have about introducing a "whole new level of deadly" into the mix.

Here, we substitute spells and innovative exploits for technology. But it is an arms race, just the same, and one started by Parson. Crying because Charlie happens to be as innovative and flexible as Parson, in his own way, is disingenuous. The truth is, we know nothing, really, about what Charlie was planning or doing before Parson Happened. Fun to speculate, but no way to know. And it doesn't matter, anyhow. The story is about what happens AFTER Parson arrives, and what we see is always a direct result. Charlie can "asspull" anything he wants, if it's a natural outgrowth of what his stated capabilities seem to be. We've seen enough to know he has many weaknesses, as well. Expect many more innovations not only from Charlie, but from other sides as well. This is the story about the scramble to react to a catastrophic new nuke, not the story about how "Erf has always been". Whine about OP and asspull when Charlie tames a dwagon or decrypts an army.

And, btw, BLAND, since when did having someone disagree with ONE of your dislikes automatically put them into the "them" category, as in "US, the awesome always right people, the good side" and "THEM, the losers who never have any good points but convince themselves they are right only by mutual sycophancy"?

Sheesh, talk about your false dichotomies. Maybe you are a little overly emotionally invested?

[BLANDCorporatio]

And, btw, BLAND, since when did having someone disagree with ONE of your dislikes automatically put them into the "them" category, as in "US, the awesome always right people, the good side" and "THEM, the losers who never have any good points but convince themselves they are right only by mutual sycophancy"?

Sheesh, talk about your false dichotomies. Maybe you are a little overly emotionally invested?

Indeed, I am. I like this comic and would hate to see it go in a puff of magic smoke. That, and also-

Whine about OP and asspull when Charlie tames a dwagon or decrypts an army.

As in, you (BLAND et al) are whining now and shouldn't be. When enough posters, not just you now (I'll chalk that up to you being provoked by me, so it's cool) beat me over the head with that while high-fiving each other on their so insightful points, well I think I earned the right to be snarky right back.

Hey, in limited doses it's fun for a while.

[zilfallon]

Despite what you and Bland and a few others have been saying, it cost ALOT for Charlie to get Kingworld done. He had to ally with Jillian, he had to hire a Turnamancer (it's obvious there's not alot of them floating around without a ruler in the Magic Kingdom, or there'd be a whole lot more sides using them), he had to transport said Turnamancer all the way to where she was to be deployed while staying linked. And we have it from the Archon's point of view that while he was linked, there was a complete blackout.

The story we're reading is taking in a small part of Erfworld. It is called "Great Western Conflict", so at best, the terrain we know is 1/4 of erfworld.
You are saying that there were NO Turnamancer in the whole booping Erfworld before Wanda liberated one? Seems unlikely to me...

[BLANDCorporatio]

Setting the cost discussion aside, as all of that was either really minor (really. Charlie was offline for like a moment) or off-screen,

One might easily argue that Oppenheimer did an asspull when his team produced the atomic bomb. One could argue the same about the Gatling gun. Or mustard gas. Or gun powder. Or the longbow. Or cavalry. In any case, technology and innovation are often produced during times of war, because somehow, the need to survive the enemy's attacks tends to override any scruples one might have about introducing a "whole new level of deadly" into the mix.

One might, but I don't.

What those examples forget to mention is several things:

a) most technology has foreshadowing. Example, nukes. The possibility of nukes was known since about 1907 (or 191x, whatever). Several teams were at work, all at once, at least in the USA, in Germany, and Russia (yep. Sakharov's design was actually ahead of its time and would be useful for the H-bomb, later). It's not an asspull when physics lets everyone know way in advance what the score is.

b) sometimes, not often but sometimes, real life DOES look like a lapse in story-writing. An example, I think the Inca regarded the Conquistadors' horses with about as much puzzlement as I do a certain spell. That the horses themselves played less a part in the conquest is another topic. What is relevant to the discussion is that stories are not necessarily written like real-life.

c) Technology improvement is but a small part of what wins a war. It's important, it is spurned by warfare but, in the end, it comes down to demographics, logistics, finances first, other factors second.

To expand on stories are not written like real life, in stories it's not demo-logi-fina that would settle a war, but it's still the heroic resolve of the protagonists- not the magic/tech they have available. If we were talking about Star Wars, for all the Force Chocking, Jumping, Telekinesis, Mind-Tricks, Lightning and Lightsaber duels, with planet busters in the background, the conflict is resolved by willpower, by redemption, by loyalty. Not magic (or tech, which is the same).

[DevilDan]

A few notes for Oberon:

If Erworld were LotR we wouldn't really care this much. We loved the constant reversals in the first book, and for my money the uncroaked volcano will likely always be the real greatest a--pull of this novel, except that it was always a caldera. I mean, come on, it's such a tremendous stretch to call "active" "alive" and "dormant" "dead" when talking about a volcano. "Constipated" is a more apt metaphor. Which brings us full circle to the idea of an a--pull, I guess.

With enough money, intelligence, and planning, Charlie could conquer Erf. The question stands as it always does: What is his motivation? That aside, even the panoply of powers shown by archons would not be nearly enough to conquer a whole world, they simply aren't flexible enough. Now, if he starts making allies of all tribes like he did with the Western Giants (and with the marbits?)...

Speaking of which, what more explanation than "terms as agreed upon" do we need? One way or another, Charlie made them an offer they couldn't refuse, whether it was bribery, coercion, plain old turnamancy of leaders, misinformation, or sheer persuasiveness. And as for remote links: How do we know it can't be done by any thinkamancer with sufficient skill?

[Nihila]

If Erworld were LotR we wouldn't really care this much. We loved the constant reversals in the first book, and for my money the uncroaked volcano will likely always be the real greatest a--pull of this novel, except that it was always a caldera. I mean, come on, it's such a tremendous stretch to call "active" "alive" and "dormant" "dead" when talking about a volcano. "Constipated" is a more apt metaphor. Which brings us full circle to the idea of an a--pull, I guess.

Well, if a volcano on Earth has the faultline or hot spot move away from its location, then that volcano is dead. Extinct.

One might easily argue that Oppenheimer did an asspull when his team produced the atomic bomb. One could argue the same about the Gatling gun. Or mustard gas. Or gun powder. Or the longbow. Or cavalry. In any case, technology and innovation are often produced during times of war, because somehow, the need to survive the enemy's attacks tends to override any scruples one might have about introducing a "whole new level of deadly" into the mix.

No. Just no. The longbow was foreshadowed by the regular bow, which was around since people decided to hunt. Gunpowder was picked up from an "ancient book of spells," or, of sorts. Cavalry was heavily foreshadowed, people used horses to pull plows before chariots, to pull chariots before riding them, rode them before stirrups and saddles. Need I go on?

Despite what you and Bland and a few others have been saying, it cost ALOT for Charlie to get Kingworld done. He had to ally with Jillian, he had to hire a Turnamancer (it's obvious there's not alot of them floating around without a ruler in the Magic Kingdom, or there'd be a whole lot more sides using them), he had to transport said Turnamancer all the way to where she was to be deployed while staying linked. And we have it from the Archon's point of view that while he was linked, there was a complete blackout.

The Archon thought that Charlie had been linked from the end of the RCC's last turn. So, that's, what, 12 hours, maybe less. Wow, what an amazing cost. There is so much chance of something happening at night, while no one has Move and everyone's asleep. And, if your enemy attacks the hex, well, that's exactly what you want. I really don't see that as such a burden on Charlie.

b) sometimes, not often but sometimes, real life DOES look like a lapse in story-writing. An example, I think the Inca regarded the Conquistadors' horses with about as much puzzlement as I do a certain spell. That the horses themselves played less a part in the conquest is another topic. What is relevant to the discussion is that stories are not necessarily written like real-life.

Maybe a better example would be the steel that Pizarro used. Like, suddenly you see your king's personal bodyguard get chopped in half with one swing of a weapon. And then it keeps happening. However, the Conquistadores did not make a very exciting piece of Earth's history, it was just "Yay, we kill your numberless horde!" "Boo hoo, we die horribly," which, all in all, could use some more plot development. That's my objection to arms races in general. They're only exciting if your idea of excitement is Mutually Assured Destruction.

[splintermute]

However, the Conquistadores did not make a very exiting piece of Earth's history, it was just "Yay, we kill your numberless horde!" "Boo hoo, we die horribly," which, all in all, could use some more plot development. That's my objection to arms races in general. They're only exiting if your idea of excitement is Mutually Assured Destruction.

How do you misspell exciting twice, and then spell excitement correctly?

Sorry, I'm just grumpy this morning.

[Nihila]

However, the Conquistadores did not make a very exiting piece of Earth's history, it was just "Yay, we kill your numberless horde!" "Boo hoo, we die horribly," which, all in all, could use some more plot development. That's my objection to arms races in general. They're only exiting if your idea of excitement is Mutually Assured Destruction.

How do you misspell exciting twice, and then spell excitement correctly?

Sorry, I'm just grumpy this morning.

Err... Moderate stupidity, layered onto sleepiness and insanity. I will fix that... now. Thanks!

[Banjooie]

I just sorta view the comic like--

'Parson wins the Battle of Gobwin Knob by destroying the entire siege before they even get there.'

'Now redo the battle, except Jillian destroys the dwagons over the lake. Difficulty+!'
'Now redo the battle, under New Condition: No Dwagons after this point.'
...
'Now redo the battle, under New Condition: Archons can teach Dance-Fighting'

So the obstacles don't really bother me because it basically boils down to 'We know Parson already won, but let's try a higher difficulty mode'

[robak]

I mean, come on, it's such a tremendous stretch to call "active" "alive" and "dormant" "dead" when talking about a volcano. "Constipated" is a more apt metaphor. Which brings us full circle to the idea of an a--pull, I guess.

Ah, Sizemores other specialty...
Maybe with the Arkenchamberpot attuned to Sizemore he can perform any a--pull he likes.

[effataigus]

Hmm, this discussion is increasingly selling me on the idea that Charlescomm isn't "just another side." Parson mentioned the game that he was going to run was designed to repeatedly cheat the players out of a standard victory, so perhaps Charlie is just taking over the GM's role (old idea, I know)... as Oberon points out, every time one of Parson's good ideas has been smooshed Charlie was involved in the smooshing. This kinda worries me because I have a minor objection to every possibility for how this situation could have arisen:

1. Charlie is just another side with his own motivations, units, and powers.
I hope this is true, but it is getting to be awkward storytelling if so because he is built like an invisible omnipresent plot device. The term Schrodinger's location was apt... if the location probability distribution was the square of the plot function.

2. Charlie is a game balance mechanic/difficulty slider with the objective of defeating Parson.
I mention this possibility only to shoot it down... Charlie could have crushed GK and Parson back in book one... this is clearly not Charlescomm's main objective.

3. Charlie is a game balance mechanic/difficulty slider with the objective of making Parson tell a good story.
A very interesting idea from a story perspective, but it would cheapen it for me if a good story were told. It's kinda like going to Vegas with the express intent of "getting an awesome story out of it." Anything you do on that trip will be lot less genuine and awesome for having that as a goal.

I kinda hope it is option 1, and I kinda think it is option 3. This is a slight worry for me, but Oberon's retelling of Star Wars/LoTR would be taking my objection to option 1 too far. Erfworld hasn't been a millionth as heavyhanded with its sudden reversals and, to me, has always been awesome (regardless of whichever objection applies, if any). Really, as long as it's not option 4, I'm happy:

4. Charlie and Parson collectively maintain a backdrop of war and turmoil in which Jillian's touching love stories are set.

Ah, Sizemores other specialty...

nice

Two random ideas:

I haven't played that many TBS games, but the only one I did play a lot of had an economic victory option. It was kinda dumb (like beating Civ by colonizing Mars), but once a player had enough money they could just buy out the world's economies and the game ended... possible Charlescomm objective?

If Charlie is another player is it possible that he is either entering cheat codes or scaling down the difficulty of the game as he goes on? This might account for how he seems to be getting powers as he needs them.

[Carne]

4. Charlie and Parson collectively maintain a backdrop of war and turmoil in which Jillian's touching love stories are set.

I think this one is my favorite

I'd say you're thinking like an earthling and not like an Erfworlder. I'd say it would likely be created with a thinka-looka-FOOLAmancer link.

They were created using exactly that combination. It may be possible to "re-tune" the existing eyebooks to perform encryption/decryption processing without needing the trimancer link re-established.

And when your best attempt at encryption is foiled by a veiled Archon floating nearby, then what?

So your solution is Don't Try, because maybe there's a veiled Archon around every time you open an eyebook? Sounds rather self-defeating. Plus you could say the same about all other communication methods (relays, scouts, hats etc.) But, even taking that into account, there may be some cheap Foolamancy trick to put on the eyebook output that prevents anyone but GK units from seeing the real text. Sort of like a privacy screen for a monitor.

No solution might be perfect, but the main objective is to secure the communications between the eyebooks, assuming Thinkagrams are unreliable.

[Ansan Gotti]

For about the 5th time: I'm not complaining about Charlie's relative power. I'm complaining about the constant reversals of fortune and the unnecessary escalation of power.

Since we seem to be rehashing old ground, here is an old exchange between us that I believe illustrates the issue very clearly. The below is from the Book 2, Page 4 (yes, THAT long ago) Reactions thread.

--

Yes, Parson set up his game to place his players in an unwinnable situation. This was what he called "cheating", it does not imply that the rules were being changed, but that the odds were very heavily stacked. As explained, no conventional tactics would win, not because of any Dieu Ex Machina meddling by some otherworldly force, but simply due to the enormous odds. This was the framework, and the volcano was the means to the win. The DDR wasn't bogus because it was a cheat, it was bogus because it does not fit within the framework of the story. If we accept the DDR at face value, we have to also accept the following:
1) That Wanda, Sizemore, and Maggy were ignorant of Archon abilities while Ansom, a non-casting warlord knew all about them;
- This is implausible. They are all bright and powerful casters. Wanda is proficient in many forms of magic, Sizemore likes to learn about all kinds of things, and Maggy is a caster of the same sort as Archons draw many of their abilities from.
2) That Erfworld unit stats and specials are visible, to the point where rank and file units knew they they had to burn Bogroll (and yes, I'm aware that his Regeneration special ability was retconned. But it was not retconned atthe time he was being burned.), but that Archon abilities are somehow not visible.
- This special ability to hide of their abilities vrom view isn't discussed anywhere, including in the Summer update where their abilities are discussed.
Face it, their ability to lead troops via DDR just doesn't fit within the framework of the story. It breaks suspension of disbelief by throwing known facts away and substituting new ones with no explanation. This is poor writing.

You are apparently either unaware of, or refusing to acknowledge, the author's own words as conveyed through the protagonist, Parson. Here, let me requote them.

"That, um, game I was developing at home... It HAD rules. But it couldn't be won within the rules. I wanted a game where the players had to surprise the GM with lateral thinking. So I was essentially gonna CHEAT them. Undermine everything they tried. Until they found a clever enough way to cheat ME. To break my rules, and win."

It's not just a question of the odds being heavily stacked. They certainly were. It's the fact that on top of that, the GM would UNDERMINE EVERYTHING THEY TRIED. The players could come up with some amazing conventional gambits -- just like Parson did -- and things would seem like they were looking up every single time. Look at the dwagon donut. The psyops campaign. The tunnel trap. The uncroaked on the walls. The Air Wanda Expeditionary Force. The “shock and crap” guerilla strikes. The troop rotation withdrawal. The Thriller defense. The “tower down” scorched earth desperation ploy. All of these gambits were good to brilliant ploys, based on conventional (albeit at times innovative) tactics.

And every single time, Ansom and the RCC would undermine them and riposte. It got to the point where it was just painfully, eye-rollingly bad. Again, I was vocal about how bad it was, and I was this close to giving up on the comic.

Balder turned it all around, however, when it became crystal clear that ALL OF THIS was deliberate authorial intent, in order to convey the underlying point: of course we were frustrated as readers, of course this was getting ridiculous. It was INTENDED to be ridiculous. It was a feature, not a bug. The game was cheating. Not in the sense of breaking the rules, but in the sense that the GM would very conveniently do the precise thing necessary to foil the players. Every single time.

Most RPGers will have experienced a situation where the GM had an agenda, whether it was to railroad a certain plot point through, or to save the life of a certain Big Bad NPC, or to make sure the PCs don’t accomplish a certain goal. In situations like that, the players tend to get very frustrated. Just like Parson. Just like us readers because we are intended to identify with Parson Gotti (an anagram for “Protagonist,” and really, who else could it be, given that we are all webcomic readers, many of whom enjoy gaming and fantasy).

And sometimes, the GM agenda gets so blatant, so obvious, that the players just throw up their hands and quit, or effectively upset the gaming table. “Rocks fall, everybody dies,” as Parson himself says. Or sometimes -- very rarely -- the players do something that is SO brilliant, SO unconventional, that a good GM has no choice but to laugh and go with the flow.

Regarding your claim that the DDR concept breaks the rules, again, I totally disagree. (I also totally disagree with your “that hex” semantics argument, but that is somewhat peripheral, so I will simply leave it at that.) Archons were well established as having the ability to project thinkagrams and images. Warlords were well established as being able to dance fight, and Parson even admits that ALMOST no one (as opposed to a categorical no one) in the RCC could dance fight.

The fact that probably none of us saw it coming (including the casters), that no one in Erfworld had done it before, doesn’t mean that it breaks the rules. In actuality, Ansom’s gambit was brilliant. Innovative. Used a perfect pop culture reference which is totally in keeping with the tone of the webcomic. And if Parson had done it, most of us would have been totally cheering. It only frustrated us because by then, most of us were just totally sick of seeing Ansom pull yet another rabbit out of his boop.

You only support my point. Parson was sending Wanda to do a thing. If it was so trivial for the enemy to counter by having their own units do the exact same thing, Parson would not have been counting on this as an edge. The exchange would have gone like this: Parson "Wanda, go lead the undead in a dance fight, that will let us hold the courtyard!" Wanda "And what's your brilliant plan once the RCC troops start dance fighting also? It'll be even unit odds again, they they still have the numbers."
Get it?

Once again, I’ll let the author’s words through Parson rebut your argument.

http://www.erfworld.com/book-1-archive/?px=%2F124.jpg

Read panels 6-10. Sometimes the enemy pulls a fast one that you didn’t see coming, and sometimes you lose a battle. Parson is not omniscient, and neither is Wanda. Ansom pulled a good one. The fact that it frustrated most of us to no end as we were living through it real-time does not make it bad writing. On the contrary, the fact that it provoked such strong feelings and was deliberate and planned out from the beginning makes it excellent writing.

--

You are apparently either unaware of, or refusing to acknowledge, the author's own words as conveyed through the protagonist, Parson. Here, let me requote them.

"That, um, game I was developing at home... It HAD rules. But it couldn't be won within the rules. I wanted a game where the players had to surprise the GM with lateral thinking. So I was essentially gonna CHEAT them. Undermine everything they tried. Until they found a clever enough way to cheat ME. To break my rules, and win."

I did indeed read this, and I accept it at face value. It supports my position perfectly. You, however, have read into it things which are not there. Yes, Parson uses the word CHEAT, but look at the context. Did he say that the rules would be changed? No. He very specifically says that the situation was simply one which could not be won within the rules. If you decide to read into this that established limitations of units would change to cheat the GK side, you're stretching, reaching far beyond the Protagonists own words. It's you who are refusing to acknowledge the author's own words as conveyed through the protagonist, Parson.
Once the rules are understood, they must remain. To have them change is to invoke Dieu Ex Machina, the fiddling with the very framework of the story by forces suddenly introduced. The RCC side could not dance fight. Parson knew this, he based his plan on it, and his casters who could see Archon abilities just by looking at them and are also completely familiar with the mechanics of Erf supported his plan. And then the DDR came. This is flawed writing.

You do understand, don't you, that Parson is not omniscient and not perfect? And that sometimes -- especially for a person with limited understanding of Erfworld -- he is going to get it wrong, and lose a battle?

Ansom made a good move, one that Parson didn't see or count on. He might have even revolutionized warfare with his new tactic, just like Parson has on multiple occasions (casters leading stacks typically hadn't been done; dwagon express typically hadn't been done; now they are becoming more standard and commonplace, just like Archons leading dance-fights might become). That isn't changing the rules. That's just applying the rules effectively in a different way. "Can project a warlord dance-fighting on a carpet" isn't a unit stat anyone is going to see, just like a unit looking at Sizemore isn't going to see, "can collapse tunnels on people's heads." They will see dirtamancy. How you apply that dirtamancy, however, is the essence of tactics.

The fact that the RCC had effectively countered Parson every single time up until the end makes Ansom a pretty decent leader; but it also reflects Parson's quote, in which the GM was undermining the protagonist every single time. That doesn't support your point of DEM; that supports my point, that it was planned by the author from the beginning.

The fact that YOU didn't see it doesn't make it DEM. It was clearly foreshadowed and planned, and was deliberate authorial intent. It's the type of thing that MOST people can see and appreciate after-the-fact. And that is good writing.

Awww, did I hurt your hero? Grow up.

He's right. You ARE being rude. I really don't think you'd be acting this way in person.

--

(Since I posted the "Wall o' Text," I win, right?)

[Nihila]

@Ansan Gotti: Help! Wall of Text falls, everybody dies!

If Charlie is another player is it possible that he is either entering cheat codes or scaling down the difficulty of the game as he goes on? This might account for how he seems to be getting powers as he needs them.

Wait. The Arkendish extends Thinkamancy not to the Matter axis, but into Naughtymancy, Numbers. Everything is explained. With the Arkendish, Charlie can use limited forms of Retconjuration. Charlie just doesn't know this yet, as it only applies to the meta-level: when Charlie needs a new ability, not only does he get it, he has always had it, but he could not use it in the past because he didn't have it then. Make sense?

When he needs Archons within move range, the wave function of those Archon's locations collapses onto the location he needs-retroactively. His move orders from the future become retroactive, so his Archons are there in the past.

[MarbitChow]

(While I love to argue, those who have expressed their opinions about why they dislike the KW spell have done so eloquently and validly, so I'm going to just talk about positives in the story as I see them.)

Vanna is a turnamancer, based on Vanna White, from the show Wheel of Fortune.
Wheel of Fortune is a modern day gameshow, and also an ancient idea about capricious reversal of fortune.
Vanna was designed to be the instrument of a turn-based magic that caused a complete reversal of fortune.

The fact that all of these elements (turnamancy/turning letters/Wheel of Fortune/end-of-turn) mesh so well, and the fact that the larger "pun" (Wheel of Fortune spell to reverse fortune) was obscured by the smaller/obvious pun (Vanna the Turnamancer because she turns letters) until after it hit, makes Vanna my second-favorite plot device to date, with the Volcano being the first.

[zilfallon]

Nihila: An interesting theory, however i find it very unlikely. We know that only Titans are able to use Retconjuration as a fact.
I don't really see a problem with him having enough Archon's wherever he needs. This question has same answer as how Faq keeped the right city veiled: Predictamancy.
Although he wouldn't need Predictamancy most of time. He is a smart man, he handles most sides communications and can track others, and he probably has a good understanding of game mechanics, so he doesn't need a predictamancer/mathamancer to have enough troops stationed everywhere. He has 1 city, and it's guarded by cloth golems, spell defences and a few archons. So those 600 Archons are scattered all across the Erfworld.

[ftl]

(While I love to argue, those who have expressed their opinions about why they dislike the KW spell have done so eloquently and validly, so I'm going to just talk about positives in the story as I see them.)

Vanna is a turnamancer, based on Vanna White, from the show Wheel of Fortune.
Wheel of Fortune is a modern day gameshow, and also an ancient idea about capricious reversal of fortune.
Vanna was designed to be the instrument of a turn-based magic that caused a complete reversal of fortune.

The fact that all of these elements (turnamancy/turning letters/Wheel of Fortune/end-of-turn) mesh so well, and the fact that the larger "pun" (Wheel of Fortune spell to reverse fortune) was obscured by the smaller/obvious pun (Vanna the Turnamancer because she turns letters) until after it hit, makes Vanna my second-favorite plot device to date, with the Volcano being the first.

Hah! Good call. I like it.

[Chris Goodwin]

(While I love to argue, those who have expressed their opinions about why they dislike the KW spell have done so eloquently and validly, so I'm going to just talk about positives in the story as I see them.)

Vanna is a turnamancer, based on Vanna White, from the show Wheel of Fortune.
Wheel of Fortune is a modern day gameshow, and also an ancient idea about capricious reversal of fortune.
Vanna was designed to be the instrument of a turn-based magic that caused a complete reversal of fortune.

The fact that all of these elements (turnamancy/turning letters/Wheel of Fortune/end-of-turn) mesh so well, and the fact that the larger "pun" (Wheel of Fortune spell to reverse fortune) was obscured by the smaller/obvious pun (Vanna the Turnamancer because she turns letters) until after it hit, makes Vanna my second-favorite plot device to date, with the Volcano being the first.

This was telegraphed in October of 2009, where Vanna was originally named:

My casters' names are Vanna, a Turnamancer, Jeftichew, a Carnymancer, Bowie, a Changemancer, and Spenser, a Findamancer.

Interestingly, the immediate next sentence is:

I made them pledge only to work for Royal sides, and sent them to the Magic Kingdom.

Charlie is not a Royal side. Is Vanna working directly for Charlie? Did she break her pledge? Very interesting. Edit: Oh, wait. She is working for Transylvito, paid for by Charlie.