Book 2 – Page 72

[CelebrenIthil]

Oh yeah so much stuff is about to happen! :D
....
Awww lookit that poor infantry in panel 9.... D:

[Aster Azul]

STEP THROUGH THE PORTAL, PARSON!!

[CNagy]

Jay's idea was that, since Dollamancers appear to be able to conjure powerful items at the drop of a hat, you could put them to work and after a few turns you'll have the most awesome armory ever. Until you meet another side with Dollamancers, anyway.

There would have to be some drawback--aside from the obvious one of supplying your enemies with magical items in the battles that they win--to explain why magic items aren't in wide circulation. Perhaps equipment has an effect on upkeep? A baseless guess, but it would be one way to encourage hoarding rather than using. Alternatively, magic items have been mentioned as things that are sometimes sold (such as Parson being told what certain mathamancy-dependent sides would pay for his bracer) so they could be another means of bolstering the treasury when needed. Probably good in trade for diplomacy, too.

With Dollamancers, though, it could just come down to opportunity cost; how many cloth golems' worth of juice does it take to make this, that, or the other item? Does the increased combat ability of the unit outweigh the increased combat usefulness of additional units, etc. That said, I don't see why important units (heirs, kings, and the like) aren't covered head to toe in protective/offensive gear.

[MarbitChow]

There would have to be some drawback--aside from the obvious one of supplying your enemies with magical items in the battles that they win--to explain why magic items aren't in wide circulation.

You don't need much more than that. You don't give magic items to level 1 units; they get chewed through. Your high-level units already have massive bulls-eyes painted on them since their leadership bonuses apply to everyone. Magic items aren't a force multiplier - they only enhance a single unit. Equipping a level 2 unit like Parson is decked out is foolhardy in the extreme (unless you're Parson).

Most magic probably comes from the Magic Kingdom. The MK has a strong interest in repeat business: selling services and one-shot scrolls are better business than a magic item that you only need to buy from them once.

No magic items (other than the 'Tools) are enough to make a major difference in a war. If one side is constantly at war with another, and the 1st side is the only one making magic items, the 2nd side likely gets some of them for free eventually.

[atalex]

Two possibilities about Dollamancers that might reduce their twinkability:

1. It takes X amount of juice for a Dollamancer to fabricate a magical item, but using the item also drains Y juice from the Dollamacer at the time of use (where Y is a fraction of X and also varies depending on the type of item). This might explain why Slately (seemingly obtusely) sees little value in Ace's shockamancy-based doodads -- aesthetics aside, they also cost more juice in comparison to the more efficient golems.

2. Many game systems which make use of magical or techno-magical artifacts include a Repair/Upkeep stat indicating how long the item can be used before it must under go a commensurate amount of "tune-up and repair" time at the hands of its creator or some other qualified repairman. Otherwise, the device quickly breaks down and becomes unusable. This would account for items like the Tesla Bracer being used sparingly, as every use hastens the time when the item either must be turned in for upkeep or else it becomes completely useless.

[╒╦╧╬╩╦╦╛]

So much awesome packed in one update, if it were possible to get an overdose of erfworld (since many are talking about getting their fix when update is slow) I think this would be the closest we'd have since a very long time.

Also... good thing the armor let him fly at will... or Jack would have been beheaded by a closing portal.

[Raza]

I'm still coughing from Mars Attack Action Slately. 'Took me two glances to catch that. This doth not bode well for anything he aims that sceptre at.

Looks like shit is about to happen again.

I think we may well get a look at Ossomer's skeleton very soon. Bonus points if Slatley shouts "ack ACK ack" while doing it - or if the cloak allows him to absorb a blast from an Archon and talk in a "helium voice".

Hehe.

Ossomer won't be fried, though. He'll turn or otherwise end up absorbed back into Jetstone, now or later. There's predictamancy out on that.

[Aquillion]

The portal only vanishes when the city is no longer a capital, and the city remains a capital as long as Slately is still there and alive to defend it.

No. The attackers control the city once they've captured the Courtyard, Dungeons, and Tower, regardless of whether Slately is still alive or not. (Holding the airspace doesn't count, remember.) The moment the tower crumbles, the portal closes, because every important part of the city is in their hands.

[Swodaems]

The portal only vanishes when the city is no longer a capital, and the city remains a capital as long as Slately is still there and alive to defend it.

No. The attackers control the city once they've captured the Courtyard, Dungeons, and Tower, regardless of whether Slately is still alive or not. (Holding the airspace doesn't count, remember.) The moment the tower crumbles, the portal closes, because every important part of the city is in their hands.

Antium speaks as if there are still some enemy units in the dungeon and courtyard.

[kreszantas]

Here is the predictamancy on the fate of Ossomer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsXnK0ouTL8... Just like the General "Ack! Ack! you can fast forward to 0:38 for the full effect

[oslecamo2_temp]

There would have to be some drawback--aside from the obvious one of supplying your enemies with magical items in the battles that they win--to explain why magic items aren't in wide circulation.

You don't need much more than that. You don't give magic items to level 1 units; they get chewed through. Your high-level units already have massive bulls-eyes painted on them since their leadership bonuses apply to everyone. Magic items aren't a force multiplier - they only enhance a single unit. Equipping a level 2 unit like Parson is decked out is foolhardy in the extreme (unless you're Parson).

Not exactly true. While magic items may not be force multipliers by themselves, they can save the ass of your actual force multipliers.

In most games where you have heroes leading mass-produced troops, it's always a good idea to invest at least in protective items. Anything that prevents your high level warlord that took hundreds of turn to level up from falling to a lucky enemy blow is a big help.

And then who's to say that there aren't force multiplier items? If King Slatley can get a shockmancy gun, why not a dittomancy belt that doubles leadership all the time?

We know at least the arkentools grant an Artifact bonus to your troops combat ability.

Plus there's the utility factor. Granting a warlord flying for example allows him to move where he's needed most faster, and also allows would make retreating easier.

No magic items (other than the 'Tools) are enough to make a major difference in a war. If one side is constantly at war with another, and the 1st side is the only one making magic items, the 2nd side likely gets some of them for free eventually.

But what use are those magic items if they just sit in your armory doing nothing? Again, GK has a pretty decked out armory. It makes no sense to just leave them there gathering dust.

[badninja]

Wow so many plots coming together, now how will it all end? It is the little things in this comic that get me, I just feel that Maggie will run out of juice at a crucial moment coming up and disrupt Parson's plans. Loved the Mars Attacks reference, wonder if that is how King Stately will also die? Good way to enter the weekend!

[atalex]

Meta-predictomancy: It occurs to me that it's been a long time since we've seen a splash page (IIRC, volcano day was the last one). It also occurs to me that the tower collapsing would make a beautiful one.

[chefsotero]

Two possibilities about Dollamancers that might reduce their twinkability:

A 3rd one would be charges, like the cape that can absorv one blast, the ray gun could have X blasts until it has to be recharged at a cost of Y juice

[Kreistor]

Another, "trying to maintain the suspense" page. Sigh. King issues a challenge to son. Whoopie. Parson moves up to portal and Predicamancers arrive. Yawn. Sylvia sitll hasn't crashed the tower. Joy.

Stop it with the NOTHING HAPPENING already and make something HAPPEN! Nothing serious has changed in 12 pages! It's dragging and dragging, and the suspense is totally being lost!

[Jamus]

So, Jack could leap through the portal and join the coming fray in the MK, leaving (after the second blast) Wanda and her Deadite minions sitting on a perfectly good capital site, with Jack, Parson, Sizemore & Friends in the MK with a tunnel that leads back to GK. A quick distraction from Jack (who's very good at such things, and the whole gang has time to race down the tunnel, jump through the portal and leave GK with a massive advantage in casters.

I think that this is probably closer, suddenly, than anybody realized. Jack's fiddling around at the portal and the roadblock in the MK are clues.

Parson isn't going to Spacerock. Ever, maybe. Because Spacerock is not going to be part of the GK.

A predictamancer- or more probably Marie in particular, since she knows him- is going to tell Jack to get the hell back into the MK before he becomes a puppet. Spacerock will fall- with Jetstone the side surviving, barely- and Wanda is going to turn and take the side.

I have worried for a while that Wanda might secretly be her own side. That her chief warlord has been a decrypted was probably my second hint on that- after her having her own new livery. While we've seen that Sizemore's bonus changed when Parson took over, so far as I recall there's been no mention of any of Wanda's units getting a new bonus- with the possible exception of antium on page 68, knowing Parson's bonus. (Though he might have simply seen that from the living units, say Jack.) Anyway, that's probably unlikely.

The bigger point is that Charlie's still too unknown, still too friendly in his way with Parson, to be the big bad. Just yet, at least. And the book is drawing to a close, and no matter how you look at it, Jetstone/Transylvito are unlikely to be serious threats after this, even if they both survive their crises.

There's been foreshadowing on Wanda becoming an enemy for a long, long time. And judging by her parley with Jillian, she's been planning to take this capital as her own long before she actually got there. She jumped at the chance to decrypt Jack at the first justification for it- the only reason he's still alive, now, is that maggie would call back Parson if she took him now.

At least, until he got there. And that's probably the big surprise here. A predictamancer set Wanda's plan into motion way back at Faq. Someone has already seen at least part of Wanda's path; and I'm willing to bet they saw this part here. The predictamancers aren't coming to help Parson through. They're coming to make double-sure he doesn't.

[Beeskee]

Ace said most of his juice went to making magic teddy bears and the rest went to fancy outfits. In this update, it seems like it took both Ace and Cubbins to fully outfit Slately. We don't know how much juice they used, but it's probably safe to presume that they used most or all of their available juice for the day. If it takes 2 casters to fully outfit a single unit, and pikers pop a dozen at a time, you can see where it wouldn't be possible to outfit every single unit.

Plus, with the non-combat uses of magic, it's possible that Ace and Cubbins were kept busy making clothing because the courtiers wanted to "wook pwetty" and the king didn't want to focus on war.

It's easy for us as readers and for Parson as a strategy gamer to focus on just the military side of things but apparently there are plenty of non-combat things going on, for some of the sides at least. One of the text updates mentions Jetstone having regular parades. Stanley seems like he's focused mainly on military, due to his background as a piker/warlord, but Slately probably held plenty of social events, or at least it seems like that due to the demand on casters for new raiment all the time. Ace complained about not being able to make more military hardware, and he was probably restricted from doing so most of the time. Combine that with most rulers likely having their casters conserve juice in case of emergency and it becomes apparent why everyone is not decked out head to toe in magic items.

Also we don't know how much of the warlord gear we have seen is magical. Tramennis' "skirt" might be magical, it could give a diplomacy buff or something. I would imagine the top units are fairly decked out in magic items, but to outfit every single unit is beyond the means of most sides, even if they have the right mix of casters.

[MarbitChow]

But what use are those magic items if they just sit in your armory doing nothing? Again, GK has a pretty decked out armory. It makes no sense to just leave them there gathering dust.

I'm not arguing against the utility of magic items. I'm saying that there's a good reason that magic items are exceptions rather than rules. Cranking an item out for a special high-level unit is fine, but then items are as rare as the units themselves.
The MK wouldn't mass-produce them, since that cuts into their main business model, and any given side that tries to mass-produce them eventually loses some to the enemy over time through normal attrition, so it makes sense that they are uncommon.
Note that when Jillian was captured, there's a reference to Stanley leaving her "magic items" (plural) out in the field. It seems clear that high-level units all will have a couple of items each, but it doesn't make sense to create too many of them - your unit goes from being a powerful unit supported by items to an irresistible target of choice.

[Masennus]

"What's going on here?" repeated five times - what's going on here?

Notice that each unit who asks it is one of Stanley's. I think his shock us so powerful that his Natural Thinkamancy as Leader sent the question as a command to all his leadership.

[Renion]

What's going on here?