Summer Update - 034

[moose o death]

also wrigley may be down for good due to not being strong enough for this assualt force. they mention that everyone has at least 6 base attack, wrigley seems like a low level garrisoned unit for his entire career. he may be too low for them to bother keeping. i hope so

[raphfrk]

also wrigley may be down for good due to not being strong enough for this assualt force. they mention that everyone has at least 6 base attack, wrigley seems like a low level garrisoned unit for his entire career. he may be too low for them to bother keeping. i hope so

It is still worth decrypting him, even if he is only used to hold the city (again). This means that they don't have to leave any of the main strike force in place. Decrypting the defenders means that the strike force doesn't lose strength each time they take a city.

[bathysphere]

Well, assuming they want to hold on to these towns, the low level or low move units may just be decrypted and left as garrison. (Poor Wrigley.) I'd also like to say this was a good update. We've been talking about the inevitable strategy of intentionally killing every enemy in a fight and decrypting them ever since Wanda attuned; it's no surprise, but it is surprising to see how gruesome it is. Even though Erfworld is more than a table-top game, and one of the main themes of the comic has been the gruesomeness of the rules and reality of a table-top game, I still inevitably think of what's going to happen mainly in terms of strategy and exploiting game mechanics. And then get knocked for a loop again. It's a good story.

[KiltedNinja]

Awesome, awesome update.

Nice work

[shadowdemon_lord]

This was a brilliant update, positively brilliant. Telling the conqurering of the city from the perspective of a victim as opposed to Ansom or Wandas perspective is awesome. I'm left wondering if we'll get to see the change in his perspective once he becomes decrypted (will he still be bored?).

[Spot]

This was a brilliant update, positively brilliant. Telling the conqurering of the city from the perspective of a victim as opposed to Ansom or Wandas perspective is awesome. I'm left wondering if we'll get to see the change in his perspective once he becomes decrypted (will he still be bored?).

As a reader, (and a storyteller myself), I'm pretty darn sure that we'll see Wrigley again.

Basically, we the readers are (supposedly) rooting for Parson to change Erfworld, and break/destroy the mode of wargame-ness that binds Erf into a cycle of never-ending puppet-hood followed by a senseless death for its inhabitants.

Well... we already saw how Parson accomplished the making of the first crack in Erfworld's rules: He changed his perspective, and realized that the Sword of Ruthlessness was not a helpful/useful tool, but was actually the equivalent of a slave collar and threw it away. It wasn't the throwing away that cracked the rules of Erfworld, but the mental realization that it had to be thrown away.

So now we have poor Wrigley... who never realized that his Spear was a slave collar, and he went to his first death more worried about the fate of the device that chained him than the fate of his own existence.

Maybe Wrigley's second life, with Wanda's help, will go better; it certainly couldn't go any worse.

[teratorn]

My thought on reading this was: wow, regular units are kind of stupid. This guy only wanted to poke things with his spear, and even now it's not death that worries him but his spear. Stanley was probably a genius compared to the other pikers.

Oh, and I find it scary that this guy has no thoughts for someone else, his city, anything. Devoid of feelings except for his spear. Wrigley made me think of these guys more like units, an ant-like entity, and not as much as individuals. As HandofShadows puts it, they are like drones.

[Angband]

Poor Wrigley Spearman.

Another erfling that the war...

(Pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...chewed up.


Yeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr...

[elddonnemar]

Amazing writing. Really drives home how much Erfworld is a world for war.

[Spot]

Poor Wrigley Spearman.

Another erfling that the war...

(Pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...chewed up.


Yeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr...

It seems to me that Wrigley Spearman is...

(Pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...glum.

Yeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr...

[Fiendishrabbit]

Poor Wrigley Spearman.

Another erfling that the war...

(Pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...chewed up.


Yeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr...

It seems to me that Wrigley Spearman is...

(Pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...glum.

Yeeeaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr...

Well. We may feel sad for this spearman...

(pauses to put on dark sunglasses)

...but I guess that was the point.

Yeeaaaaaaaaarrrrr

[DevilDan]

One of my favorite updates by far.

I always suspected units popped with basic weapons and equipment.

[DevilDan]

One of my favorite updates by far.

I always suspected units popped with basic weapons and equipment.

What's so wrong with decrypting? The entire garrison would have been put to the sword either way. If Wrigley is decrypted and is not really what he used to be, then it's the same as if he'd died. If he's decrypted and is essentially the same unit, just re-popped, then what's the problem?

He was always a puppet; everyone on Erf, really, except for Parson, was popped a puppet. Some just have a bit more freedom than others.

I suppose that the shackles are natural stuffamacy.

[Welf von Ehrwald]

My thought on reading this was: wow, regular units are kind of stupid. This guy only wanted to poke things with his spear, and even now it's not death that worries him but his spear. Stanley was probably a genius compared to the other pikers.

Oh, and I find it scary that this guy has no thoughts for someone else, his city, anything. Devoid of feelings except for his spear. Wrigley made me think of these guys more like units, an ant-like entity, and not as much as individuals. As HandofShadows puts it, they are like drones.

He is kneeling in line waiting to get executed, slowly realizing that his entire life was pointless and that he has no chance of doing anything about it. I think it's okay to be little self-centred in such a situation.

[DevilDan]

I'm sure Wrigley had friend (even lovers?), but his aspirations were military ones, his life was a soldier's life. It's not a surprise that he focuses on that when his life is about to end in stabbity agony.

[gameboy1234]

I'm sure Wrigley had friend (even lovers?)

I'm not sure about that. The writing sure makes it sound like he didn't have any aspirations. Maybe you have to level a couple of times before a unit starts to develop real personality, at least for basic unit. Warlords (Dora) seem to have personality at a much lower level (2).

[moose o death]

One of my favorite updates by far.

I always suspected units popped with basic weapons and equipment.

What's so wrong with decrypting?

it's about on par with robot wives, for me, your mileage may vary. they are not born again (popped again) they are mind controlled versions of their former selves..ansom thinks he's alive, he thinks stanley was right all along and he thinks wanda is his goddess. but he's still a corpse. a puppet. uncroak lets the puppet master control the body. decrypt lets them control the mind. i'd prefer death over that existence

[carisbourg]

Oh yeah, that's right, Stanley and Co. aren't misunderstood, they're the bad guys. I was starting to lose track of that for a while.

[Wed Dwagon]

So, we now see Stanley, Ansom, and Wanda employing that time-honored strategy that always works so well in fantasy fiction: build an enormous world-conquering army of troops whose loyalty, effectiveness, and most likely very existence is dependent on a single powerful magical artifact.

What this presages for the future (whether near or eventual) is: epic fail. (Literally!) Even bigger epic fail when the artifact in question is actually being deployed in the field of battle instead of, say, sealed up in an "impregnable" tower somewhere.

Parson is (as we know from some of his early Klog entries) familiar enough with the cliches of fantasy fiction to recognize this problem right away. The question will be, what can he do about it? The more interesting question will be, does he care?

[raphfrk]

it's about on par with robot wives, for me, your mileage may vary. they are not born again (popped again) they are mind controlled versions of their former selves..ansom thinks he's alive, he thinks stanley was right all along and he thinks wanda is his goddess. but he's still a corpse. a puppet. uncroak lets the puppet master control the body. decrypt lets them control the mind. i'd prefer death over that existence

I wonder if Decrypting is what would happen if a croakamancer spent hundreds of turns on a single unit. Is it basically what happens if you could put a massive amount of effort into uncroaking.