Book 2 – Page 25

[Rosa Vernal]

He's wicked pissed, and totally understandable.

I hope he lives, though!

[Ditto]

Booping is context-sensitive. Wanda says 'CRAP!' in comic 5 - but she's (probably) talking about the Yellow dwagon's poo assault as opposed to uttering an expletive. That would be interesting if they just call all round bouncy toys 'boops'... leads to all manner of confusion in the bedroom as it is already, I'm sure.

[The Old Hack]

I LOVE IT! Man, how Sammy had earned that.

I feel convinced that Charlie ordered Sammy to go first. It is completely in character, he cannot count on controlling Sammy forever so weakening his forces is a logical move.

However, I am not sure the updates will be vital to understand the story once it is fully published. After all, we don't know yet what will be related in later pages to make the behind-the-scenes knowledge less necessary to understand what is going on. What may now appear to be out of left field might make sense another ten or twenty pages from now.

[Neko]

Ah yes - 1st wave. This is why you don't torture archons...just collect your over 9000 and move on. Charlie is 'da man! (woman/dish/entity/whatever.)

Unless Ansom positions himself at the head of the GK defensive column, Jillian should still be able to make a surgical strike to get him regardless of Haggar going in as fodder.

[DaveOTN]

I'm sure that torturing Archons didn't help, but I have to agree with the imgran and the other poster above - this didn't feel like a vengeful move by Charlie, just a carefully planned one. I wouldn't be surprised if he wants Haggar to make sure Ansom gets killed in the attack, or even if he wants Haggar to capture Ansom personally so that Charlie can use him for further leverage with Jillian all along.

[Kadasbrass]

Duncun is missing!

[Urf]

SHIIIIIIIIIT.

Poor Jill's going to be scrambling now.

[technojunkie]

I'm sure that torturing Archons didn't help, but I have to agree with the imgran and the other poster above - this didn't feel like a vengeful move by Charlie, just a carefully planned one. I wouldn't be surprised if he wants Haggar to make sure Ansom gets killed in the attack, or even if he wants Haggar to capture Ansom personally so that Charlie can use him for further leverage with Jillian all along.

Ya beat me to it. I also think that charlie my be attempting to neutralize a variable that has horked his plans far too many times.

[Sygerrik]

Charlie is making a pretty basic error here.

What does this look like to other Royal sides? It looks like a Tool threatening a Royal, pushing a Royal around, because he can. If Sammy falls here-- which is possible-- or even suffers serious enough casualties, it'll look like a Tool getting a Royal out of the way by sending him to his death. Plus, since Charlie and his ally kingdom of Faq refused to attack the other Tool, only her minions, it'll look like he really does believe in Toolism, and is only going through the motions of helping the Royals.

Charlie thinks that he's "helping" the RCC by getting a formerly intractable semi-ally to do their bidding. He's a manipulative bastard, this is his kind of "help." What he doesn't understand is that while the Royal sides fight amongst themselves all the time, they are uniting against Toolism, and in any conflict of Royal vs. Tool, all the Royals are going to gang up against the Tool, just because they're Royal. This is, of course, excluding Jillian from this equation, as she doesn't really think like a Royal, or at least like the Royals we've seen.

Charlie, as we've seen, hates, hates, hates being outsmarted, and hates being shut out of things. He's very arrogant and he pulls boop like this in order to keep his hand in the mix. He may think that by helping the Royals defeat GK, he's earning their trust again and getting back in their good graces, but what he's really doing is demonstrating the underhandedness of Toolism to the RCC2. Of course, he may be earnestly trying to help, but this is all about how they will see it-- and they'll see it as treachery and betrayal and a confirmation of what most of them already believe.

[emyrs]

Well unless Sammy Follows the rocker code of F*** the Man and Allies withe Goblin Knob as soon as he gets across the bridge. The would put all sorts of Hurt on Charlie since his involvement will now be relieved to Both sides.

[DevilDan]

I guess I, and a few others, were right in guessing "norp" was an alarum used by camp guards, actually.

"After all those puzzling delays..." - I'm really getting to like Tramennis.

[gazes_also]

Innnnnnnnnnnteresting.

You all do realize that Jillian absolutely, absolutely cannot let Haggar go in the first wave without joining up and taking her orders. If they get ground up that's no loss, but if they manage to take a certain blonde decrypted Chief Warlord with them, well there go all of Jillian's plans, at least all the ones we assume she has. She'd avoid that risk at all costs.

There's about to be some trouble here.

Um, Infantry column with arial support. Fontal assault distracts Ansom while an airborne group grabs him. not really an issue

[Jamus]

No, Sammy did not choose to be the first wave. That was Charlie's choice. Because Charlie is angry.

We know that at one point, GK was taking their turn. GK uses their veil trick to capture Ossomer, and gunk Tramennis. On the same turn (Tramennis is still gunked) Wanda moved forward to make parley, and GK's turn was ended and RCC's began. Jillian moves to meet Tramennis, and Charlie talks to her on the way. At this point, Charlie has a "situation," goes quiet for several minutes, then disconnects abruptly.

At another point, Charlie's scouting team took their turn at dawn, because they were unallied. Charlie is blacked out at that point, *and has been since the day before*. Then RCC's turn begins, including Haggar's Sammy discovers them, Sammy has his conversation with Charlie, who is no longer blacked out. Haggar then moves to meet Tramennis and Jillian.

There's a couple things that get me about this, though. First: Charlie was blacked out at least one turn BEFORE Kingsworld. But why? We know that Vanna was linked with Charlie, since Charlie 'released her', but how long? Why the black out since the day BEFORE, rather than beginning the link at dawn? Why did Charlie spend his entire turn on this day blacked out?

Then there was the developing situation:

Then she heard Charlie's voice, for the first time sounding stressed. "That's extremely interesting information, Jillian. We'll talk about it later, but I've got a developing situation. Please don't attack the column alone. I'll try to get you some help. Goodbye."

We assumed at the time that the developing situation WAS the information about Wanda, but that didn't really fit the sentence. Charlie is usually very eloquent. My suspicion, now, is that that conversation was happening at the same time as his scouting stack was being attacked by Haggar. He sounded stressed because he had just found out that his archons were being killed. He terminated abruptly because he needed to talk to Sammy. That answers the question about whether Charlie can hold two conversations at once. He cannot.

What's key here is Charlie's actions. We have NEVER seen Charlie as anything other than cool and in charge. Except once- to Jillian. For the first time, sounding stressed. Charlie has never come across as anything but level, even at the height of TBFGK. He has never been terse or stressed. And then he orders Haggar's army into a "first wave" attack against GK's infantry. First means that it won't be enough- which means, likely, that Charlie expects very high casualties. For Haggar.

Charlie is PISSED about the loss of his archons. The only motivation we've ever gotten from Charlie- indeed the only motivation even his archons are aware of- IS his fleet of archons. Those archons have not merely loyalty and duty, but something approaching love. My off the wall idea is that Charlie feels pretty much the same thing back. And then the bonus is this. If Charlie is that pissed off at Haggar for killing three of his precious girls... just how furious is he with GK and Parson, for not merely killing but STEALING them?

(And my tinfoil theory: Archons have thinkamancy AND foolamancy. They have a natural thinkamancy network- something like a hive mind. The ONLY units Charlescomm appears to have are archons. The only motivations Charlescomm appears to have are cash, and that only for increasing their numbers. That sounds an awful, awful lot.. like a natural side. Like the hobgobwins. Does Charlie even exist? Or is Charlie the chief archon?)

[atalex]

What does this look like to other Royal sides? It looks like a Tool threatening a Royal, pushing a Royal around, because he can.

I disagree. Charlie is forcing Sammy into the position that is absolutely best for Jetstone -- a troublesome ally which had been threatening to betray the alliance is now being forced to bear the brunt of an assault. If GK is defeated in a manner that cripples Haggar, I cannot conceive of a better outcome for Jetstone, and I cannot see how Slately would not be thrilled with this turn of events. I always got the impression that Jetstone wasn't really sure whether Charlie was into Toolism or not and didn't care -- it was just more beneficial to spread the rumor that he was a Toolist in order to frighten neighboring kingdoms into the RCC2 than it was to keep Charlie on the payroll as an unknown quantity. I also think Charlie's efforts to date should demonstrate rather dramatically that he is not allied with GK and, if not loyal to the RCC2, at least favors it over the alternative.

Which is ironic since I also think that Jillian's slip to Charlie about the possibility of an alliance with Wanda may well cause him to rethink his pro-RCC2 leanings right as Slately is willing to welcome him back into the fold.

[ftl]

(And my tinfoil theory: Archons have thinkamancy AND foolamancy. They have a natural thinkamancy network- something like a hive mind. The ONLY units Charlescomm appears to have are archons. The only motivations Charlescomm appears to have are cash, and that only for increasing their numbers. That sounds an awful, awful lot.. like a natural side. Like the hobgobwins. Does Charlie even exist? Or is Charlie the chief archon?)

Re: the tinfoil theory:

From Parson's interrogation of the archons, we know that:

Archons are knight-class units with random specials from the set of Dance-fighting, Leadership, Shockmancy, Thinkamancy, Dollamancy, or Foolamancy. They gain more of these specials as they level up. So some archons will have both thinkamancy and foolamancy, but others may have neither.

Charlescomm has two types of units: archons and golems (mostly cloth golems) (which guard the capital).

For more details, see http://www.erfworld.com/wiki/index.php/ ... mission_46 .

[atalex]

Does Charlie even exist? Or is Charlie the chief archon?

An interesting theory. My only objection to it is that they have gone to great lengths to assure us that Charlie is male, and since all archons appear to be female, that seems like dirty pool from a narrative standpoint. But certainly not impossible if its set up properly.

Obviously, Charlie's true nature is one of the great mysteries of the story. I remain convinced that Charlie is an outworlder like Parson for several reasons.

1. Almost everybody's name in Erfworld is a pun on something from Parson's world, but with the archons, this seems particularly obvious (first we had overt Charlie's Angels references, now a squadron whose members are named after pop stars).

2. To me, Charlie's conversations with Parson seem more peer-to-peer than his conversations with other Erfworlders, to whom his demeanor alternates from polite sub-contractor (with Jillian and Book 1 Ansom) to mob boss (with Sammy). When he eyebooks Parson, he seems to actually talk.

3. Finally, there are obvious parallels between the Erfworld story and the Wizard of Oz, and we all know who the Wizard of Oz ended up being, don't we.

[gazes_also]

I'm wondering what Trammenis's "Well then" in panel 1 was in response to...
It could mean they're at an impasse or it could mean he's agreeing.

It looks as if he was already preparing to attack the GK column before Sammy arrived, and then was proposing looking at the maps to plan joining forces in the attack when Sammy told him Haggar was taking the lead.

Soooooo

Does that mean that Jillian had persuaded him by some means to back her up?

BTW - I love Jillian's expression and body language in the bottom panels - "Charlie? Charlie who? I do not know of this Charlie of which you speak."

[copperhamster]

I think Charlie is a tuna myself.

Anyway.

Sammy is actually the perfect choice to lead the assault. Why?

Cause he can rock out. Most of GK's Dance fighting capability comes from Wanda-leading-uncroaked (and I assume she can lead the decryped in a dance fight, since they are 'superior in every way to an uncroaked') or the Archon's DDR, which likely went with Wanda since they are flyers.

I think this is gonna be a dustbath until Parson gets involved.

[ftl]

I thought the "well then" was about him seeing Sammy's forces. "Well then. More guests."

Sammy would be a good choice to lead the assault - if he's leading the assault, rather than going in without support. If Sammy, Trem, and Jillian all go attack together, it should be a straightforward victory with a capture of Ansom.

But for some reason, it seems like Charlie gave the orders for Haggar to go in alone first. They might not be able to win that, though they'll likely inflict heavy losses. The reason MAY be because Charlie wants Ansom out of the picture (or captured by him, so he gets some leverage on Jillian.)

I don't know whether Jillian will buy it. She might again defy Charlie and go in at the same time as Haggar to try to get Ansom; there might be a fight in the middle for who gets Ansom, Haggar/Charlie or Jillian...

[lukewarm]

Either Jillian is very unslick or she just found a loophole in her NDA.