Book 2 – Text Updates 027

[Ansan Gotti]

If Jillian told Vanna "Come here, and fast!" would she mean that she should hurry up or that she shouldn't eat anything?

LOL!

Man, I cannot wait for the next update. Starting to go through withdrawal.

[Oberon]

It's been pointed out that that is a narrated portion, perhaps an illustration of the story as it is being told.

That's conjecture. We have no reason to believe that what is presented isn't true, except for the desire of some readers for it to be otherwise.

And there is no more proof that it happened the way as it was depicted, other than the desire of some readers to belive it.

Er, no. Doctor Jest has it right. We have a lengthy run of comics/narrative, and none of it has ever been shown to be anything at all along the lines of "My perception as to what happened, which is proven wrong later", from any point of view. Until we are shown other, clearly false, strips, the opening scenes have to hold as much validity as the remainder of the strips. The weight of evidence is that nothing is ever portrayed falsely. Thus, the only safe assumption until any other evidence is introduced is that all scenes have been portrayed accurately.

[Oberon]

We note Stanley learning of the creation of pigeons. No reason to assume that Charlie knows all of the dishes capablities and inner workings.

Sure. There's no reason to assume that the person who's been attuned to their Arkentool longest would know everything about it.

I'll assume that this is a tongue-in-cheek comment. One which I will agree with, for multiple reasons. First, Charley is a smart guy, and would have actively explored the potential of his Arkentool. Stanley discovered the walnut/pidgin conversion while using a tool of the Titans as a nutcracker. Even Wanda was shocked. But there is no doubt that this was a rather random discovery, and not at all a discovery which came about via any hint of the application of the scientific method or even any attempt at such. It was wholly random.

Charlie may be surprised with additional Arkendisk capabilities, but I sincerely hope not. He is already the character who has the power of plot whenever needed. No additional powers need apply.

[Hiai]

[ Thus, the only safe assumption until any other evidence is introduced is that all scenes have been portrayed accurately.

A nitpick of your nitpick: There IS precedent that when a "story" is being told, there is illustration of that in-comic, which is not necessarily carried out within the unfolding events. Specifically, look at Vinnie's "illustration" when he describes the TV plan to pair TV warlords with Archons, using dance fighting to boost their power and ambush Stanley and his FAQ-bound forces. We know that although the illustration showed the Archons and Warlords dancing together, in actual practice the Archons were not available and Stanley ultimately escaped the trap, having faced only TV and Jillian's forces.

Carrying that precedent to the current debate point, the idea that possibly the "story" of the Titans creating Erfworld and leaving one extra gem behind, and its effect on the Battle of Warchalking, would logically show that it could merely be a "storytelling" event, in the sense that atheists believe faith-based creation stories are nonfactual tall tales. On the other hand, it could be as you say, a simple laying out of the actual events in context of story setup. There is simply no information at this time to determine which scenario we are looking at. The fact that the opening narration before the "entrance of a main character" scene, in which we are introduced to Wanda, happens to be all in quotation marks muddies the waters considerably, imo. The presence of the quotation marks makes it seem more as if it were a story being told, as opposed to a third party perspective of a scene unfolding. When the narration seems to be a possible first person view, the scene unfolding is much more ambiguous in character. Since we haven't been introduced in-comic to this possible first person type narrator, we have no way of definitively saying which it is, in either direction.

Personally, given the real presence of the Arkentools, and the "fact" that they are sentient in some way, according to actual Voice of the Titans, I lean more heavily to the camp that believes there ARE Titans, and they ARE (or were, for that matter) Elvis impersonators that created Erfworld and all it's mechanics. Makes as much sense as anything else, and is considerably less taxing on my tinfoil hat maintenance fund, not having to come up with "what if Parson is the real Titan!" theories.

An addendum to another debate thread going on- The usage of Vanna's "turn" term. My first reading of the comic led me to believe she meant juice that had been saved for two turns. But I am quite willing to believe, now that it has been pointed out, that she meant "the juice that it would take to turn two different units". I think either theory is equally valid, and the idea that she was "low on juice", even after having her juice refreshed at turn beginning, wouldn't actually affect the debate in either direction. After all, she could have had her jucie refreshed, and then had it depleted by the act of disengaging the link.

Since Charlie and Vanna were linked until after the turn for RCCII had started, and ended the link shortly thereafter, the state of Vanna's juice is no predictor of..well..anything, really. My pet theory was that the Kingworld spell's juice cost was paid for by the Arkendish, given that the Arkenhammer and Arkenpliers seem to have no discernable juice costs to speak of, either, but it's quite open to interpretation. For all we know, it cost no juice from Vanna at all, and her juice was depleted by Charlie having her do another spell, after the turn had started and before they unlinked. Hard to say, and tbh not worth the debate, imo. It's unlikely to be addressed specifically ever again, and "knowing" one way or another wouldn't enhance or detract from the story as it is. And, as I said before, my tinfoil hat maintenance fund is subject to far too much depletion as it is.

P.S. Taking donations for my tinfoil hat maintenace fund! (Thinking about adding new earpads...)

[Dr Pepper]

Here's a quatloo.

[I<3ChocolateMilk]

I'm basing my speculation on the fact that the word turn has been used for both meanings throughout the comic. Many many examples of people talking to each other "now would be a good time to turn, Jack!" Jillian went and asked Jack again if he wanted to turn, right after Vanna cast her "endturnnow" spell. This event actually happened more recently than Kingsworld, so the overwhelming plot device is diluted some.

Okay, I'm not arguing the validity of the possibility, but I do think that interpreting this single word ambiguously defeats the objective of the comic, which is ultimately to tell a story.
If your theory is true then we would have to go back to every single strip and make sure that we've not interpreted things in one way without considering the ambiguous meaning which would probably serve to irritate the reader base more than it would to keep them interested.

[I<3ChocolateMilk]

Okay, I'm not arguing the validity of the possibility, but I do think that interpreting this single word ambiguously defeats the objective of the comic, which is ultimately to tell a story.
If your theory is true then we would have to go back to every single strip and make sure that we've not interpreted things in one way without considering the ambiguous meaning which would probably serve to irritate the reader base more than it would to keep them interested.

Yeah, you know what, ignore me. Sometimes I just ramble on for no apparent reason. Plus, the new one's been released, so this is old news

[kwotski]

Okay, I'm not arguing the validity of the possibility, but I do think that interpreting this single word ambiguously defeats the objective of the comic, which is ultimately to tell a story.
If your theory is true then we would have to go back to every single strip and make sure that we've not interpreted things in one way without considering the ambiguous meaning which would probably serve to irritate the reader base more than it would to keep them interested.

Yeah, you know what, ignore me. Sometimes I just ramble on for no apparent reason. Plus, the new one's been released, so this is old news

Just to add to the pointlessness... strictly speaking, you'd expect someone using the verb "turn" as a noun to use the gerund: "two turnings ago".

Sorry. I tried to resist.

Edit: blech, I got it the wrong way round. "two turnings' worth" is what I meant! Not "two turning's ago", which would be nonsense, since that sense of "turn" is alread a noun!! I should have resisted harder!!!

[Oberon]

Here's a quatloo.

5000 quatloos says the newcomers are untrainable and will have to be destroyed.