Inner Peace (Through Superior Firepower) – Episode 018

[badninja]

Wow kinda saw this coming, but really hoped she would not actually do it. I feel that now Wanda will never trust Olive and the romantic intentions are gone (weather or not they are true for both ends). I wonder how Wanda's father will feel about this choice of hers, accepting or will he send her away to achieve peace?

[pSycHOtic chICkeN]

Even Tommy's uncroaking only took "hours of subjective effort"

I had to reread that part myself to make sure, but it said she spent those hours of subjective effort in a few seconds, so it is definitely referring to the mental exhaustion and not the length of time.

You could read it that way.

Alternatively you could write a similar statement about a stupid world sniper team. They spent morning hours getting into position. They tracked the target with through their scopes for most of another hour before agreeing it was time to fire. Exhale, hold breath, squeeze. "The attention of an entire day was collapsed into those few seconds." "After hours of ... effort, [they] felt [their] work coalesce...". Clearly the act of pulling a trigger is not in itself a great effort. A typical sniper team could fire buckets of ammunition for entertainment. Wanda is doing something like exploratory surgery and diagnostic internal medicine.

[Gorky]

The beautiful, triumphantly perfect uncroaked unit followed her order. His arms, like tree branches, encircled Wanda

Great stuff.

[Raza]

Who wants to bet that the poison in question came from the plant Wanda helped save in Kiloton's garrison?

[Azukar]

That was all... kinda sad

In other news, can we imagine a Hippiemancer called Lucrezia Borgia at some point, if poisons are Flower Power...

[Zeku]

We've seen how heavily Erfworld (or the author) resists specific stratification of abilities or powers.

Turnamancy involved both the passage of turns, and the act of "turning" as it relates to your loyalty, two subjects that are utterly unrelated. It makes sense that flower power would have extra meaning also. It seems that it has governance over real flowers.

The craziness here is that the narrative itself could then become a form of diverging, occasionally self-referential magic. The all encompassing nature of stageamancy allows it to alter any truth as long as it adheres to it's own internal truth. Erfworld could be Hat Magic, all the way down.

[splintermute]

Even Tommy's uncroaking only took "hours of subjective effort"

I had to reread that part myself to make sure, but it said she spent those hours of subjective effort in a few seconds, so it is definitely referring to the mental exhaustion and not the length of time.

You could read it that way.

Alternatively you could write a similar statement about a stupid world sniper team. They spent morning hours getting into position. They tracked the target with through their scopes for most of another hour before agreeing it was time to fire. Exhale, hold breath, squeeze. "The attention of an entire day was collapsed into those few seconds." "After hours of ... effort, [they] felt [their] work coalesce...". Clearly the act of pulling a trigger is not in itself a great effort. A typical sniper team could fire buckets of ammunition for entertainment. Wanda is doing something like exploratory surgery and diagnostic internal medicine.

Yes, but to an outside observer in a hex where time runs more slowly, the sniper team's hours of preparation leading up to the killshot could possibly be seen to take place in an instant. Similarly, Wanda's hours of mental preparation for the uncroaking could also be seen to take place in an instant.

Poisoning doesn't operate like that - regardless of where you're observing from, you'd see the poisoning, then some form of time delay, then Tommy croaking, which seems to make it an unusual, perhaps unique, mechanic in Erfworld, unless it was somehow tied to a non-temporal factor, such as move.

[BLANDCorporatio]

Poison is hippie territory, weird.

Why do you think so? Hippies and "poisons" go hand in hand.

[cloudbreaker]

She had never seen one before, and she did not understand how it worked, but this was certainly a poisoning. And poisons, both natural and magical, were Flower Power.

So does this mean spidews have natural Flower Power? I find that to be really interesting and a little amusing for some reason.

[Dante]

Probably not. Something like a tree frog or a lionfish, sure. But not Spidews -- they have venom. Contrary to popular belief, venom and poison are fairly dissimilar. Venoms cause necrosis in most forms of tissue, whereas poisons affect the nervous system almost exclusively. If inaccurately injected or poorly absorbed, a poison may have no effect at all, whereas venom will damage whatever tissues it comes into contact with regardless of precision. This property of venom actually allows it to be used in antiseptic salves, in extremely diluted proportions. If anything I would say that venoms are the province of Healomancy.

[ScegfOd]

wow neat, learn something new everyday!

[BLANDCorporatio]

wow neat, learn something new everyday!

Meh, not really accurately though. You'd be better served by QI or Wikipedia even, because-

Contrary to popular belief, venom and poison are fairly dissimilar. Venoms cause necrosis in most forms of tissue, whereas poisons affect the nervous system almost exclusively.

is a bit misleading, depending on how the weasely "almost exclusively" are defined. For example, a list of types of poison includes herbicides, fungicides and spermicides all of which arguably do not have a nervous system. Also, the poster-poisons of the whodunnit genre (aka crime fiction), potassium cyanide and arsenic, act upon (general) cell respiration and ATP production respectively. Thallium, featured in one of A. Christie's novels, is also a real thing and acts by "tricking" the body into thinking it's an alkali, then messing up (general) cell chemistry afterwards because it's not alkali after all. Carbon monoxide, the gas responsible for "the most common type of fatal air poisoning in many countries[19]", acts on haemoglobin (aka that part of the blood that carries oxygen to the cells and CO2 from them). alpha-Amanitin, found for example in the Death Cap (a mushroom causing many poisonings among unwary mushroom collectors) destroys the liver. Hydrofluoric acid, while it does "interfere with nerve function", isn't lethal because of that; it is lethal because it reacts with blood Calcium, which disrupts muscle activity in, for example, the heart. Good old fashioned Chlorine, the first poison gas to be used in warfare as far as I know, irritates the respiratory system.

So yeah, the "poisons are nerve-acting" distinction is new to me and I suspect not widely used. A more relevant distinction would be that "poison" is usually applied to one toxic substance of whatever origin and whatever means of introduction to the body, whereas venom is a toxic (mix of) substance(s) secreted by an animal and injected into another by means of a bite or sting.

[pSycHOtic chICkeN]

wow neat, learn something new everyday!

Meh, not really accurately though. You'd be better served by QI or Wikipedia even, because-

Contrary to popular belief, venom and poison are fairly dissimilar. Venoms cause necrosis in most forms of tissue, whereas poisons affect the nervous system almost exclusively.

is a bit misleading, depending on how the weasely "almost exclusively" are defined. For example, a list of types of poison includes herbicides, fungicides and spermicides all of which arguably do not have a nervous system. Also, the poster-poisons of the whodunnit genre (aka crime fiction), potassium cyanide and arsenic, act upon (general) cell respiration and ATP production respectively. Thallium, featured in one of A. Christie's novels, is also a real thing and acts by "tricking" the body into thinking it's an alkali, then messing up (general) cell chemistry afterwards because it's not alkali after all. Carbon monoxide, the gas responsible for "the most common type of fatal air poisoning in many countries[19]", acts on haemoglobin (aka that part of the blood that carries oxygen to the cells and CO2 from them). alpha-Amanitin, found for example in the Death Cap (a mushroom causing many poisonings among unwary mushroom collectors) destroys the liver. Hydrofluoric acid, while it does "interfere with nerve function", isn't lethal because of that; it is lethal because it reacts with blood Calcium, which disrupts muscle activity in, for example, the heart. Good old fashioned Chlorine, the first poison gas to be used in warfare as far as I know, irritates the respiratory system.

So yeah, the "poisons are nerve-acting" distinction is new to me and I suspect not widely used. A more relevant distinction would be that "poison" is usually applied to one toxic substance of whatever origin and whatever means of introduction to the body, whereas venom is a toxic (mix of) substance(s) secreted by an animal and injected into another by means of a bite or sting.

"Poison" and "venom" are a subset of "toxin". The difference is the delivery method. Venoms are usually injected through bite or sting. Poisons are usually ingested and sometimes absorbed. Most food is made out of flowering plants. The meat, dairy and processed foods in stupid world are derived from flowering plants. Venom could fit in carnymancy because of the flesh association. Many venoms especially spider venom is evolved digestive enzyme. One could also argue for naughtymancy because it lacks life and therefore shockamancy by default. A number of snake and spider venoms paralyze the victim.

Toxin and poison are often treated as synonyms. Carbon monoxide probably should be called a "toxic gas". The problem is that people incorrectly think of toxicity as less serious then poisonousness. It all depends on dosage Bottles of pressurized CO should have the white #2 diamond with a skull and crossbones. We might as well use the wrong grammar on labels if that saves lives. Similarly chlorine reacts with the lining of the lung forming hydrochloric acid which burns the tissue. That should be called a corrosive. Corroding your long tissue makes you dead so the bottle should also be labeled with whatever will prevent people from inhaling it. The diamond label with skull and crossbones sends the right message. The gas used in WWI was actually phosgene whenever phosgene was available. Phosgene smells like chlorine and kills like chlorine but in lower concentrations.

Tommy got hit by a neurotoxin because the damage was directly to his nerves. It also must have been some form of corrosive because the nerves were gone not just dead. Nerve gas causes the nerves to fire constantly. Death from VX results because muscles are unable to relax. The inability to breath is the immediate cause of death. Wanda would have removed the toxin and then proceeded the same way she would if a victim had been strangled or drowned. The nerve cells would be quite healthy except for the lack of oxygen.

[Raza]

Picture related.

[Housellama]

The only peaces on Erfworld seem to be death, deception and betrayal.

Inner Peace (Through Superior Firepower), indeed.

This harks back to my favorite quote from The Art of War. (Also in my sig line): All warfare is based on deception.

She granted Tommy the peace he wanted, but absolutely not in the way he expected. Wanda hit the nail on the head at the very beginning of the siege.

Tommy laughed. "Well get on your bronto, then! D'be a fine thing if we turned around now, just because we weren't attacked. Who wins a battle that way?" He laughed again.

"With peace?" said Wanda quietly, "Perhaps a Hippiemancer."

Olive outthought, outplayed and outfought Tommy and Wanda every step of the way. They had only the chances she gave them, and when they ran out of chances she used peace to kill them. Olive is a very different Hippiemancer than Janis.

[shamelessmerc]

Although I'm sure this has been said before,

re "normal" attitudes to croakamancey, I imagine Wanda's attitude to her craft is much like "The Code of the Igors" from Terry Prattchet - putting bodies into the ground to rot is rather gruesome, and a waste of perfectly good components

(OK, I know corpses depop, but the religious "waste not want not" mentality would be echoed by more than a few recycling fanatics I know)

Surely Hippiemancers should be in favour of recycling?

[Raza]

Iunno. Janis has the luxury of relative free will, being a magic kingdom barbarian. As far as we can tell, Olive seemed to have genuinely preferred the peaceful and mutually beneficial solution of her alliance offer - but once that got rejected, Duty kicked in and required her to do what she could to help the fight against an enemy side.

Goodminton's leadership shouldn't have expected differently, and I don't fully see how Duty could've allowed them to reject those alliance offers. Love, again, perhaps.

[Whispri]

Poisoning doesn't operate like that - regardless of where you're observing from, you'd see the poisoning, then some form of time delay, then Tommy croaking, which seems to make it an unusual, perhaps unique, mechanic in Erfworld, unless it was somehow tied to a non-temporal factor, such as move.

Maybe the turn ended? It wasn't mentioned in the text, but nor was the loss of Tommy's bonus.

We've seen how heavily Erfworld (or the author) resists specific stratification of abilities or powers.

Turnamancy involved both the passage of turns, and the act of "turning" as it relates to your loyalty, two subjects that are utterly unrelated. It makes sense that flower power would have extra meaning also. It seems that it has governance over real flowers.

The craziness here is that the narrative itself could then become a form of diverging, occasionally self-referential magic. The all encompassing nature of stageamancy allows it to alter any truth as long as it adheres to it's own internal truth. Erfworld could be Hat Magic, all the way down.

The passage of turns and the act of turning are related by the word 'turn'. So it is with the magick of flowers. Yet Croakamancy, the magick of death, the magick of Wanda, is so intense in it's focus. It's a one trick pony, she has one thing she can do. No variations on the theme, no death spells, no ghosts, no speaking with the dead, no wraiths or mummies, no summoning of Grim Reapers, just yer bog standard zombies. As of yet I suppose. Could 'little croak' spells be hers?

Iunno. Janis has the luxury of relative free will, being a magic kingdom barbarian. As far as we can tell, Olive seemed to have genuinely preferred the peaceful and mutually beneficial solution of her alliance offer - but once that got rejected, Duty kicked in and required her to do what she could to help the fight against an enemy side.

Goodminton's leadership shouldn't have expected differently, and I don't fully see how Duty could've allowed them to reject those alliance offers. Love, again, perhaps.

Her peace offer had no value. It wouldn't have saved Goodminton from Quisling and Frenemy. Unless of course Haffaton is in a position to call off that operation, in which case, haven't they just proven that Alliance with them is worth nothing? Never mind that she left out the 'or die' part. Duty may well be her excuse and in fairness it's a good one, but the flower girl still murdered Tommy, who at that point was about as far from being an immediate danger as troops stationed in Goominton itself were. I'll further note that if Wanda's really done a perfect job of Uncroaking Tommy, the only thing the flower girl accomplished by her foul deed was to make some people who loved him cry.

I'd be shocked if duty ever compelled them to force their people, let alone their ylimaf, into bondage to a foreign Ruler. And given that Wanda only avoided molestation during the parlay thanks to a wall of uncroaked she wouldn't be able to use in self defence as Haffaton's slave...

[Zeku]

I would imagine that croakamancy would include guttural animal noises, complaining, and some lawnsports. Based on what we've seen so far, it might also include making things dead, and a 'very strong' personal appreciation for the recently dead.

[Raza]

Iunno. Janis has the luxury of relative free will, being a magic kingdom barbarian. As far as we can tell, Olive seemed to have genuinely preferred the peaceful and mutually beneficial solution of her alliance offer - but once that got rejected, Duty kicked in and required her to do what she could to help the fight against an enemy side.

Goodminton's leadership shouldn't have expected differently, and I don't fully see how Duty could've allowed them to reject those alliance offers. Love, again, perhaps.

Her peace offer had no value. It wouldn't have saved Goodminton from Quisling and Frenemy. Unless of course Haffaton is in a position to call off that operation, in which case, haven't they just proven that Alliance with them is worth nothing? Never mind that she left out the 'or die' part. Duty may well be her excuse and in fairness it's a good one, but the flower girl still murdered Tommy, who at that point was about as far from being an immediate danger as troops stationed in Goominton itself were. I'll further note that if Wanda's really done a perfect job of Uncroaking Tommy, the only thing the flower girl accomplished by her foul deed was to make some people who loved him cry.

I'd be shocked if duty ever compelled them to force their people, let alone their ylimaf, into bondage to a foreign Ruler. And given that Wanda only avoided molestation during the parlay thanks to a wall of uncroaked she wouldn't be able to use in self defence as Haffaton's slave...

Meh, don't agree. The peace offer clearly had value as a stand alone event, and even in the larger strategic picture there's much to be said for it: Goodminton could've gotten out of their situation with Quisling and Frenemy by simply paying the explicitly small price of the remainder of their treasury, haggling for a new treaty with a significant penalty clause (which would only be reasonable under those conditions) to prevent repeats, and still recovered more comfortably than we've seen them thus far with their new allies and cities.

Duty compels Erfworlders to send their friends to their deaths or sacrifice their own lives; I'm sure it applies to turning, too. And Wanda wasn't molested, just hit on; she'd be a commander under Haffaton and able to simply order most of the people involved in that to knock it off, with the only possible exception being Larry who we know to be otherwise influencable.