Inner Peace (Through Superior Firepower) – Episode 027

[Zeku]

Haha! I don't trust him

Beady little eyes

[multilis]

"....this is a world created by a man. You're trying to tell me the author is lying about magic to us." - We already know about thinkomancy, that it is scary magic. We haven't been really shown how. If this was normal story, after Parson's blog about thinkomancy we would see nasty in action. But we don't. Because this is not an ordinary story. It is a conspiracy.

Rob is under control of thinkomancers, and only can give us hints as to the truth. We can trust Rob when he gives those hints, but the rest, it is not really Rob but the thinkomancers talking. Don't trust them. Especially Charlie.

They are corrupting our young with evil subliminal messages. Protect yourself, protect your kids, do not go to web sites like this one http://www.hamstard.com/, and especially do not read them for long. Thanks.

[Masennus]

Indulge me for a moment, I'd like to explain battlespaces and Turn-Based Relativity as I understand it, both to check my understanding, and help answer some questions raised in this thread.

Each unit in Erf has their own temporal reference frame. Experience of the passage of time is heavily dependent on who you are, and what you do during your turn. Any time that passes that does not directly affect you, is not experienced by you. This simple rule defines the Natural Predictamancy of battlespaces.

Let's first examine the thinkagram scenario, because it's simple:

Side A goes before Side B, and sends a thinkagram near dusk on their turn reporting on what they experienced.
In Side A's turn-based reference frame (TBRF) an entire day has passed, then a thinkagram was sent.
In Side B's TBRF the thinkagram arrives at dawn, and the turn starts immediately after the thinkagram ends.
This is not inconsistent as long as no other interaction between these two sides takes place on this turn, they both experience events in a consistent (if unintuitive) chronology. Causality is preserved.

Now let's examine Jillian's turn in this update.

Jillian realizes their turn didn't start. Natural Predictamancy tells her she'll have a choice about an encounter.
Almost immediately that choice presents itself. She sees some elves. This predictamancy is vague, and on the order of seconds or minutes.
Now, those elves may experience several more hours of scouting. They may tell their side where to find Jillian. Their side may decide to return and engage Jillian's stack. In Jillian's reference frame, none of that takes any time. The next thing she'll experience is their army arriving, or her turn starting, depending on their choice.

What if that had gone differently? What if the elves hadn't seen her? Wouldn't the battlespace predictamancy tell them something strange had happened?

The answer is a resounding nope. They would have experienced walking through that hex exactly as they would have had it been empty. They won't even notice they're in Jillian's battlespace if she elects not to follow and engage them. As long as she doesn't interact with them on her turn, they won't experience any time during her turn.

Can you abuse battlespace's Natural Predictamancy?

Again, no. The Natural Predictamancy is exactly what prevents it from being abused. Battlespace determinations behave predictively. They know what interactions will take place during a given turn, and place turn orders accordingly. The only information units gain from Battlespace determinations is a few seconds warning before they see an enemy. If they wouldn't have noticed the enemy (and the enemy would've decided to leave them alone) then they don't experience the enemy's turn at all, and it's the Natural Predictamancy that preserves the scout's stealth.

In an odd paradox, if Battlespaces were determined Mathematically by what COULD happen, then there's predictive information to be gained. Having them determined Predictively by what WILL happen is better for the preservation of secrecy.

[splintermute]

Side A goes before Side B, and sends a thinkagram near dusk on their turn reporting on what they experienced.
In Side A's turn-based reference frame (TBRF) an entire day has passed, then a thinkagram was sent.
In Side B's TBRF the thinkagram arrives at dawn, and the turn starts immediately after the thinkagram ends.
This is not inconsistent as long as no other interaction between these two sides takes place on this turn, they both experience events in a consistent (if unintuitive) chronology. Causality is preserved.

That's sort of right, except dusk doesn't occur until the end of Side B's turn. A day (from dawn to dusk) is the sum of all the turns of all the sides in a battlespace. If A and B are the only sides in the battlespace, A's turn might run from dawn to noon, and B's turn might run from noon to dusk. During A's turn, B is capable of doing most of the actions it normally does (e.g. casting certain spells, restacking troops, etc.), except for moving between hexes or between zones in an enemy city, which it can only do once A declares its turn ended.

If there's no-one in B's battlespace, its turn would run from dawn to dusk. The fact that B's turn didn't start at dawn indicates that A (or another side earlier than B in the turn order) is Predicted to interact with B that day. Since A goes first, it has no warning - perhaps the advantage of having an earlier turn is offset by the inability to partake in natural battlespace Predictomancy.

[Masennus]

That's sort of right, except dusk doesn't occur until the end of Side B's turn. A day (from dawn to dusk) is the sum of all the turns of all the sides in a battlespace. If A and B are the only sides in the battlespace, A's turn might run from dawn to noon, and B's turn might run from noon to dusk. During A's turn, B is capable of doing most of the actions it normally does (e.g. casting certain spells, restacking troops, etc.), except for moving between hexes or between zones in an enemy city, which it can only do once A declares its turn ended.

If there's no-one in B's battlespace, its turn would run from dawn to dusk. The fact that B's turn didn't start at dawn indicates that A (or another side earlier than B in the turn order) is Predicted to interact with B that day. Since A goes first, it has no warning - perhaps the advantage of having an earlier turn is offset by the inability to partake in natural battlespace Predictomancy.

I don't think that sides split the day evenly because they share a battlespace. I think the only time they experience concurrently is the time of their interactions. The only moment they both experience, in this example, is the thinkagram. From Side B's perspectiveSide A's entire turn elapses in the instant between dawn and the thinkagram. From Side A's perspectiveSide B's entire turn elapses in the instant between the thinkagram and dusk.

Find the text update where Parson learns about how time works for more examples. The commander waiting for a scout doesn't experience the entire time of the scouting mission. He only experiences sending the scout, anything he does while the scout is gone, and the scout returning. The rest of the empty waiting time is collapsed for him, because it doesn't matter.

The entire point of my post is that there is no actual benefit of the Predictamancy to partake in. The Predictamancy is actually what PREVENTS sending extraneous information to your enemies through turn ordering, because Predictamancy keeps turns from being ordered unless they have to be.

[splintermute]

I don't think that sides split the day evenly because they share a battlespace. I think the only time they experience concurrently is the time of their interactions. The only moment they both experience, in this example, is the thinkagram. From Side B's perspectiveSide A's entire turn elapses in the instant between dawn and the thinkagram. From Side A's perspectiveSide B's entire turn elapses in the instant between the thinkagram and dusk.

It doesn't have to be an even division - what's notable in this case is that B's turn doesn't start at dawn, it starts an instant after dawn, and B would be cognizant of some time delay (a nanosecond? an hour? a morning?) between dawn and the start of its turn.

[Zeku]

You made your example work by placing A's conversation at the end of their turn, and B's at the beginning. Logically, this is the same as simply preserving a normal chronological turn order, since 'thinkamancies are arriving at dawn' still informs side B that they are going second.

[Masennus]

It doesn't have to be an even division - what's notable in this case is that B's turn doesn't start at dawn, it starts an instant after dawn, and B would be cognizant of some time delay (a nanosecond? an hour? a morning?) between dawn and the start of its turn.

B is not only aware of the delay, they are aware of the reason. The duration of the delay is the length of the thinkagram.

This is largely my point. There is no delay that goes unexplained. Any time you are never made aware of the reason, you also don't experience the delay. (Excepting, of course, some brief lag time as in this update.)

It is also perhaps worth mentioning that it doesn't matter where in A's turn the message is sent. B's experience is always message at dawn, then start of turn.

[Masennus]

You made your example work by placing A's conversation at the end of their turn, and B's at the beginning. Logically, this is the same as simply preserving a normal chronological turn order, since 'thinkamancies are arriving at dawn' still informs side B that they are going second.

Exactly the point. Turn order is always preserved, but sides don't experience any of the time taken by turns of sides that they don't interact with.

One possible wrench in this example would be if thinkagrams can be sent off-turn, which seems likely. Is it possible to receive a thinkagram mid-turn if the sender is otherwise unaware of your actions? Could side B send side A a morning thinkagram? If they had a message to deliver before A's turn, would they have to send it the night before?

[Zeku]

Ive always operated under the assumption that absolutely anything, except movement, can be done on any turn. Otherwise, croakamancy favors going "last" so strongly that it breaks the entire world.

I think we just saw Firebaugh do several things on Haffaton's turn. Send hat message, promote an heir, and this sort of thing has happened many times before.

[raphfrk]

I sincerely do not know which one of us is correct, but for the time being, I am not assuming that the universe knows that a conflict will take place, and introduces turn orders as a result. I'm assuming that turn orders are introduced as a consequence of battle being possible.

One possible way to do it would be

A) have all sides move at dawn
B) If sides do interact, then form battlespaces containing those sides, the remaining sides are in battlespaces of 1
C) Repeat the turn with sides in each battlespace ordered according to the global order
D) If the interactions in each battlespace occur as required, then finish, otherwise goto C) with a new random seed.

Predicatamancy in general could be made to work that way.

A) The predictamancer looks into the future
B) run the game forward
C) The predicatamancer sees the future in A)
D) This future is then locked in
E) if the prediction doesn't happen, reset the world to the start of B) and repeat with a new random seed

This requires a lot of processing power, but a universe can be assumed to have nearly unlimited processing power.

It isn't clear if battlespaces can form long distance chains. If A and B interact and B and C interact, are A and C in the same battlespace?

With experiment you could try to see if that is the kind of thing predictamancy can do.

Something like

- have the predictamancer predict what number you are going to pick
- roll a die
- if the die comes up 6, pick the number the predictamancer said, otherwise, pick a different number

If you do that 10 times, and you get 6 on the die 10 times, then that shows that time-lines that contain a paradox are destroyed.

the explanation for why a particular side goes first.

It appears that there is a global turn ordering that is used to break ties. If 2 sides have to move in sequence, then the one that is earlier in the global ordering moves first.

One option would be that the order is determined based on the age of the side. "Young" sides would move first. This would explain why barbarians (age 0 sides) occur before everyone else.

The age could also depend on the age of the Ruler, and barbarians would move first since they would be generally younger than Rulers of a side.

[doran]

Ive always operated under the assumption that absolutely anything, except movement, can be done on any turn. Otherwise, croakamancy favors going "last" so strongly that it breaks the entire world.

I think we just saw Firebaugh do several things on Haffaton's turn. Send hat message, promote an heir, and this sort of thing has happened many times before.

Quote from here

p64Erf-b1-p064-p3 panel 3 seems to be a major hangup. Wasn't intentional and I agree that it's misleading. We'll clarify that for the book.

For the record, the rule is actually pretty simple and I am amazed it's been such a sticking point for people.

You can move only on your turn, and you can cast only on your turn.
When an enemy comes to you on their turn, you can engage, and you can cast. This includes when they are attacking your city.

Why could Parson not have ordered a veil to be cast, even if the Foolamancer had been in the group with the wounded dwagons? It was not his turn, and they were not under attack. Once Jillian entered the hex, a theoretical Foolamancer within that hex could have veiled, but it wouldn't have been very effective at fooling her.

Why could Parson have his casters cast on the Coalition's turn, later in the story? His city was being attacked.

Why could the Archons cast the DDR spell? They were part of the Coalition and it was now technically their turn. But they could not move because all of Charlescomm's units' move went to zero when Charlie ended turn. Move and hits are restored to full at the beginning of a side's turn, and (re)forming an alliance does not count as starting a new turn.

Why could the Archons "cast" the contract, when it was not their turn? Well, why could they still fly? It's not a spell, it's a natural magic. There's also a heavy dose of "talking is a free action" in that scene, another thing about turn based games that is silly but almost universally true. It's no sillier than food popping at the start of a turn.[8]

[Swodaems]

//Enter two high elves, one thin and one fat, stage left.

Did anyone else notice the inclusion of the old Fat and Skinny duo?*

*I think this trope goes back to Shakespeare which, considering Rob's major, is a more likely source for it than anything listed on that page. However, I can't find find any direct references. Googling "enter 2 men, 1 thin and 1 fat" gives fitness results or a reference to a certain speech in Julius Ceaser as I sadly can't remember the exact play involved if it exists. Could someone with more Shakespeare knowledge than me tell me if I'm right?

[Housellama]

I've been working through the information that has been given thus far and following the logic of it to see if I could find anything. And I did. I'll share my findings and lay out my reasoning for my peers (and the rest of you) to inspect.

First of all, some confirmed facts.

1. Time is relative from hex to hex.
A. Units moving from hex to hex can experience relative time effects.
B. Information is preserved between hexes with different relative time
We know both of these things from the discussions that Parson had with Sizemore and Maggie. Scouts can enter a different hex and spend a lot of time over there and when they return to the original hex, very little time has passed. We also know that the information gathered by that scout is preserved, because even though the relative time spent is very different, the scouting report is still given.

2. Days are experienced by an Area.
A. If a Side is not in a Battlespace, Day is experienced by that Side alone.
B. If a Side is in a Battlespace, all Sides within the Battlespace share the same Day.
We've seen numerous examples of this I don't think I really need to explain it further.

3. Information is preserved within the same Day
A. Information is preserved between Side-turns within a single Battlespace.
This is an extension of the scouting report example from above. Information can be transmitted to all sides within a Battlespace. For example, Parson could see Ansom talking to the DDR girls. This is kind of a duh statement, but it's nice to establish even the obvious ideas.

4. Day starts at the beginning of a Turn.
A. If a Side is not in a Battlespace, Side-turn starts at dawn.
B. If a Side is in a Battlespace, Side-turn starts at dawn in the Battlespace for the Side that goes first.
C. Turn order is determined by some currently unknown mechanism when a Battlespace is formed.
This is again a duh kind of a thing. A Day starts at the beginning of a Turn. Which Side turn comes first within a Battlespace is determined by some yet unknown factor.

5. Day ends when all Sides in an Area have ended turn.
A. Day ends in a Battlespace when every Side in a given Battlespace has ended turn.
B. Day ends at the end of the Side-turn if a Side is not in a Battlespace.
Once again, establishing the basics.

6. Battlespaces are formed by Natural Predictamancy.
A. Battlespaces form when and only when an encounter between two or more Side will occur.
This is the new one. We have this confirmed by canon in this strip.

So now that the facts have been established, here comes the implications and suppositions.

We know that the basic unit of absolute time in Erfworld is the Turn. Erfworlders talk about being x Turns old, or that the battle happened y Turns ago, etc. We also know that a Day is the length of a Turn. But a Day isn't the same as a Turn, otherwise there wouldn't be a distinction. Yet there is. I make a distinction between Side-turn and Turn to indicate the difference between a Turn for one Side vs the Turn that corresponds to the Day. Each Side has one Side-turn per Day, and when all Side-turns are finished, the Day ends and the Turn ends.

We also know that Days are different in different situations. If the Side is not in a Battlespace, then the Day starts when the Side-turn begins, and ends when the Side-turn ends. However, we also know that Days can start before a given Side-turn does. That happens when two sides share a Battlespace. We've seen that behavior before too. With Kingworld, there was a lot of discussion about turns and the length of a Day.

So given that in theory any Side can interact with any other Side at some point, Turns must be the same everywhere. When a Turn ends, every Side-turn for every Side has ended. Otherwise you might have Sides on Turn 999 while there are other Sides that have only passed 60 Turns in the same "time". We know that Erfworld is an internally consistent system, so there has to be some universal somewhere and I propose that the Turn is it.

Now we have problem, because Days are different that Turns. Some Days may be longer than others. An isolated Side that does absolutely nothing but end Turn as soon as it begins is going to have a very short Day, whereas in a pitched battle, the Day might seem to go on forever. How do these two things reconcile? Well, we've already seen that time is relative in Erfworld. I see no reason that this should be any different. So I propose that all Days, no matter how long or short they are, happen at the same "time". That is, when a Turn happens, all Sides have their Day (in whatever respective areas they may be) simultaneously. So that outside each individual Area, a Day is actually the same length: one Turn.

This is where the concept of Battlespace comes from. We know that a Battlespace forms when two or more Sides encounter one another. That was proven back in tBfGK Book 1. That's what a Battlespace is. An Area (as I call it) that is shared by two or more Sides. We know that Sides in a Battlespace share the same Day and that information is consistent within them. We've seen Battlespaces that were already formed, but we've never caught one in the act of forming. Here's where the Natural Predictamancy comes into play. Two Sides that will not interact with one another in any way don't need a Battlespace. The discussion above about Days and Turns show that. If a Side isn't going to do anything but end Turn without acting on anything else, why should it need to wait for other sides? A Battlespace is only needed when Sides must interact with each other. So Erfworld, knowing that some Sides are going to come together this Turn, creates a shared space with it's own relative time where those Sides can interact. Hence, Battlespace. This completely supports Jillian's assumption that since a Battlespace came into being (which she noticed only because Day started before their Turn did), the need for a Battlespace must be present. And that need is for multiple Sides to interact.

So. Now we've established that there's a Turn where Erfworld creates pockets of time that share the same Day. Each of those pockets is distinct from each other, as Erfworld automagically creates Battlespaces where they are needed. We've also established that all of these individual Days happen simultaneously. Now we run into another problem. What happens when one Day needs to look into the information for a different Day? If all the bubbles are happening at the same time, and all Days are the same length of absolute time, how do you preserve information between the bubbles? The simple answer? Magic. Or 'mancy, if you prefer. Because all possible communication between Days happens through some form of 'mancy, the information problem doesn't exist. If this was real physics, it'd be a cop-out answer, but we're talking about Erfworld. Magic makes it work.

So. There you go. Feel free to tear it apart.

Naw, man. You got the right idea, but it's all, like... relative.

Okay, so you've just got one Day, in the whole world. And all of the sides on Erf take their turns, right? One after another, from the Barbarians in the morning all the way to Jetstone or whatever. So there's a buncha sides all taking their turns. And if you could see all of them, every unit in all of Erf, they'd all move one after the other and the day'd go on for hundreds of hours.

But, see, time is relative, right? If you aren't watching tbose scouts from Haffaton, they won't take up any of your time. But as soon as they enter your hex, you're interacting with 'em, right? So the time streams synchronize. You're sittin' there in your trees, and the day starts -- 'cause the scouts entered your hex, and now you gotta deal with 'em. When they leave the hex, you stop interactin' and yer turn starts.

That's the predictamancy, see? It's not actual magic, it's just the observer effect. Like, you send a scout out and you get back a report right away, you don't hafta wait for him to hike across all the hexes. You just interact with 'im when he's sent, and when he sends the report, but nothing happens to ya in between, right?

So that means... if ya got a Predictamancer, and a Turnamancer, and a Lookamancer... an' you put 'em in a little bubble...

... hey dude, you got any juice left? I'm startin' ta come down.

Spoiler: show

I've been working through the information that has been given thus far and following the logic of it to see if I could find anything. And I did. I'll share my findings and lay out my reasoning for my peers (and the rest of you) to inspect.

First of all, some confirmed facts.

1. Time is relative from hex to hex.
A. Units moving from hex to hex can experience relative time effects.
B. Information is preserved between hexes with different relative time
We know both of these things from the discussions that Parson had with Sizemore and Maggie. Scouts can enter a different hex and spend a lot of time over there and when they return to the original hex, very little time has passed. We also know that the information gathered by that scout is preserved, because even though the relative time spent is very different, the scouting report is still given.

2. Days are experienced by an Area.
A. If a Side is not in a Battlespace, Day is experienced by that Side alone.
B. If a Side is in a Battlespace, all Sides within the Battlespace share the same Day.
We've seen numerous examples of this I don't think I really need to explain it further.

3. Information is preserved within the same Day
A. Information is preserved between Side-turns within a single Battlespace.
This is an extension of the scouting report example from above. Information can be transmitted to all sides within a Battlespace. For example, Parson could see Ansom talking to the DDR girls. This is kind of a duh statement, but it's nice to establish even the obvious ideas.

4. Day starts at the beginning of a Turn.
A. If a Side is not in a Battlespace, Side-turn starts at dawn.
B. If a Side is in a Battlespace, Side-turn starts at dawn in the Battlespace for the Side that goes first.
C. Turn order is determined by some currently unknown mechanism when a Battlespace is formed.
This is again a duh kind of a thing. A Day starts at the beginning of a Turn. Which Side turn comes first within a Battlespace is determined by some yet unknown factor.

5. Day ends when all Sides in an Area have ended turn.
A. Day ends in a Battlespace when every Side in a given Battlespace has ended turn.
B. Day ends at the end of the Side-turn if a Side is not in a Battlespace.
Once again, establishing the basics.

6. Battlespaces are formed by Natural Predictamancy.
A. Battlespaces form when and only when an encounter between two or more Side will occur.
This is the new one. We have this confirmed by canon in this strip.

So now that the facts have been established, here comes the implications and suppositions.

We know that the basic unit of absolute time in Erfworld is the Turn. Erfworlders talk about being x Turns old, or that the battle happened y Turns ago, etc. We also know that a Day is the length of a Turn. But a Day isn't the same as a Turn, otherwise there wouldn't be a distinction. Yet there is. I make a distinction between Side-turn and Turn to indicate the difference between a Turn for one Side vs the Turn that corresponds to the Day. Each Side has one Side-turn per Day, and when all Side-turns are finished, the Day ends and the Turn ends.

We also know that Days are different in different situations. If the Side is not in a Battlespace, then the Day starts when the Side-turn begins, and ends when the Side-turn ends. However, we also know that Days can start before a given Side-turn does. That happens when two sides share a Battlespace. We've seen that behavior before too. With Kingworld, there was a lot of discussion about turns and the length of a Day.

So given that in theory any Side can interact with any other Side at some point, Turns must be the same everywhere. When a Turn ends, every Side-turn for every Side has ended. Otherwise you might have Sides on Turn 999 while there are other Sides that have only passed 60 Turns in the same "time". We know that Erfworld is an internally consistent system, so there has to be some universal somewhere and I propose that the Turn is it.

Now we have problem, because Days are different that Turns. Some Days may be longer than others. An isolated Side that does absolutely nothing but end Turn as soon as it begins is going to have a very short Day, whereas in a pitched battle, the Day might seem to go on forever. How do these two things reconcile? Well, we've already seen that time is relative in Erfworld. I see no reason that this should be any different. So I propose that all Days, no matter how long or short they are, happen at the same "time". That is, when a Turn happens, all Sides have their Day (in whatever respective areas they may be) simultaneously. So that outside each individual Area, a Day is actually the same length: one Turn.

This is where the concept of Battlespace comes from. We know that a Battlespace forms when two or more Sides encounter one another. That was proven back in tBfGK Book 1. That's what a Battlespace is. An Area (as I call it) that is shared by two or more Sides. We know that Sides in a Battlespace share the same Day and that information is consistent within them. We've seen Battlespaces that were already formed, but we've never caught one in the act of forming. Here's where the Natural Predictamancy comes into play. Two Sides that will not interact with one another in any way don't need a Battlespace. The discussion above about Days and Turns show that. If a Side isn't going to do anything but end Turn without acting on anything else, why should it need to wait for other sides? A Battlespace is only needed when Sides must interact with each other. So Erfworld, knowing that some Sides are going to come together this Turn, creates a shared space with it's own relative time where those Sides can interact. Hence, Battlespace. This completely supports Jillian's assumption that since a Battlespace came into being (which she noticed only because Day started before their Turn did), the need for a Battlespace must be present. And that need is for multiple Sides to interact.

So. Now we've established that there's a Turn where Erfworld creates pockets of time that share the same Day. Each of those pockets is distinct from each other, as Erfworld automagically creates Battlespaces where they are needed. We've also established that all of these individual Days happen simultaneously. Now we run into another problem. What happens when one Day needs to look into the information for a different Day? If all the bubbles are happening at the same time, and all Days are the same length of absolute time, how do you preserve information between the bubbles? The simple answer? Magic. Or 'mancy, if you prefer. Because all possible communication between Days happens through some form of 'mancy, the information problem doesn't exist. If this was real physics, it'd be a cop-out answer, but we're talking about Erfworld. Magic makes it work.

So. There you go. Feel free to tear it apart.

[Kreistor]

C. Turn order is determined by some currently unknown mechanism when a Battlespace is formed.
This is again a duh kind of a thing. A Day starts at the beginning of a Turn. Which Side turn comes first within a Battlespace is determined by some yet unknown factor.

Look up "Natural Turn Order". Each Side has a set position relative to all other Sides that is used to determine where they are in the Turn order. Jetstone always goes after Gobwin Knob, Charlie before. Sides that are allied move simultaneously on the last Natural Turn Order of the allied Sides.

6. Battlespaces are formed by Natural Predictamancy.
A. Battlespaces form when and only when an encounter between two or more Side will occur.
This is the new one. We have this confirmed by canon in this strip.

There must be an exception. This can lead to paradox.

Example:
On Turn T-1, Natural Turn order is A then B.
1. Side B attacks Side A in City A-1.
2. Side B wins but takes heavy losses. City razed, and very small Army B heads for City B-1, but has to camp in field.

Turn T, option 1 -- Turn Order:
1. A goes first and scouts for Army B. Army A is nearby and can crush Army B.
2. Army B not found. End Turn.
3. Commander of Army A has a decision. Move and risk encountering a scout, or hold position and hope they think he has moved on and avoided the scouts. Commander decides to hole up in a cave, and hold tight.

Problem: No encounter. Despite being in Battlespace, there was no encounter, and there should be no Turn Order. Proceed to Option 2.

Turn T, option 2 -- Simultaneous Turn Order.
1. Commander Army A believes Army B is out of range, sends scouts fast forward to try to catch up.
2. Commander Army B beleives no enemy units in Battlespace, so can move without encountering enemy.
3. Commander Army B hits a hex with a scout in it, and unled scout attacks.

Problem: need a Turn Order because of encounter. Correct variant was Option 1. Redo with Turn Order.

The Turn Order itself conveys information that can result in a different decision by the commander.Wanda says it near the end of Book 1: "No barbarians either." Turn at damn means no Barbarians in Battlespace. We call that Meta-information, and it can do nasty things to worlds like this.

The Turn Order needs to be enacted whenever the possibility of conflict occurs, not just the future choice of conflict. Simultaneous movement can lead to unlead units in the same hex initiating conflict, when Turns were simultaneous. It just has to be this way.

[Balerion]

There must be an exception. This can lead to paradox.

Example:
On Turn T-1, Natural Turn order is A then B.
1. Side B attacks Side A in City A-1.
2. Side B wins but takes heavy losses. City razed, and very small Army B heads for City B-1, but has to camp in field.

Turn T, option 1 -- Turn Order:
1. A goes first and scouts for Army B. Army A is nearby and can crush Army B.
2. Army B not found. End Turn.
3. Commander of Army A has a decision. Move and risk encountering a scout, or hold position and hope they think he has moved on and avoided the scouts. Commander decides to hole up in a cave, and hold tight.

Problem: No encounter. Despite being in Battlespace, there was no encounter, and there should be no Turn Order. Proceed to Option 2.

Turn T, option 2 -- Simultaneous Turn Order.
1. Commander Army A believes Army B is out of range, sends scouts fast forward to try to catch up.
2. Commander Army B beleives no enemy units in Battlespace, so can move without encountering enemy.
3. Commander Army B hits a hex with a scout in it, and unled scout attacks.

Problem: need a Turn Order because of encounter. Correct variant was Option 1. Redo with Turn Order.

The Turn Order itself conveys information that can result in a different decision by the commander.Wanda says it near the end of Book 1: "No barbarians either." Turn at damn means no Barbarians in Battlespace. We call that Meta-information, and it can do nasty things to worlds like this.

The Turn Order needs to be enacted whenever the possibility of conflict occurs, not just the future choice of conflict. Simultaneous movement can lead to unlead units in the same hex initiating conflict, when Turns were simultaneous. It just has to be this way.

Not sure I am getting your objection here. What you seem to be saying is that because the world telling two sides that they will interact will change their actions, they could change what they will do based on that information and now not interact?

This seems to get right back into another debate on Predictamancy, which is what this is. Can being told a prophecy let you prevent it from happening? The comic's answer so far has been no. So since this is another prophecy, that there will be an encounter this turn, we should assume that there is no escaping that occurrence. It might change individual choices, knowing that information, but it won't do so in such a way that prevents the prophecy. The details of that are murky, but it is what we are told so far.

But we might be able to doge the whole issue; consider this way of it playing out: We are assuming Haffaton knows that there is another side out there as well, and that they will find them, but what if that isn't the case? Jillian moves after them, and because of their actions will have an encounter (relative time lets this play out, but it involves predictamancy since it is predicting events that haven't occurred). However, Haffaton started move as usual because no side before them encountered them on that side's turn, so doesn't know the battlespace exists. They never get that meta information.

From the other way, if Jillian's troops will encounter Haffaton forces on their turn, they might get a surprise as ending their turn shifts things to noon instead of ending the day, but Jillian will have seen things begin at dawn as usual so receives no warning that could influence her action.

[Masennus]

I think I am ready to formulate a Theory of Erfworld Relativity:

Let us define two sorts of Time. Absolute Time (atime) and Observed Time (otime).
For a hypothetical omniscient observer atime and otime are identical.
From the omniscient reference frame every Side takes its Turn in order every day.
Number each event on a given day 0 through N. Notice that this numbering is well ordered finite sequence.
Any Unit on Erf observes a subsequence of these events.
Each Unit experiences otime for each event they observe, and no others.
All Units experience Dawn (event number 0) and Dusk (event number N).
The Sun behavess as a separate Unit in each hex.
The Sun rises at Dawn, and moves 1/nth of the way across the sky for each of the n events in its hex, then sets at Dusk.

I believe this system is completely consistent with canon, and also paradox-proof.

[Swodaems]

C. Turn order is determined by some currently unknown mechanism when a Battlespace is formed.
This is again a duh kind of a thing. A Day starts at the beginning of a Turn. Which Side turn comes first within a Battlespace is determined by some yet unknown factor.

Look up "Natural Turn Order". Each Side has a set position relative to all other Sides that is used to determine where they are in the Turn order. Jetstone always goes after Gobwin Knob, Charlie before. Sides that are allied move simultaneously on the last Natural Turn Order of the allied Sides.

6. Battlespaces are formed by Natural Predictamancy.
A. Battlespaces form when and only when an encounter between two or more Side will occur.
This is the new one. We have this confirmed by canon in this strip.

There must be an exception. This can lead to paradox.

Example:
On Turn T-1, Natural Turn order is A then B.
1. Side B attacks Side A in City A-1.
2. Side B wins but takes heavy losses. City razed, and very small Army B heads for City B-1, but has to camp in field.

Turn T, option 1 -- Turn Order:
1. A goes first and scouts for Army B. Army A is nearby and can crush Army B.
2. Army B not found. End Turn.
3. Commander of Army A has a decision. Move and risk encountering a scout, or hold position and hope they think he has moved on and avoided the scouts. Commander decides to hole up in a cave, and hold tight.

Problem: No encounter. Despite being in Battlespace, there was no encounter, and there should be no Turn Order. Proceed to Option 2.

Turn T, option 2 -- Simultaneous Turn Order.
1. Commander Army A believes Army B is out of range, sends scouts fast forward to try to catch up.
2. Commander Army B beleives no enemy units in Battlespace, so can move without encountering enemy.
3. Commander Army B hits a hex with a scout in it, and unled scout attacks.

Problem: need a Turn Order because of encounter. Correct variant was Option 1. Redo with Turn Order.

The Turn Order itself conveys information that can result in a different decision by the commander.Wanda says it near the end of Book 1: "No barbarians either." Turn at damn means no Barbarians in Battlespace. We call that Meta-information, and it can do nasty things to worlds like this.

The Turn Order needs to be enacted whenever the possibility of conflict occurs, not just the future choice of conflict. Simultaneous movement can lead to unlead units in the same hex initiating conflict, when Turns were simultaneous. It just has to be this way.

Kreistor, you have a valid point with the paradox that pops up in that particular situation, but I do have some small issues (read nitpicks) with it.
First your use of the word simultaneous to describe turns. Why are you assuming that the sides' actions would be happening simultaneously just because they would both be experiencing dawn (or the start of day-turn T) at the same moment relative to their respective side-turns. The position of the sun relative to your actions has little meaning in Erfworld. In fact it can even jump backwards depending on your actions. Natural turn order may still hold in the case of two sides both appearing to have turns at the same time relative to the sun.
Secondly, the decision of the commander army B to hole up in the field to avoid scouts after experiencing a delayed start of turn makes little sense. That is because the units you are saying he has to avoid are merely scouts. A good lexicon of counter scout tactics can do wonders here while still letting Commander B end turn closer to City B-1 than he was before. There are other scarier reasons that a commander could have for trying to avoid an encounter by not moving. (Ambush! Buttsex for everyone! Or on a more serious note, wanting to stick to terrain in which he has some form of advantage.)

On a side note, I find it interesting that the characters describe dawn as it getting light out instead of it being the moment the suns peaks out over the horizon.

[Kreistor]

1: "Secondly, the decision of the commander army B to hole up in the field to avoid scouts after experiencing a delayed start of turn makes little sense."

Avoiding detection ensures the enemy does not know where you are, making their task of finding you that much more difficult. Commander of Army A knows every hex where his scouts were. If a Scout is dead on his next Turn, then the enemy killed it. Given a known army make-up (ie. attacking City A revealed their deployment), then you can figure out a smaller region to search.

Let's say that you knew where an Army was at the end of your Turn 1. On his Turn 1, the Army moves a maximum of 5, because that's the known speed of its slowest Unit. On Turn 2, you search as much of the circle range 5 centered on that Hex as possible, and wind up leaving scattered scouts. On Turn 3, you still have no sign, so the last known coordinate is still the same, but now the enemy Army could be as far as 10 from that start point. However, if on Turn 3, you know that one of your scouts disappeared, you know that the army must be within 4 of the hex where the scout died (1 to move in, and 4 moving out).Searching a radius 4 is much less difficult than radius 10.


2. "Why are you assuming that the sides' actions would be happening simultaneously just because they would both be experiencing dawn (or the start of day-turn T) at the same moment relative to their respective side-turns."

I said nothing about the Sun's position. But the answer is here:

http://www.erfworld.com/book-1-archive/?px=%2F144.jpg

Parson: "Turn at dawn means... Neither Charlescomm nor Transylvito are in Battlespace."
Wanda: Nor Barbarians.

If Side A is in Battlespace, Turn does NOT start at Dawn for Side B, with it's later Natural Turn Order. This tells us that some time passes between dawn and your Turn start when someone is in Battlespace.