hkmaly

I second David Fenger's note about this likely starting as discussion about dieting.

It's probably not the ordinary catgirl transformation but the pet version from Goonmanji. Or she's on catnip. Or maybe this is how she was when she was actually 18, before the "betrayal" of Noriko.

Use is a strong word... for me, at least. Attack is definitely stronger. Well, sure. She can train falls. If such skill is any use to her, given she's floating. Or she can do some tricks like breaking bricks. I'm pretty sure she can't use martial arts against some human even if she doesn't mean to hurt them. Both Voltaire and Zeus were really careful to not even touch anyone. (Pandora obviously DID touch Blaike and was hugging several people, and Jerry hugged Susan, but that really wasn't martial arts.)

Not really. One of the first obvious examples is dogs -- we've created and altered hundreds of dog breeds, a number of the current breeds only existing for a single human lifetime. Going from wolves to wolf-like dogs may have happened long ago, but turning those into Papillons was much more recent. Dog breeding was a Victorian craze and many modern breeds were developed then. Ehm. I meant for humans. Sorry, I see I wasn't clear on this. Generally, the shorter the "generation" of species is, the quicker it evolves. Bacteria can evolve a lot in just few years (and that's not counting horizontal gene transfer). Dogs reach sexual maturity around six months and are only pregnant for two months. (Also, deliberate breeding is quicker than evolution.) Humans reach sexual maturity around 13 years (and often postpone having kids further, but that's really recent). Of course, even if dragons live longer than humans, they may start reproducing sooner, giving them quicker evolution. However, even the Komodo dragons take 8 to 9 years to mature - that's shorter but not by much. Tyrannosaurus reached sexual maturity at 20 years according to one study. One generation per year. Tawny owls pair off from the age of one year.

As long as Vladia is okay with a boyfriend who cosplays Chun-Li. We don't know how often he does it, do we? Besides, Vladia might be more ok with that than average given her own sex history.

Remember that immortals are limited to "empower and guide". Adrian is the only Elf we've seen in canon, but he isn't unique, which means that Immortal-human sex is allowed as long as it is consensual. ... yes, empower and guide is either not exact description or there is way how can having child be considered empowering. But my point was than Hanma can't really use any martial arts (against humans at least) and couldn't directly attack Vladia, which I though was implied in that second post. She could try, but Greg is creeped out by attractive eighteen-year-olds. Actually pretending to be older would have a better chance of working, although it doesn't seem likely Hanma could pull that off for very long if the Hanma in canon is much like the Hanma in this longest NP arc ever. I can imagine Greg being ok with combination of "manage to keep older looks most of the time" and the logic she gave to Catalina. Although I still consider Vladia more likely.

Perhaps, but it's not strictly speaking necessary. All that's really required is a human-like intelligence (in order to properly pose as human) and a good shape-shifting spell. I suppose unless it's a hereditary ability it is unlikely they'd have only the one spell, and such an advanced one at that, so they might need to be a powerful and skilled magic user to do such shapefhifting - but just because they have a lot of magical power does not necessarily mean they're also an unstoppable juggernaut physically. Bringing things back to EGS (while remembering that in fiction most Dragons are tough but not so much so that they can't be killed by a protagonist with medieval weaponry), if Adrien Raven was in danger from a gun, I don't see why a Dragon Mage couldn't be too. While true, human level inteligence and being skilled magic user is more than lot of dragons have. And the true danger of dragons is magic - both their flying and fire are usually magic. Stories confirm this: while being physically stronger isn't related to intelligence, there seem to be big correlation between intelligence and dangerousness of dragon in fiction. Those stupid but physically unstoppable juggernauts might be the ones who died on food poisoning. Adrian Raven didn't have any scales. We can debate the effectiveness (how much), but I would consider obvious that scales raises resistance to bullets. He was also close, not in air and not aware of the attack, which lowered his ability to evade. Obviously, dragon mage WOULD be in big danger from a gun while in human form. Sounds obvious, doesn't it? Sure, there are alternative explanations, but even if the reason they became concern was different, they likely got stronger due to both evolutionary adaptation and normal (training) adaptation. (Hmmmm ... wait. Training would have bigger effect. Evolution is too slow to be measurable on scale of human history and dragons usually live longer ... on the other hand, evolution is more effective the more of affected population is dying from evolutionary pressures ...)

It could be a special wand, of great power and/or with one or more special spells in it. Of course that wouldn't be obvious on sight (at least not to the readers; the Golem appears to have magic detecting vision), but I can't think of anything that would fit with EGS that it could be that readers would suddenly know exactly what it was and what it meant when they saw it. I can't think of anything either (the grail was just joke) but I hope Dan can surprise me. We don't know what the golem is made of, it might still be possible for the the axe Abraham was going to use on Ellen to be heavy and sharp enough to cut the golem's head off, or just break the head with the impact. Given the damage the golem already took, I don't think single hit of axe can cause serious wound, no matter the place. Also this. (I mean, it wasn't the point I was making but it's a good point regardless.) Wild but interesting speculation. With a bonus of "any forbidding of it is no longer necessary due to ending the magic reset cycle and magic going public". However, even wand capable of working over reset wouldn't necessary be chaos magic.

Considering that Kevin didn't show up until the Diamond was destroyed, and he was created during the latest magic system, I think it more likely it was the Diamond's destruction that activated him than the reset. I suppose we'll need to wait for Word of Dan or confirmation in the story to know for sure, though. The magic reset caused him to work. He still needed to be powered to activate. That depends on the dragon and who/what you're comparing it to. I was commenting that dragons who have shapeshifting abilities are usually considerably stronger than ones which doesn't (because it's not only ability they have). I was specifically thinking the Dragons might have bred with humans, leading to descendants with only a little dragon blood and no knowledge of it (except perhaps a family legend no one believes). Therefore the sentence in parenthesis. Yes, I can imagine say Nanase having some dragon blood. It would be superfluous, as her having some fairy blood would be enough to explain her abilities, but if there would be some good reason for it ... And yes. "What, did you though her charisma 32 goes away when she takes human form?" However, that's sideefect. If it's supposed to be hiding, it means there are some dragons (or people with enough dragon blood to be able to shapeshift to dragon form) still alive.

That's obviously part of same event and Elliot is tough enough to change even if it would hurt him, if he has good reason. That's true but doesn't combine well with going into public.

Remember that immortals are limited to "empower and guide". Agree. And probably do something embarrassing (to them) in failed attempt to get them closer.

The "require lot of power" is definitely option. The "diamond somehow fixed Kevin" is something I would consider less likely than that it was the magic reset. Or Dragons might have the ability to shapeshift into a human-like form, and the dragon population is currently mostly in hiding among the human population. There might even be people with dragon blood in the main or secondary cast... So, are you with me on the topic of "Dragons are not weaklings"? Yes, they may be able to shapeshift and use it to hide between population. However, I don't think they would be hiding from themselves, and main character hiding something like that from us would be weird. (Of course, little dragon blood is possible.) Secondary cast is more likely but I still don't see anyone specific who would be likely to be dragon. After all, CATALINA ended up just marked with cat spell despite being foreshadowed heavily. Also the dragon we see in the background behind Pandora might be only a handful of yards away from her and be no bigger than a pony. That would make it easier for it to hide. Based on his tail on previous picture I would expect he's bigger, unless Dan is bad at perspective "It's all rubbish." Lady Sybil sniffed. "Oh, it sounds nice, I'll grant you. Then they realize it means soot-burns, frizzled hair and crap all down their back. Those talons dig in, too. And then they think the thing's getting too big and smelly and next thing you know it's either down to the Morpork Sunshine Sanctuary for Lost Dragons or the old heave-ho into the river with a rope round their neck, poor little buggers." -- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards! Yes, using living dragons as shoulder pads is bad idea. You are supposed to use dragon summon.

Well Elliot can only punch and kick, Magus might have some ranged spells, but maybe they won't be effective. The best they might be able to do is keep the golem's attention away from Ellen and Ashley until suddenly a sword or axe attack from behind lops the golems head off. It's GOLEM. Normal sword or axe wouldn't help, and Abraham's weapons looked like having normal parameters. And Susan is busy. You really want to see a smoking crater, don't you? I wouldn't be against smoking crater either if not for the high risk of several main characters being painted on it. I expect it to be a wand, of the more traditional wooden type. It would fit well within the Diamond, and it would be obvious to readers that it's a magical object (so long as they don't mistake it for a random stick) without requiring familiarity with anything besides EGS (or Harry Potter). But wand wouldn't be anything special. It would be magic, but not reason to be considered evil or something. The main reason I think the power is something different is because the golem didn't seem concerned about it until he found what the source of it was, so I don't think it would have felt the need to exterminate anything if it was just normal magic that it was detecting. Sure ; however, there can be third option besides normal magic and chaos magic. In fact, if it would be chaos magic the golem would likely be able to identify it without looking at source. Another option is that it IS normal magic but due to what the source is the golem doesn't believe it.

"Accidentally". Sure I'm with Justin on this. However, Dan claims Ashley is not transformed and neither looks Elliot (despite him having that spell) ...

Hmmmm .... Hanma is staying on astral plane here, but maybe? It's not like Greg must KNOW his new girlfriend is an immortal who is stalking him for years ... SURELY a completely anime-obsessed and incredibly bored young Immortal with nothing better on her hands to do could have nothing to do with being inspired to GUIDE and EMPOWER a handsome looking human who was watching and rewatching one of the best and most unjustly cancelled anime shows for 168 hours straight. I also think the 3/4 is too low estimate.

Possibly, but not insoluble. It is entirely possible to have married couples that hate one another. They usually didn't hated one another when the marriage STARTED. Usually. True. It wouldn't fit in the page. More likely, however, the golem will charging up to Ellen in next page and Ashley will do the 9EK. It's hard to build up suspense when we already know Ashley will make 9EK but how exactly it will happen needs to be shown. There is, of course, still question of what will Kevin do and what will Ashley do besides the 9EK ... will she try to protect Ellen with her body? Sounds very dangerously. Note that Ashley can't UNDERSTAND the golem ; the golem needs to do something to make attacking Ellen obvious. Note that if he would attack the thing in crate, it would likely be impossible for us to see it in few pages as Dan promised. And the "whatevers" bleeding out is probably "just" magic which powers random artifacts around. Probably. It's true that the golem is concerned about it.

Well, as far as I know, Daleks do not routinely undertake a vow of celibacy. The fact they were genetically modified to not have any emotion except hate might be problem. It would certainly be fortunate if Abraham were to show up soon though if Elliot and Magus prove unable to stop the golem. ... I would prefer someone more powerful than Abraham to help them. Although it would be good story-wise ... I dunno, Abraham's enchantment of the diamond not working as intending (creating duplicates that can spread the curse) could be related to whatever the diamond's original purpose, or whatever the core's purpose, was. This is purely wild speculation here, but what are the chances of there being a power that humans once used that was completely unaffected by the WoM's system changes? The WoM mentioned storms of chaos magic happening if spell rules were too ideal. So what if there was a spell that was somehow created outside the given system of magic that harnessed chaos magic? That might be considered threatening enough for the need to have it sealed away. The diamond DEFINITELY seemed to be affected (read: his original purpose not active) by magic reset, unless the creature inside was restricted physically by being inside the crystal. I think Abraham's inexperience explains the diamond not working as indented enough ; it is however also possible there was additional power leaking which modified the behavior ... I think that harnessing chaos magic is very hard, by definition. The wooden core just being there, as opposed to already casting random spells on the parking lot and on everything closer, also implies it's not THAT dangerous. And most importantly, we wouldn't be able to recognize what it is in few pages, making Dan's comment weird. PS: What recognizable shape could wooden core have? Say, cup, fit for carpenter?

I dunno, Ashley doesn't seem as calm as Melissa was, Melissa was actually kind of a badass when she attempted the Flight of Dragons bit after. you could see it in her eyes, that scream was only meant to get Noah's attention, not actual panic. Ashley's gonna be panicking. Which is why I said similar. I agree she will likely be in panic and would be just lucky that screaming to attract superhero is the correct course of action. However, I also think she wouldn't be screaming due to danger to HERSELF, but due to danger to Ellen. Who is again declared something in need to exterminating, again, similar experience as she already had, specifically with Abraham. ... yes. All those are possible, although just ONE MIGHT making the golem's actions correct/justified. Wait. Open question: is it possible Ellen will be affected by the diamond original purpose due to her current exposure to his magic? As opposed to "just" being created by it's other purpose ... Could she get new powers? Could it be bad for her and making necessary to find a cure for her? Both? Will she retain the powers after the cure? If it wouldn't be intact, it would likely be hard to identify. Also, maybe the core is not simple geometric shape? Maybe it's something more recognizable? (Also, the golem didn't shown anything which would make me give it "them" treatment yet. Especially not on this page. But if Dan is doing it ...) He married into the family. Daleks are allowed to marry?

So....possible that the original purpose of the diamond was to seal certain power? Ellen being created by the diamond's later purpose, as added by Abraham, still left her imprinted with that power? And of course it sees it as having affected other artifacts. Also, Ellen is quite close to the diamond. And the golem may not be AS good as he thinks in reading origins of power. And we don't know WHY the golem thinks humans shouldn't get that power ; he may be misguided. But yes ; seems the original purpose of diamond is related to having LOT of power and being dangerous. Being prison for something, while not only explanation, seems more likely after this page. And I'm definitely worried now. Seems the golem wouldn't be easy to convince to stop, especially with it not understanding modern language ... and the aura around it's hand suggests he's not limited to physical power. So there will be fight and Ashley's reaction is suddenly more similar to Melissa's ... (Also, Dan basically confirmed the magpie, being from current system, was only activated because the diamond powered it.) ... yes. All those are possible, although just ONE MIGHT making the golem's actions correct/justified.

The thing about that is though, Tedd, as a Seer, needs to be able to make wands with spells that work in the new system in order to teach others how to use the new system, and the only way he can do that is by using the spells he's learned in the old system, the knowledge of the effects would carry over but not the actual system the were originally learned in. No, I don't agree that's the only way. In fact, new system may be different enough - and the seer exposure to previous magic system limited enough - that nothing in new system resembles old one ; AND even the seers which don't know about magic AT ALL are given informations to teach in new system. That suggest some sort of info dump from Will of magic which doesn't have anything to do with what the seers already knew beforehand. Ordinary users usually need to be re-taught when the position of icons on screen changes with upgrade from version 4.3 to 4.4. So, yes. Minecraft doesn't really have an API, there's pseudo API's out there (the Twitch Client, Technic Launcher, AT Launcher, etc) but modders are reliant on someone being able to de-obfuscate Minecraft's Java code and create the Minecraft Coders Pack (MCP), the guy that was originally able to do that eventually got a job at Mojang to help speed up the process. (Reading ...) ... seriously? The game known for modes has no official API and mods are basically hacking the game and only MCP licence is protecting from abusing that? ... didn't expected that sort of shortsights from developers. Sure, wouldn't be first time where game got more popular after being hacked with new functionality, but that was essentially abandonware ; and in fact there is a famous web server NAMED by the fact it was originally distributed as patch to other server, but that was long ago and is no longer true. My explanation is that if you are seer, you can get "exposed" to old magic by reading some instructions made by previous seer. But, yes, this is speculation not well supported by EGS. Actually, Dewitchery Diamond being repurposed is still fan speculation at this point ; the EGS canon doesn't make that certain. However, regarding Kevin, note that he was NOT WORKING AT ALL before the not-reset. And that the sentience is EXACTLY the feature which needed to be coded recently to explain his modern knowledge. You are assuming. You are assuming that these other ancient dragons were more powerful than modern weaponry is today. I see absolutely no reason why that assumption should be true. A dragon of a thousand years ago could have armouring much weaker than modern bullet resistant metals and still be impervious to most human weaponry. Plate armour of the fifteenth century gave such good protection against weaponry extant at the time that trained knights were quite difficult for common foot soldiers to kill. They most commonly died when pulled down by being surrounded, held down and stabbed through cracks in the armour. I explicitly said that I DON'T think they are more powerful than guided missiles. However, you are right that everything we know about dragons from Magus world is that they are considered serious problem, everything else is speculation. Indeed. Are you aware that when water is left in the open at temperatures above freezing, it will evaporate and turn into moisture or steam sooner or later? I assure you, that is equally relevant. That is to say, not at all. It's not THAT bad. We ARE talking about armor and this would be relevant in the "yes, this kind of armor can be made from natural materials" kind of way. *snicker* Yes it is. EGS is part of the published literary body, your denial notwithstanding. And ironically it is the BEST example we have for EGS because it is the ONLY example we have. EGS being published literary body only makes Buldog dragon one of examples of dragon in literature. He can't become typical because he's wastly outnumbered, being SINGLE example. Indeed. And in literature in general, dragons range from unstoppable engines of death and destruction to small inoffensive swamp creatures that accidentally explode if they get a bad case of hiccups. We have no idea which if either extreme applies to EGS. Note, however, that just because you think those "inoffensive" swamp creatures are less dangerous than buldog dragon it will not make him typical. Most it can say is that his level of power is not lower than the low end of power of dragons. And, frankly, I can imagine swarm of creatures likely to chain-explode to be danger justifying special dragon sirens. Special mages for fighting them, less so. That's true. I'm not sure how that big swarms would be possible - like, what would they be eating - and I don't understand your comparison with battleships - those definitely withstand MUCH more than gatlings - but I must agree that group of dragons more powerful than bulldog dragon OR same powerful but with numbers in hundreds could be danger special group of battle mages needs to be trained against even if you only need several hits from gatling gun to take them down. (Note that Magus is STUDENT. I would assume professor in said school is more powerful than him OR Terra.) I still think that resistance to gatlings is necessary if single dragon is expected to be danger, but I agree that we don't have that confirmed. Not only he's not boasting of his world's technology, he seem to have problem with understanding how car work. On the other hand, the university didn't looked THAT historic and the uniform they wore looked quite modern too. There were quite big improvements in loom technology in 1733 and 1785. Ford, the first company mass-producing cars, was found in 1903. First automobile was created in 1885. In comparison to that, gunpowder was developed in 9th-century China and spread into Europe on the end of 13th century. Oldest university was founded in 1088. Sirens were invented sometime before 1799. I find more likely that Magus's world technology level is similar to something like 18th or 19th century that than they didn't developed gunpowder yet. Of course, that is just speculation ; our information about Magus word is very limited and it might be even worse if Dan didn't actually though about it in level of details we do. If you consider more likely it's something like 12th or 13th century, I'm not aware of anything in the comics which would disprove it, because it's true that comparing level of development of two civilization is hard and can't be done with single number. No. I have something against poor reasoning and ill faith arguments. I suggest you work on both of these areas, you have a lamentable tendency to stumble into both of them in a desperate attempt to retain dominance of a discussion. I really don't see how my comment about dragons could bring me any special level of dominance of a discussion. Compared to, say, other comments I'm making and which you don't react so aggressively against. And I remember how big was the argument started when I talked about "real dragons" and didn't added the smile to establish it's a jab against the buldog dragon not expected to be interpreted literally and not expressing the idea fully with all disclaimers and full explanation. (Although I'm glad you don't react this way on everything I say. Posting stuff like this post takes LOT of time. Quick speculating is quicker and more fun, although it's true that sometime it can lead to being less reasoned than I think when writing it. AND I really don't know how to respond to posts like this quickly ; OF COURSE I can't provide those sources when you formulated it in way which has nothing to do with how I meant it.) EDIT/PS: Actually, this is speculation: we don't know for sure those are LOCAL dragons making that problem. It is possible people on Magus's earth control whole planet, BUT the dragons are arriving there either from other planet, other half of the planet in same sense Griffins used, or from other universe / plane of existence. (The explanation of it being local dragons seems simplest in terms of occams razor, but every universe having other half is established in EGS canon, so them being from other half of Magus's Earth would be close second.)

To use Tedd as an example, he made the wand that had FV5+clothing resize on it, if magic changed that wand would no longer work, it'd be inert, if he then remade the wand with the same spell, it'd be using the new system to work, not the old one, it's unlikely that Tedd would have been able create the wand with the previous system. If someone found old texts that mention spells, the best they could do is be like "oh hey this spell looks kinda like this spell I already know or know someone who knows" there would be similarities, but they'd be using the current system's spells to get an approximate effect and not the old magic. But having the old magic becoming available again shouldn't "fix" any imperfections of another system, someone with the knowledge of both systems would be more likely to "patch" things to make it work. I'm actually saying that yes, if the magic reset happened, Tedd would still be able to create another wand with FV5 + clothing resize on it and it wouldn't work. If you don't agree with that, we must agree on disagree ; the best canon argument for it to work that way is the existence of Kevin, so if it's not enough for you I don't have anything better to convince you with. Compiling everything isn't hard nor obsolete and can be automated. Running windows programs on linux is possible. And with binfmt_misc, you can actually do that without special syntax. However, I wouldn't be surprised if Disco Wizard didn't knew that. That may be better example. Except, not sure about Minecraft, but generally it IS possible to provide multiple versions of API at once. Note that seers are developers here ; normal magic users can't adapt to reset by themselves, they need seers to tell them the new rules apparently. Or, maybe they can get new spells in new system randomly if they are lucky but need seers for anything specific. What's happened is that the situation became SIMPLER, not more complicated. It's not like suddenly older magic systems are being emulated. Instead, they were ACTIVELY BLOCKED from working before. And that's said by Will of Magic itself. So, it's like there is API with overabundance of system calls, and some of them were blocked in previous systems, different set every time. Now, all are available. And most likely, part of the API was always available because it's too basic to hide. Seer abilities, for example, seem to not change - by design. (In addition to the blocks, some variables likely changed as well. However, there are limited ways to configure the default system of magic. The number of ways how to build an API is only limited if you want some limit on minimal size of request. Magic is definitely more limited than Minecraft programmers in how different can the magic systems be.)

Armour has a tendency to be as heavy as needed to protect its wearer. It has to do with practicality among other things. A thousand years ago mankind possessed few weapons even approaching the penetrative and destructive power of even common armour piercing bullets. A dragon that was all but invulnerable then might be far less so today. I give as an example the demon from season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that was so powerful that it took armies to bring it down. Two thousand years ago, that is. Buffy brought it down quite nicely with a common rocket launcher. That assumes humans was the most dangerous threat dragons needed to protect against. Which is unlikely ; I propose the most dangerous threat against dragons were other dragons. Therefore, their scales are likely resistant against claws sharp and hard as metal and against fire. BTW, are you aware that the synthetic fibers current "bulletproof" vests are made from are still not as good as spidersilk? Please give a baseline for the typical dragon in the EGS-verse and give links to your sources. Sigh. We were already talking about this. You know exactly what I mean. NO dragon is shown to be typical in EGS. You can't have "typical" from one and half example. When I talk about typical dragon, I'm talking about literature in general. It's a speculation which I'm JUST making (in that post you quote) - speculation which is indirectly supported, but not proven by EGS - that the buldog dragon is not typical in EGS just like it isn't typical in literature in general. And I did provided one example of type of dragons I'm speaking about in the rest of post you didn't bothered to quote. (PS: There may be multiple candidates for typical dragon in literature, however the buldog dragon is none of them.) However, you appear to prefer the idea that all the people in Magus universe, including Magus whose power we already saw, are unable to deal with threat on level of few buldog dragons without the advantage of being re-summoned every time they are killed. Maybe they should learn from Noah? Do you have something against dragons? Because I don't remember you complaining about any other speculation as much as in case of dragons. No, seers knowledge would not be automagically converted. Seers alive at the time of reset are perfectly aware of both systems. And seers ability to analyze magic and the way Tedd was using it imply they are able to create spells based just on their knowledge, without copying it from anyone. We don't know if this is limited to seers or if any wizard can do that, but that's not important. We know there are two seers missing from the meeting who found out seers second purpose. It's perfectly possible one of them, while researching old texts, tried to make spell based on what he read and ended up with something which was blocked by same blocks which blocked previous magic system. Maybe researching why Kevin doesn't work was the thing which later lead him to discovering seer's second purpose. That's not what I meant. Think of it this way: Magic operates kind of like a computer, and "taken at its most technical" how magic works is the operating system, like Windows. A specific magic system is then a program, let's say a word processor, that runs on the computer. The current system is Microsoft Word, and an older one (which is now forcibly prevented from running) is OpenOffice. The researcher discovers that Microsoft Word uses a particular Windows system call to display text. He tries to do something else (or rather, make something that does something else) with that Windows system call, but what he tries coincidentally happens to be something that OpenOffice did (and Microsoft Word does not), so Windows rejects the call even though it's technically valid. You have bonus points because unlike serious operation systems, Windows are full of undocumented kludges and workarounds (mostly to keep old programs running despite actually being buggy) so it's perfectly possible something will not work because of hitting some backward compatibility hack despite the fact it SHOULD work according to documentation. It also reminds me how I was coding program - completely from scratch - and suddenly got error message saying "OS/2 is not supported" from VMWare. Apparently, I randomly did something which OS/2 was doing and it either was too hard to support properly or VMWare authors didn't liked OS/2. (Ah, yes ... found the notes from 2001 about that. 16bit stack segment.) However, it's not that magic operates that much as a computer. It's just that computer is one of the few systems capable of running algorithms we have experience with.

She already was a mouse, ironically enough, so to be a mouse by choice would be unlikely. But it was Ashley who put it on her. Catalina is and was unlikely to use mice forms on anyone.

Yes. Yes, the bulldog dragon will be too close to evade effectively. Also, as I keep repeating, the bulldog dragon is not exactly typical dragon and I expect the dragons on Magus world will be closer to the one behind Pandora ... or like Dragon Nobilis from discworld. That might also be what happened. Although I'm not sure if it's actually that much different from my hypothesis.

Not at the moment, at least. Although Catalina is unlikely to use mice forms ... No. Dan just said he's trying to keep the number down. Less than 100 he said.