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Stature

Story Wednesday May 16, 2018

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55 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

The 'they' in question would be the DGB security team, I suppose.

Probably.

Although in current situation, Arthur is probably glad someone activated the alarm and allowed the doors to be formed, if, as Dan implies, it wouldn't be possible otherwise ...

(Before reading the comment, I also considered the possibility the doors will be formed but noone arrives as the usual team would be declared not good enough and Arthur would still be preparing better team ...)

23 minutes ago, partner555 said:

Wonder what's going to happen to Elliot, Ellen and Ashley?

Well, so far Arthur doesn't have any reason to assume he will need hostages to ensure Tedd's cooperation, so ... nothing? It's not like they tried to steal anything, the uteronc is only artifact which left the building and it's obviously still there ... and they are registered and Edward can vouch for them saying truth ...

I do, however, wonder how will Ashley manage to smuggle Kevin out (or would it be how Kevin manage to smuggle himself out with Ashley's unintentional help?). Maybe they would focus too much on the possibility of other dangerous artifacts activating?

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1 minute ago, hkmaly said:

I do, however, wonder how will Ashley manage to smuggle Kevin out (or would it be how Kevin manage to smuggle himself out with Ashley's unintentional help?). Maybe they would focus too much on the possibility of other dangerous artifacts activating?

I'm rather afraid that they will try to return Kevin to storage. They may not consider him safe to have running (or floating) loose. Or maybe they just want to keep public irritation levels down.

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5 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:
8 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

I do, however, wonder how will Ashley manage to smuggle Kevin out (or would it be how Kevin manage to smuggle himself out with Ashley's unintentional help?). Maybe they would focus too much on the possibility of other dangerous artifacts activating?

I'm rather afraid that they will try to return Kevin to storage. They may not consider him safe to have running (or floating) loose. Or maybe they just want to keep public irritation levels down.

It would be expected reaction from DGB and possibly even from Ashley. But story-wise, I suspect she somehow ends with him long-term, so I wonder how ...

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Just now, hkmaly said:

It would be expected reaction from DGB and possibly even from Ashley. But story-wise, I suspect she somehow ends with him long-term, so I wonder how ...

That is of course possible and I will say it would be a source of much hilarity. One possibility is that Kevin simply manages to pass unnoticed amidst everything else. While being extremely indignant that they are not even noticing him.

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Monty Hall was never this dramatic when opening Door number one.

And now after fourteen years of classified activities, the long awaited return of Commander Jaguar and Specialist Steve.

And Stature, you may want to double check the link in your first post.

www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=2499

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So...the question is, did the expert team that Arthur sent to secure the facility step up the pace when the alarm went off, or are those doors just an automatic thing that are linked to an empty personnel room at the facility?

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1 hour ago, Scotty said:

So...the question is, did the expert team that Arthur sent to secure the facility step up the pace when the alarm went off, or are those doors just an automatic thing that are linked to an empty personnel room at the facility?

Hardly empty. A place like that would sport a 24-hour guard detail always ready to respond. Also, I highly doubt such a place would exist solely for the benefit of a decoy storehouse. It would more likely be linked to several similar value sites and so economise with the involved forces.

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So, Dan's been talking about how he's about to be an evil cartoonist, and he even mentions how Magus won't have time to talk with a certain person due to the quick arrival of DGB. My prediction: Magus is in a rush, so he zaps Ellen into a masculine body without asking. While a morally wrong action on Magus' part, I don't object to it as a reader as I know Tedd can fix the physical effects easily enough and Ellen is resilient enough there shouldn't be too much mental trauma. On the other hand, it is annoying how similar the situation is to the end of Painted Black with Nioi and her nose-beep.

(The alternate result of Magus not having time to talk with Ellen (which is to say, his not zapping her) wouldn't be particularly interesting or evil, so I doubt that's it.)

Random (unlikely) speculation: Thanks to having absorbed the energy of the Dewitchery Diamond, Ellen can now create duplicates of herself with any enchantments that have been placed on her; being zapped into male form will allow her to make more Elliots (though they'll all have green hair unless she uses a hair-color-changing spell too).

...Finally, this isn't in a dream world, and it doesn't seem to be representing a flash of light or anything else that would be visible in the world of the comic, soooo.... Yay for starburst background in panel three!

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12 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

And now after fourteen years of classified activities, the long awaited return of Commander Jaguar and Specialist Steve.

I don't think those two are qualified to at least carry the bags of team which should be solving this.

8 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
9 hours ago, Scotty said:

So...the question is, did the expert team that Arthur sent to secure the facility step up the pace when the alarm went off, or are those doors just an automatic thing that are linked to an empty personnel room at the facility?

Hardly empty. A place like that would sport a 24-hour guard detail always ready to respond. Also, I highly doubt such a place would exist solely for the benefit of a decoy storehouse. It would more likely be linked to several similar value sites and so economise with the involved forces.

However, the question if the usual team will respond or if Arthur managed to warn them and now special team is being ready - and if it IS already ready - remains.

7 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

My prediction: Magus is in a rush, so he zaps Ellen into a masculine body without asking.

I think he's in SO big rush he won't even zap Ellen.

7 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

The alternate result of Magus not having time to talk with Ellen (which is to say, his not zapping her) wouldn't be particularly interesting or evil, so I doubt that's it.

Dan is not good in being evil and his scale might be skewed.

Even short talk with Ellen is likely to mean Magus would not zap her, but if the talk would change the zapping, I think Dan would say it differently. Or maybe not, because he seems to work hard on being vague ...

7 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

Random (unlikely) speculation: Thanks to having absorbed the energy of the Dewitchery Diamond, Ellen can now create duplicates of herself with any enchantments that have been placed on her; being zapped into male form will allow her to make more Elliots (though they'll all have green hair unless she uses a hair-color-changing spell too).

Very unlikely. Also, not particularly interesting. Compared to her now being part dragon especially.

 

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:
8 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

My prediction: Magus is in a rush, so he zaps Ellen into a masculine body without asking.

I think he's in SO big rush he won't even zap Ellen.

I don't think so, he so much wants to atone for what he's put Ellen through with her creation and allowing Sirleck to possess her that he's not going to let go so easily. Yes he wants to get back home, and yes he wanted to get it overwith before guards showed up, but he'll more likely suggest relocating now.

Also he did agree to ASK Ellen what she wants and I doubt he'd break that agreement.

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

I think he's in SO big rush he won't even zap Ellen.

Yeah, the situation has just changed from "I don't have much time" to "I have NO time." DGB agents equipped and ready for serious magical trouble will be stepping through those doors literally any second now, if Magus is still in line of sight when they do he's risking capture.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Even short talk with Ellen is likely to mean Magus would not zap her, but if the talk would change the zapping, I think Dan would say it differently. Or maybe not, because he seems to work hard on being vague ...

Yes again, if Magus gets even the most cursory of conversations with Ellen he'd immediately bring up the zapping and Ellen would immediately and very emphatically refuse, and Magus would accept that. If Magus not getting the chance to talk would result in Magus doing the zapping, then this choice of DGB response time is changing whether Magus zaps Ellen or not, and that seems a drastic change and doesn't fit Magus' characterization or how Dan phrased the commentary.

Dan could be going for Ellen getting zapped, to be followed by Tedd promptly giving her a watch to set her base form back to the Ellen clone form he's got on file, and Magus being surprised by it the next time he sees Ellen, but I'd be surprised if that's it. My guess is that the mentioned long term character consequences will be Magus feeling guilt over having failed to fix even that much of his wrongdoings.

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35 minutes ago, Douglas said:
2 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I think he's in SO big rush he won't even zap Ellen.

Yeah, the situation has just changed from "I don't have much time" to "I have NO time." DGB agents equipped and ready for serious magical trouble will be stepping through those doors literally any second now, if Magus is still in line of sight when they do he's risking capture.

They PROBABLY won't be coming out throwing spells ... but Magus doesn't know that. His experience with DGB includes this.

His most logical course of action now is not even looking which window he flew from. Trying to cast relatively complex spell on someone who may or may not be looking from that window, while maintaining maximal escape speed, doesn't sound like good idea.

 

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Magus has two priorities ahead of dealing with Ellen at this point.

1.  Stay ahead of the Government agents long enough to

2.  Get back to his native reality.

The big variable in all this is the means and timing of the return trip for Magus.

Magus knows where Ellen lives.  The only problem is that the Government also knows where Ellen lives  And as soon as awkward Elliot speaks to a responder, the Government will also know that Magus wants to contact Ellen before he leaves this reality.  Do you think Ellen can deal with being tailed by a Federal agent 24/7 for an unspecified period?

Maybe the government will assign an undercover platypus to keep an eye on her? 

Edited by Pharaoh RutinTutin
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18 minutes ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

Magus knows where Ellen lives.  The only problem is that the Government also knows where Ellen lives  And as soon as awkward Elliot speaks to a responder, the Government will also know that Magus wants to contact Ellen before he leaves this reality.  Do you think Ellen can deal with being tailed by a Federal agent 24/7 for an unspecified period?

Yes.

Now, question is if Arthur can deal with using so useful agent on something with this low priority.

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If I may make a crunchy observation, the only time we've seen anyone actually use a magical door before was when Nioi made her exit way back in Painted Black. This does imply that the people with Dad's Government Jobs have access to gate magic, basically giving them the same capabilities as the transporters in Star Trek. So, if they do, why did it take Tedd's dad so long to respond to the attack by not-Tengu in Family Ties? What, the magic doesn't work in a snowstorm?

Well, maybe DGB magic isn't as unrestriced as Nioi's, who can make a door that not only crosses space but goes between universes. Perhaps the DGB gates have to be set up in advance, something like a sub-space subway system, or that four-way front door of Howl's moving castle (remember that four-position dial which showed where the door would open to?)

Given that, Commander Jaguar and Specialist Steve might be on the scene by Friday's comic--or anyone, including Tedd's dad and/or Arthur J. Arthur. Or how about Nioi, Lord Tedd, and General Shade Tail?

21 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

Monty Hall was never this dramatic when opening Door number one.

Yeah, my first thought was "Door Number One, Door Number Two, or Door Number Three?"

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1 hour ago, Tom Sewell said:

If I may make a crunchy observation, the only time we've seen anyone actually use a magical door before was when Nioi made her exit way back in Painted Black. This does imply that the people with Dad's Government Jobs have access to gate magic, basically giving them the same capabilities as the transporters in Star Trek. So, if they do, why did it take Tedd's dad so long to respond to the attack by not-Tengu in Family Ties? What, the magic doesn't work in a snowstorm?

This was an alarm from a government facility indicating that thieves with far too much knowledge had successfully removed at least one object from government possession. The other was a phone call from an unknown girl calling in a concerning but as yet unconfirmed report about the potential presence of a magical criminal.

Also, you are assuming. You are assuming that DGB can open portals to anywhere at the drop of a hat without locking in coordinates. It might well be that the doors at this facility are actually preset, established in advance and needing only activation to operate. It could even be that before you can use this kind of portal, you must first have had operatives on-site to ready the area for portal reception.

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4 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Also, you are assuming. You are assuming that DGB can open portals to anywhere at the drop of a hat without locking in coordinates. It might well be that the doors at this facility are actually preset, established in advance and needing only activation to operate. It could even be that before you can use this kind of portal, you must first have had operatives on-site to ready the area for portal reception.

Actually, didn't I propose the pretty much the same restrictions in the paragraph right after the one you jumped on?

If you haven't guessed by now, I'm largely a real-life version of Mr. Tensaided, an uber-nerd who has spent way too much of his life obsessed with sci-fi/fantasy, old movies and television series, wargaming, roleplaying games, and even a good bit of Trekkie-ness, although I've never cosplayed a Vulcan or a Klingon or written a Kirk-Spock slash fanfic. 

Anyway, putting the gates in the storyline implies a lot of things that Dan may (translation: inevitably will) write around later in the story and then comment on in his commentaries, on his blog, or in tweets most of which I will never read because I refuse to step into the quagmire that is Twitter.

BTW, transporters are part of Star Trek because back in the Sixties Gene Roddenberrry didn't have the budget for the special effects necessary to have the Enterprise land on all the different planets it went boldly to. It wasn't until the fourth Star Trek series, Voyager, that a Federation starship would actually be shown landing, and then only once in the entire run of that series if I remember correctly. Once transporters were part of canon, all sorts of rubber science had to be invented to find new restrictions so that the landing/boarding party could be stranded, and, of course, loopholes in the restrictions so our heroes could get out of jams. I suspect a similar process will occur in EGS if it goes on long enough.

Edited by Tom Sewell
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11 minutes ago, Tom Sewell said:

Actually, didn't I propose the pretty much the same restrictions in the paragraph right after the one you jumped on?

So you did. My apologies. I jumped the gun due to irritation and stress, neither of which you could conceivably either help or be blamed for, and I am sorry about that.

 

13 minutes ago, Tom Sewell said:

BTW, transporters are part of Star Trek because back in the Sixties Gene Roddenberrry didn't have the budget for the special effects necessary to have the Enterprise land on all the different planets it went boldly to. It wasn't until the fourth Star Trek series, Voyager, that a Federation starship would actually be shown landing, and then only once in the entire run of that series if I remember correctly. Once transporters were part of canon, all sorts of rubber science had to be invented to find new restrictions so that the landing/boarding party could be stranded, and, of course, loopholes in the restrictions so our heroes could get out of jams. I suspect a similar process will occur in EGS if it goes on long enough.

I think it has been ongoing since the start of the series and is the main cause of all these expository lumps that Dan is so prone to, in and out of story. *sigh*

Nioi and Lord Tedd are both good examples. Dan himself has stated that he jumped the gun with Lord Tedd. I feel that Nioi (as well as the entire 'Second Life' plot thread) could be edited out of Painted Black without harming the storyline in any way.

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8 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Nioi and Lord Tedd are both good examples. Dan himself has stated that he jumped the gun with Lord Tedd. I feel that Nioi (as well as the entire 'Second Life' plot thread) could be edited out of Painted Black without harming the storyline in any way.

But Dan keeps going back to Lord Tedd and Ellen's Second Life, so either he's got something worked out now and is just waiting for the opportunity to get to it, or he's stubbornly hoping that if he continues to reference it, it'll help with the brainstorming.

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14 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

Well, maybe DGB magic isn't as unrestriced as Nioi's, who can make a door that not only crosses space but goes between universes. Perhaps the DGB gates have to be set up in advance, something like a sub-space subway system, or that four-way front door of Howl's moving castle (remember that four-position dial which showed where the door would open to?)

Given that, Commander Jaguar and Specialist Steve might be on the scene by Friday's comic--or anyone, including Tedd's dad and/or Arthur J. Arthur. Or how about Nioi, Lord Tedd, and General Shade Tail?

I don't think Arthur J. Arthur is qualified for field work.

I consider Agent Wolf and Agent Cranium most likely - as in, from the ones we know, the most qualified field operatives. Commander Jaguar and Specialist Steve seems better suited to deal with non-magic adversaries, although maybe they can arrive too. Of course, it could also be someone we don't know. Or ... Noriko.

I find very unlikely that the alarm is alerting Lord Tedd, so I don't expect Nioi or General Shade Tail. (Lord Tedd himself will DEFINITELY not show.)

8 hours ago, Tom Sewell said:

BTW, transporters are part of Star Trek because back in the Sixties Gene Roddenberrry didn't have the budget for the special effects necessary to have the Enterprise land on all the different planets it went boldly to. It wasn't until the fourth Star Trek series, Voyager, that a Federation starship would actually be shown landing, and then only once in the entire run of that series if I remember correctly. Once transporters were part of canon, all sorts of rubber science had to be invented to find new restrictions so that the landing/boarding party could be stranded, and, of course, loopholes in the restrictions so our heroes could get out of jams. I suspect a similar process will occur in EGS if it goes on long enough.

Enterprise itself (meaning, constitution, excelsior, ambassador, galaxy or sovereign class starship) can NEVER land on planet without needing severe repairs afterwards. Voyager was exception in this regard. The issue wasn't special effect to shown landing of Enterprise, but landing of a shuttle and the fact they were not able to get a model soon enough - they later get one for sixteenth episode.

7 minutes ago, Scotty said:
8 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Nioi and Lord Tedd are both good examples. Dan himself has stated that he jumped the gun with Lord Tedd. I feel that Nioi (as well as the entire 'Second Life' plot thread) could be edited out of Painted Black without harming the storyline in any way.

But Dan keeps going back to Lord Tedd and Ellen's Second Life, so either he's got something worked out now and is just waiting for the opportunity to get to it, or he's stubbornly hoping that if he continues to reference it, it'll help with the brainstorming.

Dan never said he DOESN'T have Lord Tedd in plan. What he said that he shown him too soon. He's probably supposed to be some sort of final boss.

And looking at how the stuff starting with Lord Tedd is keeping referenced, I don't think he could be removed completely. I suppose that what Dan meant was basically leaving both the Goo and Nioi "hanging" in air and only later admitting they are connected and bring Lord Tedd into picture.

After all, look at Andrea. I think people would accept Nioi appearing out of thin air, making the nose-beep and only being explained later.

... it's also possible if Dan would really exclude Lord Tedd he would be regretting it now.

 

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Enterprise itself (meaning, constitution, excelsior, ambassador, galaxy or sovereign class starship) can NEVER land on planet without needing severe repairs afterwards. Voyager was exception in this regard. The issue wasn't special effect to shown landing of Enterprise, but landing of a shuttle and the fact they were not able to get a model soon enough - they later get one for sixteenth episode.

Star Trek was pretty clearly inspired by a Fifties movie, Forbidden Planet, where a ship the size of the Enterprise does land on a planet. It only had to land on one planet.

 

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Dan never said he DOESN'T have Lord Tedd in plan. What he said that he shown him too soon. He's probably supposed to be some sort of final boss.

Nope. He's meant to be Darth Vader, the bad guy who turns away from the Dark Side. I haven't decided whether Voltaire is Palpatine or Snoke.

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