2021-10-25
Posted on 2021-10-26 by Aaron

51 thoughts on “2021-10-25”

  1. Pharmadan

    Who doesn’t know Pacman and have the pattern memorized?

    1. Some Ed

      Well, I don’t have the pattern memorized. But I’m also a bit older than the average age of characters in this update, if I’m not mistaken.

      1. Pharmadan

        Honestly it was a reference to the Mark Wills song 19 something.

        1. Edward Rhodes

          I ran it on YouTube from your suggestion. I get the reference now, but I’d never heard of it before.

    2. Pharmadan

      Over a month and nobody has gotten the reference to 19 Something by Mark Wills.

      Kinda feel a little sad…

  2. Krenn

    a few pascals? that’s nothing. practically undetectable. does she mean a few kilopascals?

    1. Sabreur

      Her new superpower is perfect self-awareness… so yeah, I think she meant exactly what she said.

      1. Some Ed

        If she truly had perfect self-awareness, she’d probably realize that the answer to her question is “probably not”.

        That said, I’d guess that The Flea *might* have, but wouldn’t know the units well enough to say yes correctly. Also, probably not enough on her side to be willing to go along with her on her banter. I mean, I don’t think he’s on *any* of the other characters’ sides well enough for that.

        1. Rockphed

          I could see Moonshadow or Ron getting a banter assist. Maybe even Julie. Cecil might get a real assist, but no banter. Everyone else gets varying levels of bugs in their lives.

        2. Veritas

          She did get near-total *awareness.* What she didn’t get is the *clarity of thought* to process that into sound conclusions in a reasonable amount of time. She’s doing better than she was – when the sheer volume of information was paralyzing – but it’s entirely plausible that she *did* notice a slight pressure drop, but *didn’t* realize that others wouldn’t be able to.

    2. Opus the Poet

      Sea-level air pressure is about a million pascals plus or minus, so a few pascals is a very tiny change indeed

      1. Opus the Poet

        Whoops make that way minus I added a zero in there it’s 101,000 pa +/-

  3. Deckape

    Wow an OG K-Mart reference!

  4. Wanderer

    I’m starting to get a bit worried… PS238 is my favorite of Aaron’s works.
    The fact that it had gone monthly was hard to bear. Then it sorta went bimonthly… but the last two are kinda quarterly… I don’t know what is going on, but I’m HOPING for rather more than 7 pages next year.

    1. MrBookBoy

      I feel the same way, but there’s nothing we can really do unless Aaron chooses to do it. It’s his project after all, and if he feels he can only do this many pages, then that’s how much it’s going to update.
      Aaron, if you’re reading this, good work on the updates! I hope everything’s going well for you.

      1. Dick

        True, and your sentiments are seconded – but when PS238 and Use Sword On Monster have fewer updates in 2021 combined than Outsider (which is by far the slowest thing I read that I’d still call active – ie not Strong Female Protagonist or Edison Rex) it feels a bit concerning.

    2. Whims

      I’m a little concerned that the Manacle of Nyrathos introduced itself as the Manacle of Prometheus, and the former/current wearer didn’t react to that. It could be a plot point, and in this comic details are often significant, but this story started five years ago: it might also mean page posts are spaced out enough for the author to change his mind or lose track of details, and not notice. I like the trend of Greek mythos items, though, and I’m wondering if that’s relevant to identifying the shop’s “management”.

    3. Hazak

      To be honest I stopped regularly checking this comic a while ago, I just couldn’t stand such long cliff hangers,
      but Aaron has more than just the comic to do, so I get the slow down on most of his comics.
      For use sword on monster it has been just as bad, and the comic is nearing its end.
      I just thank Aaron for making the comics up to this point in the first place.

  5. Prairie Son

    For those who don’t know, a pascal is equal to about 0.000145 Pounds per Square Inch (PSI).

    1. David Hughes

      Or 0.01 millibar.
      A pressure drop of “a few pascals”is harder to quantify, as the value of “a few” is indeterminate. As normal sea level pressure is 101325 pascals, “a few” could be between 0.02 and 101 millibar. The upper end of that range is more than enough to result in your ears popping if it happens quickly enough.

      1. Opus the Poet

        In my experience “a few” is more than 3 and less than 11. YMMV of course.

        1. David Hughes

          In bulk numbers, were the base number is larger than 50 or so, “few” is accepted to be 10% or less.
          A few of the protestors.
          A few of the fans.

        2. =Tamar

          In the speech about the Battle of Agincourt in Shakespeare, “we precious few” have been historically estimated to be “about eight thousand”.

        3. Some Ed

          Outside of the context of units being given, I would agree.

          But if I’m going from Birmingham to see visit my friend in Liverpool and I end up in London, I don’t say I was off by a few meters. There’s a more appropriate unit, so I say I’m off by kilometers. (Unless, of course, I’m talking to someone who doesn’t do metric.)

          If Dynamode is referencing “pascals” because she’s sciency and just thinks like that, she’d probably say kilopascals. But if she’s just wanting to say she noticed an atmospheric pressure change of no approximate degree, such that anyone and everyone should be able to notice it, then I’d guess the use of the term “pascals” was more about showing off she knows the SI unit for pressure, rather than thinking “well, I really only noticed because my ears popped, but it’s probably less than 10% of the current pressure. I can probably get away with `a few`.”

          I took it to mean “I noticed this pressure shift, but it seems pretty minor. My ears didn’t really even register it. I doubt I could detect something as small as a Pascal, so I’ll suggest it was a few of them.”

          Of course, since most people aren’t me, and I think y’all don’t even mull through all of your individual word choices at the level of detail I do (that would explain how you all decide to talk so damned quickly, at least), it’s most likely the real thought process was more like “Uh oh, pressure shift. Did anyone else notice or is it a quirk of my new powers? What’s the units for that? Oh, Pascal. Got it, now speak.”

          Except, not in words, so it was four or five very quick thoughts taking about the span of time one would say, “Did anyone notice”

      2. SpyOne

        And then there’s the possibility that “a few” was intended as an obvious understatement, …

    2. HiddenWindshield

      Or roughly the drop in pressure you experience when you increase your altitude by roughly 3.5 inches (9 cm).

  6. Matthew Davis

    I just wanted to say that while I know the Flea is a expy of Spiderman in a lot of ways he’s _really- channeling his inspiration in panel 3.

  7. Messenger

    “Pac-Man Physics”… As in, if you go out one side, you come in automatically at the other opposite side…

    So not only is this place larger on the inside, we have that as well. It’s similar to the place the Transdimensional Defense Division (from Saving Alternate Omaha; 12112013).

    Makes me wonder if, seriously, that’s how the borders or limits to universes work: if you look past it, you see the other side. This concept was used in the sci-fi movie “Paycheck” (2003).

    1. Whims

      I also have a distant memory of a Land of the Lost episode when the main characters use binoculars from hilltop and see themselves on a distant hill facing away, implying the “Land of the Lost” was a small, closed topology. Pac-Man uses a torus, but I’m assuming this shop uses something a lot more exotic.

  8. Prairie Son

    Also, that’s the powerblast whatsername fired off from the staff which has apparently just been ricocheting around the building since. If this was my campaign, at this point there’d probably be at least a dozen dice in the catastrophe pool.

    1. TBeholder

      Presumably it has limited range, thus should fizzle away… eventually.
      Of course, “Blue Light Special” might lso make this little inconvenience a moot point.

    2. EB0

      Pretty sure the powerblast you see fired at the roof in panel 2 is the same one you see coming from the floor in that very same panel and it’s not a ricochet, just… pacman physics.

      1. Ed Rhodes

        Yes, I was going to say that.

  9. Dave III

    When those interdimensional cops that were trying to bench Von Fogg and Zodon brought the kids to their private universe to talk/negotiate/deputize, didn’t them mention that they only put up the walls around the room “To keep from staring at the backs of their heads all the time”? I think this is specifically how Williams-verses work.

  10. Matthew

    Is there a Patreon just for PS238? This is by far my favorite of Aaron’s work. I know he has a global Patreon, but I’d like to specifically support PS238. Money talks and all that.

  11. Ed Rhodes

    Should I know what “pacskulls” are? Because I don’t.

    1. Rockphed

      Flea does not know what a “pascal” is, so “pacskull” is his best approximation of the word.

      1. Ed Rhodes

        Ah, thanks.

    2. LookieLouE1707

      pacskulls are what the ghosts mount in their trophy room after they finish off all your lives.

    3. Faust

      I did an image search for Pac-Man skull. I’m regretting it.

      1. evileeyore

        There are many things man was not meant to see, and even more man is not capable of unseeing.

        May old age eventually bless with you blissful forgetfulness.

  12. LookieLouE1707

    Why is the flea letting bad kid #2 go?

    1. Faust

      And why isn’t he dizzy. 🙂

    2. evileeyore

      1 – The Flea isn’t Evil.
      2 – The Flea probably doesn’t want to carry the ball out while the place collapses, so…
      3 – Power can fend for himself while the place collapses aroudn them from Glory having activated the “Oops, we’ve activated the Self-Destruct so we can escape” clause.

  13. Radecliffe

    Somehow I don’t think it will be worth it. Just a hunch.

  14. Faroloz

    Soooo… Cecil aint planning on giving that Staff of Power back is he?

  15. Kar-El

    Blue Light Special – that was a K-Mart phrase. Since K-Mart no longer exists, I’m guessing we’re going to see an impressive but outdated weapon of mass destruction that either doesn’t quite work the way it should, or maybe not as well as it is supposed to…

    1. Foradain

      This turns out not to be the case, although it does seem to be closer to becoming true…

    2. Rockphed

      K-mart is still a legal entity (or Sears which was bought by K-mart exists), but they have no stores or merchandise.

      1. Opus the Poet

        Other way around. Sears bought what was left of K-Mart.

        And last I checked they still had “Blue-Light Specials”

        1. Opus the Poet

          According to Google the last blue light special was late 2015, which corresponds with my last trip to a K-Mart.

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