2015-01-09
Posted on 2015-01-12 by Aaron

98 thoughts on “2015-01-09”

  1. Random Wanderer

    Snrk.

    Does anyone think they’ll learn to actually take Julie’s word for something by the time they reach the end of the test?

    1. Flushmaster

      I think Firedrake might come around soon, if only because he seems like the kind of person that usually needs a bonk on the head to be convinced to pay attention. Neuro-whatsit seems to be at least trying to take an objective approach on this page (ie asking questions first), but I’m just waiting for Conjurer to do something stupid in a frustrated attempt to prove his superiority.

      1. Mutant for Hire

        Actually, Neuronet actually came out pretty reasonable in this scene, and even took Julie’s side of the argument. That said, I’m not sure if he was on Julie’s side or still a bit annoyed at the Conjuror making himself the leader. I can see him switching over to Julie’s faction just to annoy the magician.

        1. Veritas

          Neuronet isn’t in his element here. Conjurer is rather foolishly certain that he is, and is getting overconfident, but Neuronet is at least a bit more aware that this is not the world he knows. While he hasn’t shown clear signs of not thinking of Julie as just a kid (could be he respects Phlogiston saying it more than he would if Julie had been the only one), he otherwise seems less inclined to assume things, and thus is talking more about the things he knows to be true: that they’re in a giant magic egg, not the normal world; that 84 and Phlogiston got “ahead” of the others, without assuming they did so by merely flying quickly ahead (which he’d likely have seen anyway, right?).

          Perhaps I’m reading too much into it. Anyway, he does seem much more likely than Conjurer to acknowledge that ANYONE else, 84 included, may have a point; but how much he actually respects her remains to be seen.

    2. Van

      No. They have yet to pass a perception test to notice that they are idiots.

      1. KillerFish

        DM: “Roll a save vs. ego. Make it a good one.”

        1. Van

          DM: “You rolled a 1, critical failure, geeze, your character has an ego worse than a dragon, and proceeds to prove it.”

        2. Matt [in Middletown]

          Does that involve any gazebos, gongs, or doors in the immediate vicinity?
          “Too late.. the gazebo catches you and eats you.”

  2. AgentKeen

    Sometimes the hammer can do just as good a job as the finely tuned instrument.

    You’ll just get hurt if you aren’t careful.

    1. Veritas

      Re: the first, especially if your problem is a nail sticking up.

  3. Megamieuwsel

    That was pretty good aimin’ !

  4. Sora2455

    Well, thats one way to prove a point…

  5. anon

    So, 84 is like a little bit of batman stapled onto superman? Isn’t that like giving batman a green lantern ring?

    1. mage_cat

      Actually, Superman is usually pretty sharp. It’s just that his intelligence isn’t what leads to his most memorable displays the way Batman’s does. 84 is Superman dealing with being underestimated because she is a young girl rather than a grown man, which leads to a level of snark Superman doesn’t feel the need to dish out.

      1. Moe Lane

        True. Also, Superman is often working *with* Batman, who pretty much operates at 11/10 analytic capacity at all times.

    2. Flushmaster

      Julie is just being careful and using common sense. Conjurer seems to be intent on analyzing everything like some kind of magic CSI while Julie just sees a riddle being presented and is going for an Occam’s Razor approach (like her demonstration of the loop at Firedrake’s expense). The simplest solution/explanation is often the correct one, particularly with the type of puzzles and riddles that most trickster types like Veles seem overly fond of.

      In D&D terms Julie’s acting like somebody with high wisdom and moderate intelligence while Conjurer is over thinking the issue with (supposedly) epic intelligence but apparently dismal wisdom. And the charisma of a ticked off chihuahua.

      1. Van

        Actually the ticked off Chihuahua would have a higher charisma at this point.

        1. Mechwarrior

          Yeah, his charisma score seems closer to that of an incontinent chihuahua.

        2. Prairie Son

          I’d rather see an incontinent Chihuahua on my new carpet than any of these adults. Well, I might make an exception for Phlo, but I’m not sure she wouldn’t wreck the carpet because of her powers.

      2. Nightmask

        That’s not quite what Occam’s Razor is, which is the simplest explanation that explains the most facts is the correct one. 84 is looking at things from a more straightforward ‘there’s likely a common sense answer to the various trials’ while Neuronet and Conjurer are vastly over-thinking things (although Conjurer was at least willing to promptly accept the evidence they were in a spacial loop after previously making himself look stupid with his pontificating about his ‘finely tuned senses’). Firedrake and Phlogiston are more going with the flow at the moment, with Phlogiston trying to be peacemaker and get everyone working together instead of at odds.

        1. Opus the Poet

          And Neuronet pointed out that they are currently in a totally magic environment which might probably screws up any magic perception checks because everything’s magic.

        2. JJ

          Player: “I would like to try to detect magic, what should I roll?”

          DM: Don’t bother, you detect magic.

        3. Mechwarrior

          Actually, Occam’s Razor is using the fewest and smallest unknown variables that fit the situation.

          This is why “God did it” is never considered to be an acceptable answer under Occam’s Razor: while it’s a simple explanation, it has an unknown variable of effectively infinite size.

  6. Nico

    That’s some pretty decent aim there, 84!

    1. Psiberkiwi

      “I threw a rock into the air… and when it came down, it split Firedrake’s hair…”

  7. Shadur

    Aw, why’d it have to hit the guy who least deserved it?

    I have to concur with Moe Lane’s statement a couple pages ago that Conjurer’s helmet just seems tailor made to flip off with one good smack to the back at the right angle…

    1. Ghostbear0

      Because he is the one who projects young jock and is most acsesible to go all locker room on. Also he is the last one to say something really dumb.

      1. Russell White

        Also, he’s the only one not wearing a helmet,so it’s funnier

      2. Nightmask

        He’s also the only one with an unshielded head for the rock joke to work best with.

        1. Yhelta

          I disagree. The Conjurer’s helmet would have provided a very satisfying KLONG sound.

        2. kentda

          While it did make sense to whack Firedrake in terms of the joke, I still would have preferred a clong sound on Conjurer’s helmet. So much more amusing.

    2. maarvarq

      I think saying “How could she know…?” earned him that.

      1. Nightmask

        Except that’s a valid question to be asking, when presented with a claim you want to know by what evidence they arrived at that conclusion. Unlike Conjurer whose response was ‘What Hokem! I’m too good to not notice something like that!’ response. Neuronet meanwhile is fed up with Conjurer’s attitude and quickly points out that they aren’t in the universe he’s used to.

        1. Drojem

          His question sounds like he’s still doubting whether it really is the case. But Phlogiston and 84 just stood in one spot and: Hey look! Guess what happened? Which is all the evidence they needed, so that’s how they know. 84 didn’t have to know before she stopped: she had a hypothesis and tested it by stopping. Firedrake was being both dense and stubborn.

        2. Moe Lane

          I think that Neuronet is maybe starting to come around.

        3. Nightmask

          As they go along he seems to be getting more focused on the task they have and caring less about one of them being a kid or a FISS particularly since she’s proving herself with her actions (and Conjurer’s alienating him with his attitude).

    3. DocSavage

      It’s very hard to aim when you are throwing away from someone. =)

      1. Mechwarrior

        Fortunately, dramatic irony is a strong attractive force in this dimension.

        1. Yhelta

          Elan would be proud…

  8. CraigR

    Oh, I get it! I am SOOO dense, I can’t believe I didn’t get this before! (I haven’t bought a regular comic or even been in a comic for a long time, so I don’t know if the PS238s that are online have been published in hard copy or not. So this is ENTIRELY speculation on my part.)

    84 is going to become the next Atlas, isn’t she? Consider:
    * She’s smart. She is not taking anything for granted in the egg, which is allowing her to outthink the “more experienced” supers during this challenge.
    * She is respected among other F.I.S.S.s. The website Atlas 2 set up is getting quite a following, and it looks like she is on her way to earning the respect of supers community, both the hero and villain sides.
    * Atlas 2 doesn’t WANT to be Atlas, and is rather incompetent at the job, which is why 84 is training him.
    * Although she’s chosen the hero name “84”, that only means something to the hero community, specifically the F.I.S.S. subsection of it. If she gains widespread public recognition, the number won’t have any relevance to the world at large. I could see her taking the mantle of Atlas, but preferring to be called 84 within hero circles.

    If this was already brought up in the comments, well, I often forget to read them as well. 🙂

    1. cherub

      The PS238s have all been published except the story that is currently being told. Arron will probably publish this one once it is done.

      and you could be right 84 is on that path, Becoming Velles opponent would be one more step on that path.

      1. ThatGuy

        I just look at it as Atlas and the other important FISS that fought in the past. Both of them fought not for fame, but because it was considered the right action at the time. They saw the dangers around them, but didn’t blindly ignore the threats. Our old variant kept his flight hidden and had humility as he was a descent guy.

        Atlas on the other had came from another world as he was taught the “Super Morals” as he did go with a descent life… only to have a marriage break up and villain come and try to steal his son. (both evil school and his own home planet.)

        That leaves someone with a descent set of morals, combine with logic, then wrap it up with a descent amount of mental strength (achieved from her past adventures and a moonshadow confidence boost), with just a dash of that extra something… mostly given by having to work with villains and seeing the world in “regular vision” instead of “super vision”.

        Need an example of super vision? Take a look at the circle problem. When told what was going on it was split up. Normal vision – A child figured this out before me? That can’t be right? — Super vision – My ultra fancy super powers didn’t say anything so obviously I must be right. — her vision – Drat I missed the metal helmet with that rock throw.

        1. KillerFish

          I believe you mean Mr. Extraordinary?

          But you’re right. it’s not the power-set, it’s the moral decency of the person that makes them a hero.

    2. Leo Orionis

      84 is basically a Supergirl, just as Moonshadow is basically a Robin. 84 “growing up” to be Atlas (Superman) would make perfect sense. I think, however, that she’d feel stuck with the 84 name, otherwise we’d be letting down “her people”.

      Then again, maybe 81 would take over the leadership of the F.I.S.S. community and give her a big send-off party into the Atlas identiry. He might regard her getting the “job” as “validation” for the F.I.S.S.es, the same way comic fans feel that their favorite comic-book being made into a movie somehow shows how great they are, instead of how much money the movie makers think they can make from them.

      The basic difference between the F.I.S.S. community and Atlas is that the F.I.S.S. people are humans who have those powers as part of the appearance of super powers on Earth, while Atlas is a guy from another planet whose powers have a different origin. We discovered in the comic that “Argonite” affects any F.I.S.S., but we’ve never been told whether eveybody knows that, or just the people who were there when Atlas exposed the bad guy from Argo to the argonite, and 84 was affected as well. It might affect public perceptions to know that every F.I.S.S. is basically an Atlas. But would it raise people’s opinions of the F.I.S.S. community, or lower their esteem for Atlas?

      1. Kaian

        I was rereading that story arc recently and the general comments that it affecting other F.I.S.S. was an accident but they need(ed) a control incase the F.I.S.S. got out of hand as they did on Argo.

  9. =Tamar

    As drawn, Julie has blank eyes. So does Phlogiston. So do the others except for Neurowhoosit. Does that mean he’ll be the one who is killed (or severely incapacitated)?

    1. Unmaker

      It’s their masks or lack thereof, except perhaps for Phlogiston. I don’t think it is a deliberate tell.

      1. Mechwarrior

        Yeah, Aaron draws eyes like that on a very frequent basis in this comic.

  10. Andorxor

    That does proves nothing,she is a F.I.S.S. she could have thrown the stone strong enough to throw it round the world

    1. RayNAiken

      It could not have circled the earth that quickly without burning up in the atmosphere. Any slower and it would have fallen and hit the ground short. Any faster it would have continued out into space never to return.
      Then again maybe it’s magic.

      1. Opus the Poet

        Yeah, don’t you read the “what if?” section of xkcd? The part where real-life science is used on comic-book situations, I check it frequently for new entries.

      2. Andorxor

        I think the world in the egg is smaller than earth

    2. Ageisia

      Yeah, but if she had it probably would have done some permanent damage to Firedrake there.

  11. Naldru

    I believe that the eye that they are seeking is the “third eye” that sees inward, seeing through illusion to truth, seeing one’s own flaws instead of being self-deceived, yada, yada, yada. That would explain the Tarot cards since references on the internet refer to the tarot as a means of strenghening the third eye. The hypothesis will be strengthened if the gatekeeper shows up carrying a crystal ball.

    I also think that the locks and obstacles will be overcome by positive character traits, such as courage (stepping on the stone to open the door), honesty (getting her past the stone golems), leadership (she already has two of the others viewing her as competent), observation (noticing the spatial loop), and politeness (the gatekeeper giving her information). I expect further obstacles to be solved by kindness, charity, mercy, humility, loyalty, etc.

    1. DocSavage

      Interesting theory, we should find out soon.

    2. Van

      Crap, you may be close on that. Anyone here remember the Ultima series? In particular, Ultima IV – Quest of the Avatar? This is starting to sound like the learning the 8 virtues of the avatar and becoming the embodiment of them from the game.

    3. Lycanthromancer

      Don’t forget friendship.

      It IS magic, after all.

      1. Mr. Bawkbagawk

        this thread is now 20% cooler.

  12. Unmaker

    So is the voice the return of Grigor the sits-in-a-leaky-boat gnome or is it someone new?

    1. Debra Hanson

      Grigor is the “Doorman.” He doesn’t move from his book under the bridge.
      This is probably the “Babysitter.”
      (Who is likely to be one of Grigor’s relatives, and 84 scores again for knowing Grigor’s name.)

  13. noisyparker

    Geez, Firedrake… It isn’t a Star Trek-like loop… it is a Flintstone’s chase scene-like loop.

    1. Van

      Try reading “The Witch and the Wombat” and you will understand.

    2. TB

      Agreed. I would have said “Hanna-Barbera loop.”

    3. Wanderer

      He’s probably referencing the Holodeck, which used a treadmill-like effect to keep people from walking into the camouflaged walls. (That was the story in the pilot episode, at least. Given some of what they do in the Holodeck, it gets a little hard to justify.)

  14. Nodrog

    I don’t think 84 could have aimed that rock, so I’m assuming it’s the egg world warping things to hit Firedrake. As for why Firedrake deserved the rock: He’s the one who’s proved he’s not really listening to 84. Conjuror may be dismissing what she said, but he at least listened. Neuro is considering it. Firedrake just heard ‘warping’ and ignored the part about the fact that 84 getting ahead of them by just standing still.

    1. KillerFish

      This pocket universe must run on humorous karmic payback.

  15. Matt [in Middletown]

    Ludo, summon the rocks!

  16. J. Michael Looney

    Ok, no one said it….

    84 rocks….

    1. Kaian

      Punic wars are one comic to the right. . . o.O

  17. Devlerbat

    Maybe I am just being oversensitive but I don’t really care for how ALL the males, and just the males, on the “team” are being arrogant jerks and/or idiots. I am mean sure guys CAN totally be those things but it just comes arcoss as unfair to me. I mean if it was to show how many super heroes are arrogant jerks and look down on F.I.S.S. in the PS238 universe than why not have Phlogistan act that way?

    Again, I could just be oversensitive. Its also possible that the psychic is female, but I am pretty sure that is just the design of the armor (since armor of either gender would realistically be designed that way to deflect blows from the chest.)

    1. Lycanthromancer

      Actually, since Julie first showed him up, Neuronet has been a bit gruff but far less objectionable than Firedrake or (especially) Conjuror. Sure, he’s not falling all over himself to make nice with her, but he’s hardly been rude or dismissive.

    2. mage_cat

      Tyler has been this series Sane Person for most of its run. The Revenant has proven to be an intelligent mentor to him and a cunning strategist. Many other male characters on both the protagonist and antagonist side of the comic’s overall story have been shown as extremely capable in their fields and in general life skills. Why do you care so much that this one plot line has the male characters being put in a more negative light than the female characters?

    3. Mechwarrior

      Yes, I’d say that you’re being oversensitive.

      Of the entire cast of this comic, these three and Zodon are the only ones who’re constantly jerks. And Zodon’s been getting better.

      1. Prairie Son

        *cough*VonFogg*cough*

        1. Mechwarrior

          Von Fogg’s less of a jerk than these idiots.

          And his ego is more justified.

    4. Leo Orionis

      Also, don’t forget the chick in New York who said something like, “It’s about time the grunts showed up! I’m missing an important paid appearance for this!” Not all the jerks are male in this series, just in this small sample of the super-hero community.

    5. dsollen

      In this case I’m going to have to say yes I think you may be over sensitive. I agree that many shows are guilty of trying to adjust for sexism by going to far into positive-discrimination area, while some also manage to still have the negative stereotypes at the same time just to make everything worse; and I’m a big hater of this sort of things, of any unfair biased stereotypes regardless of sex/race/etc.

      However, in this comic there have been a fair number of girls and boys who are quite competent, neither sex has been unfairly represented in that regard over the course of the series. The comic premise might as well be ‘if common sense were a super power’, with July and moonshadow, a boy and girl, as the two prime examples of it.

      This particular plot is simply an outflow of that by intentionally showing the opposite side of things, how the ‘normal’ people who didn’t get the ‘common sense’ super power behave. I think considering the very fair handling of both sexes and diverse and non-stereotyped characters it’s far fairer to the writer to assume that the intent was to have almost everyone a jerk, and they just happened to make the one non-insane supporting character for this arc female by chance. For that matter making the non-jerk female allowed more interesting character bonding between her and 84, and thus has a good narrative justified reason to be done even if it wasn’t random chance. It is unfair to the author to presume he was controlled by some positive-discrimination in this one instance which has not been demonstrated anywhere else in the comic.

      Yes the problems you mention do occur often in media, but it’s unfair to presume it is in effect every time a female character and male character are put side-by-side and the female happens to be presented in a better light. If you went in the reverse view you could argue any time a male character was next to a female character and the male was presented in a positive light it was sexism, and suddenly you can never have character of opposite sexes that are anything other then identical without it being sexist. It’s impossible to avoid every theoretical stereotypical situation as a writer, sometimes by pure fluke, or even logical narrative reasons, your characters and situations happen to result in something that could be construed negatively out of context, even without any bias or bigotry driving your writing.

      As a (quasi) writer who is aware of these biases and tries very hard to avoid cliched stereotypes I actually find myself in a situations where the only way I could avoid designing a character that could being accused of being a stereotype was to avoid female characters entirely. Every time I came up with a remotely interesting character I realized some way that others could accuse the character of being driven by some form of bigotry. I eventually had to give up and accept that at some point I was going to be accused of being sexist just by virtue of writing anything with multiple sexes, all I could do is write good characters and hope the majority will look at my characters as a whole rather then looking at things in a vacuum.

      I’m still upset that I had to toss out the idea of writing an RPG that realistically had multiple races based off of geography because there was no way to not be accused of the non-white race being discriminated against without such extrem positive-discrimination as to ruin the theme of the story (that people are human, no one group is always right or wrong and don’t be too quick to categorize them as good or evil because were all fallible, but trying to be good). It’s good to call someone out on a pattern of stereotyping, it does occur way too much and should be addressed, just make sure to take the time to first judge rather any given instance demonstrates a pattern, or so erroneous an example, as to be clearly an issue.

  18. Unmaker

    As much as it makes a good Aesop against arrogance, the magician really should be the one to figure things out since they are in a magical setting. Instead he comes across as both incompetent and arrogant. And while I believe that a team leader can be arrogant, the teams actually do engage in action enough that incompetence seems to be unlikely to be promoted. Put it another way – a personality like that is a caricature, not a character.

    1. Knug

      It may also be that the arrogance of the Conjurer is justified based on his abilities. We know that he is a leader and quite probably an effective one at that. It may be that his past successes in”ordinary” situations have left him wide open to overlook his own shortcoming in this unusual setting. Additionally, he may have overlooked the concept that this particular eggy universe may have background effects that are specifically targeted at “magical” beings. It may not be that he normally has poor situational awareness, but rather this environment has “natural” characteristics that dull his abilities.

    2. warun

      The magician is also, well, a magician who is probably overthinking things. He’s going along trying to see everything in terms of sorcery and how it must “work” from a wizard’s perspective, when really what’s going on is fairy tale rules. “I am a magician. This place is magical. Obviously the solution is magic.” No, the solution is to pay attention, be bold without being impolite, and follow the story rather than the spellwork.

      1. Nightmask

        Pretty much, the trials are a test of one’s ability to reason things out with the victor being skilled enough in the realm of being clever to give Velos a worthy opponent. So one’s powers including magical powers and skills are irrelevant as the tests aren’t testing for that. It’s unfortunate for Conjurer that even though he recognized the theme of the setting as a fairly standard magical trap setting to guard a prize he’s failed so far to follow up on that and stop trying to make the solution about his magical prowess when he’s already been told it won’t do him any better than 84’s FISS powers or Firedrake’s fire and so on.

    3. Kaian

      I think Conjuror is failing because he keeps overthinking the problem. And I have two analogies to show it.

      First: Young Justice, they enter the tower of Fate and get greeted by a guardian. They say something flippant and get dropped to lava. Later one realizes they never answered the guardian’s question.

      Second: The St. Ives riddle. On my way to St. Ives I met a man with seven wives. Each wife had seven sacks. Each sack had seven cats. Each cat had seven kittens. Sacks, cats, kittens how many were going to St. Ives?

      Conjuror sees the mechanics of the first and mentally dissects it instead of answering it. The second he falls for the information flack in a trick question. IE one. The man and his wives were never mentioned They were going to St. Ives after all. Same with the first two puzzles here. He recognized the trigger the first time, but was thinking how to bypass it not pass it. Second puzzle he misses that he has fake information infront of him and he is in another test.

      1. Prairie Son

        You’re misquoting the end of the riddle poem, but the point stands.

        Kits, cats, sacks, wives,
        How many were going to St Ives?

      2. kentda

        In RPGs, some of the best puzzles and traps out there are ones where the DM/GM creates a trap/puzzle based on the simple fact. This is also true of stories. Players tend to …

        A) Expect Trouble, B) Overthink Things, C) Get Cocky believing they’re better than the designer.

        Large empty room, at the end of the room is a small alcove with a gem. No apparent traps. Just a large empty room. Anyone with two brain cells Knows there is a trap there. It’s Too Obvious.

        Those who Expect Trouble are considering how to looking for that catch that lets them circumvent the traps. Those who Overthink Things are wondering why someone would set up such an obvious trap. Finally there are those who believe by thinking and expecting trouble, they can Win.

        How to defeat the trap? Walk away. If it looks like a trap and smells like a trap, chances are, it probably is a trap. In this case, it WAS a trap.

        I created a room like that. It wasn’t meant to kill, but to delay them. Everything they did in the room once they set the first trap in motion was designed to annoy, slow down, humiliate, frustrate, and leave them dirty, wet, and/or muddy. The reward for all their efforts? A chunk of glass that’s been magicked to look valuable. A nice GM would have it be an actual gem with some worth, but not enough for what they went through. Of course the truly cruel could make it a ‘key’ to progress further, which makes them feel that the way they behaved was perfectly acceptable.

        1. Nightmask

          There’s a more lethal version of that trap in one of the Eye Of The Beholder video games, some nice magical plate armor and a sword if memory serves but taking them triggers a trap that seals the room and nothing that should be able to get you out can and you can’t disable the trap so get a non-standard game over for falling for it.

  19. Rock

    Aaahahaha! ^^ 84 is becoming more awesome by the page.

  20. Devlerbat

    Wait….Is Firedrake hovering in panel one? The panel were they where scolding the other two for flying? He wasn’t doing that before or after. Why would he do that there? Is he getting ready to fight Phlogistan and 84 just because he thinks they broke the rules?

    1. Rock

      Since the three morons thought Phlogiston and 84 were flying, and flying brings retaliation, maybe he was getting ready for a fight?

    2. Nightmask

      There’s a difference between hovering or slowly gliding along the proscribed path and trying to intentionally bypass tests by flying over/around them. The three males, not realizing they were in a spacial loop assumed the females had flown up and over them to get much farther ahead on the path which would be risking setting off the punishments for rules violations. So naturally they felt like they needed to admonish them for risking that (although Firedrake does act as if only 84 was being stupid even though Phlogiston being with her would mean they were both being stupid).

      Neuronet meanwhile is learning not to be too quick to judge, so he simply asked how they got ahead of them. Conjurer (and Firedrake clearly agrees with his comment) meanwhile assumes they were breaking the rules and gets condescending and judgmental towards them, requiring Neuronet to point out they aren’t in their universe anymore but one with different magical rules and 84 to go the most blunt route to demonstrate the loop. So next we’ll be seeing who is overseeing this test and if 84 will also solve it or if Aaron will shake things up a bit and have one of the others (other than Conjurer and Firedrake hopefully) work out the solution (since 84 doesn’t have to solve all of them, just ensure that she contributes until one of them can claim the prize at the end before time runs out).

      1. Devlerbat

        I know hovering is not the same as flying. I am also fully aware of what else is going on in this page, thank you very much.

        However Firedrake is only hovering on the first page of this panel. I had thought he wasn’t hovering on the previous page thus meaning he was only hovering while scolding 84. Which, while hovering is indeed different than flying they are similar enough (and he uses the same method for both,) would is just a touch ironic. However, looking back, we actually don’t see Firedrake for the previous two pages. So he could have been hovering during them for all we know. And only only stopped when they stopped moving. Huh. Okay that makes sense. My bad.

        1. Nightmask

          Most of them seem to be favoring gliding along rather than walking (with 84 having more motivation than the rest to bring herself up more level with the rest to interact with them), it’s probably easier/less exhausting for 84, Firedrake, and Phlogiston doing that since they seem to favor that mode of moving. It’s apparently not so easy for Neuronet and Conjurer so they’re settling for walking. Other than 84 they only seem to stand around while stopped to talk.

      2. Kirala

        Nitpick – it’s PRESCRIBED path, not “proscribed”. “Proscribed”=forbidden.

  21. Drojem

    Is it just me, or does the Conjurer look like he’s wearing a bathrobe?

  22. Tarkas

    Y’know, it occurs to me that, while it looks at present as though Julie is going to end up as the new “Champion of Earth” for Veles to play with by virtue of sheer common sense (and her under-rated FISS powers), that the self-proclaimed god of mischief and magic may have other ideas. He wants someone to vie with — in other words, a playmate — and he may not actually care for a sensible opponent, much less one with the same power-set as Atlas (such a god is likely to be fickle in nature, and we’ve already seen that he gets bored easily). So Conjuror may need to watch his back; this could be more of a contest that you “lose” by winning: if we were to rank the five potential victi– er, champions by the degree to which they have contributed to the mission so far, or by their willingness to work as a team to get the job done, he’s coming a long way last — which may be what Veles wants.

    Alternatively, given the theme of standing up for FISS “rights”, if Julie is the winner, maybe Veles will suddenly realise that he doesn’t have to have a single champion: there are at least 84 metas out there with the FISS power-set, and that would give him a lot of playmates, each of which are nominally the equal of Atlas (yes, even Forak…). Of course, that does rely on him having the mental flexibility to make the leap from one-on-one combat to something broader, and we don’t know if he has that; a millennia-old god could be a bit stuck in his ways.

    1. Knug

      As mentioned previously, Veles is rather “up-to-date” as at the start of this arc, he mentioned essentially that he was a “type-A personality” – He’s keeping up with the modern world. this would imply that he isn’t a deity still thinking about things in terms of sheep sacrifices and rain dances.

      I agree that any of the 83 other FISS might have an equivalent power set, but I don’t believe its the power set that Veles is looking for in an opponent. He is a trckster god, so his tricks will be meant to test the mind of his opponent. If he was a wrestling war god, then maybe strength and invulnerability.

  23. Knug

    So, why does Phlogiston have knee pads on her costume? Neuronet has knee pads and rather strange elbow pads on his armor (as well as hip pads, but they could be power related like Classic Iron Man’s) I mean, it makes sense to have elbow and knee protection on a combat suit, where you might get tossed around and protecting knees and elbows is important. But Phlogiston isn’t front rank combat.

    1. Wanderer

      Her specialty is blowing things up, remember? If that isn’t front-line combat material, I don’t know what is.

      In any event, even if we ignore the combat option, she’s also a flier; some shock absorption would be a good idea. Remember the rule of superhero tailoring: Whether or not *you’re* bulletproof, having bulletproof *clothing* is still a good idea.

    2. Nightmask

      They seem more a decorative item than protective padding, since she doesn’t have any on her elbows yet have a matching item where a belt buckle would go and another like a broach.

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