Comic for Monday, April 25th
Well, at least the Monday comic is on time. We’ll see about the Thursday one. I’m not currently optimistic about it being on time, but it’ll come one way or another.
I do apologize that I’ve been slipping up a bit on the schedule even on two a week, and even some emails/comment replies taking a bit. I don’t have any great excuses; I’m just busy. The new job is far more demanding than I’d hoped for, and it’s taken it’s toll on time and energy. There is a certain point in a day where I become not good for much of being productive, even if it’s doing things I want to do.
The reason I don’t take a break to build a buffer is that I’m not exceptionally good at working on things with nebulous deadlines (a fancy way of saying procrastination; but slightly more complicated. I tend to do the work, and then redo again and again for any dubious benefit. This is the primary reason I am no longer self-employed…); so the best I approach I can think of for now is muddle onwards.
All that aside, I do enjoy hearing from people in comments and emails and the like and will always continue to reply; if I miss you or you think I’ve forgotten about something you’ve asked for don’t feel bad at all about poking me again.
One again I would like to note that hands are the greatest enemy. If my next comic is about chibi’s or octopi or something, you’ll know why (but it won’t be…).
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“as of matter of fact” in the 2nd panel, it should be “as a matter of fact”
I meant 3rd panel.
Fixed this one as well, sorry for late reply 😉
I am trying to decide if Peter is a creep or not. Yes he is trying to manipulate Tyler but I can’t figure out if he realizes how badly he is doing it. Not in a motivational sense he clearly knows how to present the situation to make Tyler react but in the sense I don’t recall anyone ever not knowing that he is manipulating them. If that is his MO he is at least a creep with a silver lining, if he just thinks he is outwitting them he deserves a harsher label than creep.
Tyler has to be a pretty smart guy to be in the position he’s in. (He’s a foreigner to Malsa, no less!) Though, Peter has given him plenty of useful info already -and- a Gate Detector. So far, I don’t think Tyler has regretted putting faith in what Peter tells him.
Likewise, Peter has to be an incredibly smart guy to do what he does. Socially inept or not, big ego or not, he’s smart enough to -at least- wonder if he’s fooling him by stating things that way.
Perhaps Peter is intentionally making his manipulation obvious? That way, Tyler can’t blame him, if he goes along with it anyway. And, no doubt, Peter has calculated this as another invitation that Tyler can’t resist.
Also, instead of “creep with a silver lining”, I think a better way of stating it is “creep with standards”. Though, I don’t think Peter is bad enough to deserve either title.
‘creep’ is a strong word 😉
From what we’ve seen Peter views conversations as simply a ritualistic set of things you say to get people to do what you want. If he required greater subtly, who knows if he’s capable of it, but for the most part he’s getting people to do things they already want to do, just through selective release of information more then anything.
Peter morality… well, that’s topic for a few years down the road 😉
I suspect that the same is true for peter and motivation which may affect how we view his morality.
This page worries me a lot.
If Peter is sending Tyler to the Avon situation, I’m betting he sent Mium after Kally, and I have a bad feeling about that, a very bad feeling.
Otherwise he’s just played all his cards on that side of the field and is leaving Kally to fend for herself. While that is the most sensible approach consider that she can take care of herself better then he or Miko can, judging from how he reacted it doesn’t seem likely.
He’s still got a few cards left, albeit one currently napping on a bench and one very much being a wild card.
I imagine he’s got some tough choices on this one though, one of those times where being able to see just a tad into the future would the only right decision.
He might also try to goad him into intervening at Avon so that he can send Mium after Kalli, once the MSB arrives there.
For someone who is so poorly socialized, Peter is certainly a master manipulator. ^^
Aaaand, once again AVon, the I.D.S. and the M.S.B. may engage in a three-way head-butting exercise, and it would only be icing on the cake if Special Agent Otte were part of the I.D.S. response. ^^
I feel rather sorry for Tyler. By this time he must be feeling that dealing with Peter is remarkably similar to trying to grab a whirlwind. 🙂
I think those are not necessarily unrelated; he does conversations like executing a click-path. Push button a, b, c, they do what you want. As long as he knows the buttons. If the mask has slipped and he has to actually talk to someone, though, we see him flip from arrogant to sullen to awkward.
As for Otte I guess it depends on how stabbed his arm was in the process of dismantling the autocaster; though he’s mission here is more Peter-centric last we saw.
Peter is pretty much the gateway to a much larger picture for Tyler. The danger of trying to grab a whirlwind is you may be pulled in, but that may be what Tyler is aiming for.
To quote from the newest rulebook of “Through the Breach” (the Malifaux rpg):
“There’s something to be said for getting whipped around at 100 miles per hour and thrown to the horizon. Most people go with “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” but the choice is yours!”
Haha; that’s great 😉
Tyler’s stated intention in handling Peter was to ‘take the bait before someone else does’. His interactions with Peter are likely more deliberate than Peter’s interactions with him.
If he can handle what he’s trying to bite off, I suppose we’ll see.
Peter is clearly baiting Weber and the MSB to get involved. But why? Maybe Peter is giving Weber more info to gain more of his trust?
But, isn’t Peter aware that the forces attacking Avon work for IDS? I would think that exposing Avon’s illegal AI research would work in Peter’s favor. (Though, Peter is not IDS’ favorite person now, anyway. We’ve seen Peter mess up IDS’ plans before.)
Ah, I get it! He’s tricking Weber to get involved with the Avon building, which would free up Mium to go find Agent Summers. Clever.
Peter does seem to be a little short on cards at the moment, some spares can always be handy.
Peter did prevent Jayce from getting nabbed by the IDS, so screwing with the IDS’ plans is at least one of his favorite hobbies even if there isn’t a bigger point in keeping the IDS from getting digging into Avon.
if you need to, just do 1 comic a week till things quiet down. you can work on more than one but only post one so you can build up a bit of a buffer and not be so stressed out. it’s better to do it this way so you enjoy working on the comic instead of forcing yourself to finish on time and make it feel more like ‘work’. when you enjoy making the comic, the end result is a better product.
I will go to one if I have to, but it would pain me. I’m still the primary fan of my own comic, and one update a week is a glacial update pace 😛 Two already irks me, and will be harder still when we hit the another action heavy sequence.
While, due to the rambling I’ve done, I won’t deny some level of stress, the comic is not the source of it.
I do appreciate y’all being so understanding about it though. The comic has kept updating through worse though, so I imagine we’ll troop on till I get my ducks in a row.
Not while I’m alive, you aren’t!
As I’ve said before (but in other words) a little bit of something is a lot better than a whole bunch if nothing. Better to take things a bit slower until the job feels more routine than burn out from stress and be unable to do either job or comic. We’ll live.
*plays gentle flute music to calm your nerves*
Haha; appreciated 😉
There is a fairly direct correlation between how late I finish a comic how rambling the commentary is 😛