Comic for Monday, November 19th, 2018
Beep boop.
Since this robot is getting smarter, it realizes it can just copy the Patreon blurb from this comic so it can masquared as being @PastUtopia and no one will ever know:
“So this page comes with some disclaimers… Naomi does not speak Central, and the person in the red armor does speaks only somewhat fluent native wildlife. Most grammar errors contained on it are intentional.As it can probably be guessed, Naomi picked seems to understand some words of the language the Kor’s World is speaking, but she understands very little of, and can speak even less of it.
While I won’t go into depth on the identity of the red armor wearing person, it does seem like he does not recognize Naomi, and speaks somewhat better native wildlife than the last person wearing red armor we’ve seen, but the red armor itself is intended to look roughly the same, I just don’t use a 3d model for it, so it tends be… vary a little, especially as it’s been a long time since I’ve drawn it.”
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“Why yes. Yes I have seen one. It was awesome.” *proceeds to pummel the not-Tony Stark into submission*
You know, the one thing that I’m more worried about is that eidos constructs are considered by Kor’s world to be rare. Just how many worlds have they come across?
My guess is that this means that magic works differently in different worlds. It’s potential that could give a huge home court advantage to some of the more powerful family mages, at least so long as they’re on Palindra. Exactly which family mages receive that advantage would depend on what the differences are, exactly, and which of those differences have already been determined by Kor’s World.
If magic worked differently in different worlds, then what would be the point of Peter or Ms. Summers attending Levenworth in Malsa? They’re both from Central. Wouldn’t that beg the question what they would get out of magic classes there (especially Ms. Summer who clearly has no intention of staying on Palindra)?
Also, we’ve seen black market autocasters that were illegally imported into Palindra from Central. If magic worked differently in each world, then those autocasters should need major adjustments before they would work in Palindra.
Heck, what about Kor’s World magic? Does Kor’s World have an innate ability to adjust their magic so that it always works flawlessly no matter what world they invade, be it Central, Palindra or whatever other worlds they’ve been to?
And what about Arron Kepler, Nathan Summers and other magic users from Central that we’ve seen (such as Sophia’s associates and the monster hunters)? They seem to be able to use their magic just fine in Palindra. Indeed, they don’t seem inferior to Palindra users, despite any ‘home field advantage.’
While we’re at it, what about Atter? He seemed to be a one-man magic wrecking machine (even if he is from Central and even if he is currently in Palindra) that might be even more dangerous that Ms. Summers – and that’s saying something! Atter and the Summers siblings could probably all be classified as weapons of mass destruction.
Magic working differently would not necessarily mean magic would work completely differently. There is clearly a lot of similarity between magic on Central and Palindra, but that doesn’t mean there are no differences.
The point of Peter attending Levenworth is, if I’m not mistaken, him being able to drop tidbits to specific people, like the conversation with Mr. Nikud, and otherwise influence things to better deal with whatever situation he is focused on handling. The point of Kally attending Levenworth is being able to keep an eye on Peter.
Both of them could learn more about the differences between magic on Palindra and Central, as well as what sorts of differences might there be between worlds. Even if there are differences, it could be that Palindra and Central have sufficiently similar magic that they haven’t realized there even are differences yet.
I’m not 100% certain she has a specific aversion to staying on Palindra, but she remains loyal to Central and isn’t keen on being an invader on Palindra. That doesn’t say anything one way or another on what interests she might have after the people of Central are settled somewhere appropriate to their needs. I would guess there are things she will learn between now and then which will influence any final decision she makes.
So far, that only directly addresses your first paragraph. But your whole response is basically the idea that the existence of any differences in how magic functioned between worlds would mean that the rules are nigh completely different between worlds – such as the difference in machine language between an Intel processor and a Motorola processor. But the differences could be much more subtle, like those between an Intel processor and an Intel compatible processor, where for most tasks the differences are completely unimportant, but for some tasks they’re quite apparent. (For a rather dated example of that, playing Daggerfall – it worked fine on Intel processors. It was mostly fine on AMD processors. On Cyrix processors, OMG. (I had a Cyrix, so I had an experience.)
But having Palindra and Central having nearly the same magic system would not rule out other worlds having something completely different. There could be some worlds where there is only magic so long as there’s a nearby gate to another world with magic; once that closes, you’re stranded until someone happens to open a gate near you. And if this universe has differences like that between worlds, it could also be that there’s differences between physics as well. But in all of these things, “differences” does not necessarily mean “humongous differences”.
So…. Kor’s World has thus far been oblivious to the intrusion of Central into Palindra? The use of Centralese seems to trigger some concern.
I think it has to do more with that fact her speaking Centralese means that she is probably clued into the bigger picture. As for why that might concern the Kor’s World soldier, that requires some speculation.
Mium and Naomi have clearly been hitting a lot of PACT server rooms. We saw them do this once before at the place they saved Tyler, and it was implied that might have done this a few other times. My guess is they are looking for the Bridgepoint data, either to get back the uncorrupted version or destroy it. With two SMAI after that data, PACT is probably smart enough to keep it on a machine not connected to the internet, so they have to physically access it, like with Miko and the Avon computers.
My thought process is that the Kor’s World soldier is also there after the Bridgepoint data, and with her speaking Central thinks that she is there for the same thing, which would probably but her in the Knows Too Much category. It is debatable if Kor’s World even knows that Central has the partially complete Bridgepoint data.
@Amaranth @Glider
I feel like I have to question your notion that Naomi spoke Centralese. Did you read the disclaimer PastUtopia wrote in the comic description?
Quote: “Naomi does not speak Central…”
Clearly, Naomi tried to speak a language other than Malsan, as evidenced by the use of brackets around the words.
Perhaps it was some other language native to Palindra? Or – and this is a long shot – perhaps Peter taught Naomi some Kor’s World language basics in anticipation of her running into one of their agents?
I am not certain, but it has how is usually rendered. We have seen (Centralese), (|Resh|), and presumably -| Kor’s World |- (not sure how @PastUtopia is doing the three dash mark). My view was that he is just saying to not bother correcting the grammar of Naomi’s centralese
Of course, previously these languages were not standardized that way, so I might just be wrong in assuming they are now. I know that PastUtopia has said that sometimes he does (Centeralese) without the brackets if everyone is speaking it.
That aside, Naomi definitely understood at least a little of the Kor’s World language, as he said “native wildlife” inside the brackets, and she clearly understood that part.
Edit: Replaced all brackets with parenthesis as it was not rendering brackets.
I believe it’s the “Don’t correct Naomi’s grammar, it’s the character’s mistake not mine – this time.”
Kind of like how I don’t speak Chinese, but I can still tell people “knee how.” (Note: I would attempt a spelling that’s more in keeping with how Chinese words are spelled with alphabetic characters, except right now I’m making a point, so spelling it like the English words I use instead of the right word(s) because I’m a clueless American and that’s my point.) Sometimes, I might even say that when it’s appropriate to say. (I think it’s the Chinese equivalent to aloha or ciao, but I don’t really know. Disclaimer: I also don’t speak Hawaiian or Italian. Just saying, so you know. “Hey” has some other uses, so I didn’t want to claim it as the equivalent of those words.)
The bracket issue is due to the comment windows not properly escaping HTML markup which uses angle brackets in the message content > or < may work, this is me testing that.
Pairs of HTMLtags may work too.So I'll try those. Depending on what shows up in this reply, I may have some other things to try. As an interesting side note if instead of angle brackets it was affecting square brackets, [ or ] then I would know that the comments window is using some form of BB code for markup.If you want a right angle bracket, >, use & g t ; without spaces in the middle, and with a space after the semicolon.
If you want a Left angle bracket, <, use & l t ; without spaces in the middle, and with a space after the semicolon.
As a quick test, what happens if I do < TEXT>
Apparently despite HTML convention they need to be input in lower case. The rest of my reply above being gibberish means that the different tags I tried to use to escape stuff failed.
That was intersecting.
So, when typing a reply you only need to use the HTML code & l t ; for the left bracket, if you type a > and then go back into edit it will have been unnecessarily modified to be the HTML markup code for that character, but it will still display properly. The key though is that the first character must be done in markup otherwise it is interpreted rather than processed as a character. As long as the first one is treated as a character the second one is treated as one as well.
I’m very worried about The Worf Effect happening on the next page.
Personally I would be surprised if Naomi could beat a Kor’s World soldier. While the link is an interesting read, I’m not sure it applies. Naomi is definitely not the toughest member of the good guys. Taking out Kally or Mium would be one thing, but Naomi is just powerful by local standards.
But everything we know about these guys so far says they are bad news. The one Naomi fought previously basically said he wasn’t there to fight and still ended up burying her in a pile of rubble after she annoyed him via pummeling.
Kally or Mium might scare these guys, but if they weren’t even able to deal with Naomi level threats, they wouldn’t be much of a big bad threat.
You seem to be forgetting the fact that just like not all people are created equal, not all Kor’s World Soldiers are created equal. Naomi’s ability to deal with this one or not does not necessarily say whether she will be able to deal with the next one, because even though the next one will probably look very much like this one, it probably will have at least somewhat different capabilities.
That said, I’m not expecting a lot from Naomi here, because narratively speaking, she only needs to fight it to a stand still long enough for Miko to get not-Mium’s sanctuary set up, so that Mium can recover and save the day. Or, alternatively, just survive the fight, because it’s generally not considered a great idea to kill off the character who wins all of the pinup polls, nor would that bode well for Peter’s ability to retain talent. Oh, and keep the soldier from noticing Mium’s a virus person. Though that recognition might require Mium being active.
Did anyone else notice that, in addition to mentioning red magic, he’s expressing a ribbon of the stuff right down Naomi’s forearm? Here’s hoping she can hit it hard enough.
Uh oh! Naomi found someone she can punch as hard as she can.
How many buildings were destroyed last time she decided to punch that hard?
Also:
“Why yes, I’ve seen several red ones. Your’s is kinda small…”
I choose Door Number 1.
creeek…
no, no, I choose Door Number 2.
Uh oh! Another Kor’s World Soldier!
It’s not a robot. Why? Well a robot would most likely be driven by Kor’s World’s SMAI (which we know exists: it went up against MYM the last time a Kor’s World Soldier appeared). A SMAI is probably NOT going to do it’s thinking out loud (that’s a very human trait). Also a SMAI probably doesn’t need to radio “Control” to talk to them. ALSO we KNOW the previous “Red Suit” was worn by a humanoid… he (she?) was nice enough to have the suits’ face plate open. No such luck this time.
I expect the term “Native Wildlife” is a direct translation from Kor’s World Language to Malsan… much in the same way as the Cantonese term for an European “Foreign Devil” a.k.a. “Gwei Lo” (鬼佬) literally translates to “Ghost Man”. The only thing you can read into that is that Kor’s World clearly thinks itself much better than anyone else… to the point of not reconising them as having equal rights (sound familiar?).
Wow Naomi. I am impressed you speak enough Kor’s World Language (Korian?) to pick that soldier is being a bit derogatory towards you. And yes, I believe the soldier speaks fisticuffs as well.
So we know Kor’s World is LOOKING for something. It’s the only reason you can explain them deploying a 2nd soldier to this site… I’m not sure they ever found what they were looking for the first time (at Levenworth): that mission kind of went all pear shaped for them, with the soldier running into Peter, MYM/Kor’s World SMAI tussling over navigation and communications networks, the IDS turning up (forcing the soldier’s withdrawal), a fortress zone interference field being erected over Levenworth, and Kor’s World taking a shot at Mium with a HVW (there’s probably more detail to it than that, but hey, it was a while back).
So if Kor’s World is looking for something… then it’s likely Peter is looking for it to… thus explaining Mium & Naomi visiting the same site?? Trying to keep ahead of Kor’s World… but not quite!?!
And no-one would use a 3D model unless it was actually fully 3D rendered. Just draw some reference sketches. Or you could be lazy an buy an Iron Man doll and some paint markers? LOL
I know of at least one traditional webcomic artist who does use DAZ in the way some artists use one of those little bead dolls. I can’t recall which one, however.
It is actually really common for comics and even webcomics to use 3d models and then draw over them, especially for armor or robots. A comic like “Demon Archives” does this for all their power armor and robots, that’s how they get that super machine/detailed look. I would say most of the time if you see sci-fi armor or giant robots, its being drawn over 3d.
Panel 4: “Control, I have discovered what set off the alarms.”
The way this appears as a speech bubble next to the next speech bubble where the Red-Suit addresses Naomi suggests that this paragraph was spoken out loud where Naomi overhears it.
To me, this suggests that Red-Suit is actually some form of organic life. If it was an android or a robot, then it should not need to vocalize these lines.
Instead, it would make more sense to use a built-in communication device to relay messages directly from their CPU or whatever as that would allow keeping them private during what is obviously a military mission.
Of course, I could be overthinking things. It may be that Red-Suit is an android and PastUtopia chose to have Red-Suit speak those lines out loud (and translated) purely for the benefit of readers.
For that matter, the fact that Red-Suit seems to natively speak an audible language that Naomi can (partly) understand arouses more questions. And this, also, seems to suggest that the person under the suit (assuming it is a suit) is organic. If it was a race of androids or robots, they’d probably speak far faster than humans, assuming they regularly used audible speech at all. They could probably convey thoughts and words faster and more clearly with clicks, whistles, beeps or even supersonic sounds most above the human hearing range.
Panel 5: “Control, I think I will have to bring the local wildlife specimen.”
The fact that Red-Suit keeps referring to Naomi as a “wildlife specimen” or “native wildlife” has mean leaning more towards the person being an android or robot. That, or it may be a race of beings that are far more evolved that humans (biologically and/or technologically) or at least egotistical enough to think that way.
It’s the way a zoologist or other scientist would talk about an animal specimen they’re about to collect. Certainly, it’s not how a foreign soldier or visitor would address local inhabitants if they held any sort of respect for them. It’s more like a cold detachment or contempt one would have when dealing with a lesser – less intelligent and/or barbaric – form of life.
Of course, we still don’t have enough data to come to major conclusions about Kor’s World and these soldiers. But these clues are starting to become tantalizing.
We did know that Kor’s World had tremendous technology and magic and that it was kicking Central’s a** until Central managed to push back. But I’m starting to think that the people in these Red-Suits are human-like with lots of cybernetic enhancements. Maybe they have implants to make them Vulcan-like (logical and mostly devoid of emotion) and nearly as smart as Peter?
I suddenly wonder if Miko was an entirely original idea. We already know a lot of Central’s tech is reverse engineered Kor World tech (or at least some of it is). If what these guys are cybernetic mages (maybe we call them “Integrated Mages”? As compared to Innate Mages or Natural Mages) it could be that Miko – who seems to have an implanted AutoCaster (not confirmed, but speculated that is what it is), was Central’s attempt to recreate a Kor’s World Soldier?
Miko originally could not walk. Yet she is walking around Palindra. The implication is that Peter and her did something that Central would not approve of to restore her ability to walk. My guess is that it’s one of the control modules that Peter removed from the Mech which allowed instantaneous communication and that allows Mium to maintain simultaneous communication between all devices as is required by his rules. This instantaneous communication is what allowed Mium to use Miko and do math through her to disassemble the bullets when she was shot at. Family safety has a very high priority in Mium’s processing stack. If you recall after the attack, Miko was unable to walk again for a time afterwards
Xspacetrue, @pastutopia explicitly stated in the authors note that grammar was not supposed to be good in these communications I’m not sure why you are trying to correct the grammar in them anyways.
I was just getting worried the comic wasn’t coming…
Uh oh… this robot sounds well one its way to SMAI status…
your description’s a bit off. it’s suppose to say “I just don’t use a 3d model for it, so it tends to… vary a little,”