Comic for Thursday, June 21st, 2018

Jun21

by PastUtopia on June 21, 2018 at 2:45 am

Chapter: Interlude 4

Location: Far Side of Utopia

Am sick.

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Discussion (31) ¬

Josh Shaine

June 24, 2018, 5:40 am | # | Reply

I could tell him to feel better… nope, somebody already did that.

Ah, but I could say, “Take your time!” Uh uh. That, too.

Long involved theori about… nevermind.

Exposition about how and why I love the story? Too trite, even though true.

I guess I don’t have anything original to say. I suppose I just won’t post anything.
- Glider
  
  June 24, 2018, 1:39 pm | # | Reply
  
  Quit whining and publish me some comics? I’m pretty sure working is making him sick, and publishing comics is the cure.
  
  Get better soon! Or else.
  
  -G-
Kevin Mark

June 22, 2018, 5:55 pm | # | Reply

Get well soon, @PastUtopia! If you die before completing the comic, I won’t forgive you!
- PastUtopia
  
  June 23, 2018, 5:46 am | # | Reply
  
  I mean, I think I would be pretty bummed out about that to. I’ll see what I can do to not do that thing.
EnderDDT

June 22, 2018, 2:10 pm | # | Reply

Hearing all this makes me wonder if this story isn’t about fighting a great threat only on different orders of magnitude and preperation and starting from a different perspective. To tell you what I mean let me tell you a familiar interestingly not familiar story story:

Once upon a time there is a society that is mostly couched in science (working with the rules of the world, rather than against them, to cause things to happen) and they come into contact with another universe where “Magic” is a thing, something that nearly everyone does and nearly everyone is proficient in. The planet full of magic wielders, after initiating the first contact, decides to take over the other one and, despite the science of guns and rocket fuel, it is a slaughter. Afterall, a sufficiently capable mage can negate the inertia of the bullets or prevent fire from working on the rocket fuel in addition to the more mundane solutions of shields and barriers. The fight starts out as a complete massacre.

The scientific society quickly starts doing whatever and anything they can to survive and get by. There is some magic stuff that was hidden far far back in their history, and that helps slow things, but ultimately it isn’t enough to stop the incoming tide. What does work is the combination of the scientific method and the exactness and efficiency of advanced number theory being applied to this thing called “magic”.

Suddenly with the right tools all the muggles in this scientific society get some access to magic and the scientific mages get enough efficency to do feats of magic that the otherworld mages could never dream of accomplishing despite their much greater base power capability. Eventually it becomes strong enough to create a blockade against the entry of these otherworldly magic invaders, but it is not enough to stop them or even to really fight back on their own ground.

They know it won’t hold forever and they know that the more magically capable society has access to multiple worlds, so the scientific society goes in search of other worlds to either colonize (if empty) or, if populated, to turn into allies. The situation is dire, too dire to depend on politics and diplomacy to make sure that the other worlds will agree to diplomacy and to act accordingly, so the society ends up in the habit of simply taking over the other worlds. Sometimes this is done by direct military action if they are unadvanced enough (with no access to magic), sometimes it is done by strong-arm diplomacy tactics allowed by the fact that they have so much more than any society that they encounter.

This scientific society that I have just described; In this story we call it Kor’s World.

Let that sink in for a couple moments.

Kor’s world, in an attempt to find allies (willing or unwilling), finds this quaint little world the locals (eventually) refer to as “central”. This world has a fairly good level of science but no real magic that Kor’s world can see, so they decide to take it over in as quick and as efficent a way as possible. First they setup their kill sats and ready their SMAI to take over the network, and then they try to blitz forward and take over the entire planet.

Unfortunately for them the magic wielders on Central consider themselves to be a “secret society” and over the centuries have become very very good at hiding their presence and still building up enough power to take on each other. Kor’s world came in expecting very little real resistance, but suddenly they have an entire magical underworld worth of resistance who all have enough experience hiding themselves from the public (or running and avoiding confrontations) that surgical strikes to take out the magical troublemakers just isn’t feasible with the amount of preparation they came prepared for. This was supposed to be an easy planetary subjugation, and suddenly it very much isn’t.

Central, after creating a sort of blockade to keep out the invaders and knowing how advanced the Kor’s World invaders are and knowing that they have access to multiple worlds, begin seeking allies. The situation is dire so, despite their best intentions, the actions of commanders tasked with making these alliances tends to fall into a pattern. Those societies that are too unadvanced are taken over, and those who are more advanced are subjected to strong-arm diplomacy until they may as well be puppet governments.

Sound familiar? It should.

The devil is in the details, however. And here on Palindra the governments have been subjected to a bit of strong-arm diplomacy while those from Central pit the various factions against each other. Not everyone is trying to take over this new world, but those who aren’t (like Aaron Kepler) can’t very well stand against the operations of those who are (Like Sophie) due to them being “on the same side” and that interrupting an allies operation is akin to Treason. Quite often the allies of the takeover minded commanders succeed at getting the more peace minded commanders tried and convicted of that charge, so the fear of that charge is not unfounded.

Everything is going generally according to plan, heading forward as it usually does…

And then Peter Kepler gets involved, and we have our story.

Just a little theory for everyone to chew on.
- EnderDDT
  
  June 22, 2018, 3:54 pm | # | Reply
  
  Also here are a couple other things to consider:
  
  What if the magical “secret societies” on Central didn’t actually come from there? What if they came from another more magical society; a place where magic was everywhere, perhaps even where magic worked better and was stronger (perhaps something about the worlds make some of them more primed for magic over science or vice versa)! What might be a good name for those magical promised lands where all their dreams of convenient magic could come true? Perhaps “Utopia”?
  
  Something else to consider, most societies (historically speaking) didn’t take over others. Historically most nations were only as big as your big named general could conquer with his big army, and other nations might pay you protection money (tribute) to keep your army away but they were still sovereign. Historically there were also a few places that had the equivalent of mutual defense pacts between sovereign territories, often presided over by an officer with a certain amount of authority over all (we called this a feudal system, and the presiding officer the “king” or “Zarr” or “Emperor” etc.). Even these feudal systems were bound by a similar culture and were not good at taking over another group with another culture. This was one of the really major advancements of the Roman Empire: the fact that they made a multicultural empire work for WAY longer and over a larger area than anyone else had before. Even in more modern times most large empires have crumbled so that there are really only 3 (maybe 4) left. (we will get back to them later)
  
  The problem is that individuals are just too divisive. Most large societies have to be held together by force or threat of force, though that threat of force can be either internal or external. You can be afraid of your government coming down on you if you don’t play nice with the government, or you can be afraid of someone else getting you if you don’t work with your own government. This isn’t true for all individuals, of course, but enough individuals have no inherent respect for the law or the current authority that adjudicates the law that this still holds true.
  
  Technology helps broaden these limits, but does not eliminate them. Roads and transportation mean that your internal force can quell uprisings over a larger area and that enemies from greater distances can be seen as a threat. Communication allows culture to spread more easily and keep areas from being insulated enough to forget whom they answer to while giving a sense that their capital “isn’t really so far away”. Information gathering technology allow dissidents to be found and dealt with and help prevent a separatist ideology from having the time to gain traction. Science broadens these limits, but does not eliminate them.
  
  Even in modern times this holds true. The Chineese nation, in addition to having a culture which is EXTREMELY focused on the group over the individual, views itself as having the external threat of the US and has a level of internal nationalism that many other nations would term jingoism. Russia views itself as being put down by the rest of the world and their “right to be whole” pushes them to military “re-acquisition” of territory that had been given up only a few decades ago. The US tends to see the external threat within as different internal groups are so focused on fighting each other that inclusion in the whole is not questioned, in fact the whole is seen as the protection against these groups. While these are obvious oversimplifications of these three nations (and other factors help hold them together as well), these simple descriptions are still accurate enough that they are a significant part of what holds these three together.
  
  Without this threat holding the groups together these groups would likely end up the same as the British Empire (23% of the total world landmass) or the Spanish Empire (almost 10% of the total world landmass); they would fall apart. The European Union, despite it only being an economic “empire”, is even falling apart in the same generation that it was created in.
  
  So what does this have to do with a government like Central (or Kor’s World) spanning an entire globe, and likely spanning entire multiple worlds?
  
  Everything. This point that people in extremely large groups tend to fragment unless faced with a unifying threat has /everything/ to do with what we see in these two societies.
  
  This point is a certain one for Central, we have enough background and have seen enough to know absolutely that they are unified mostly in response to the Kor’s World threat and that otherwise this unification would pretty quickly fail. We don’t know enough about Kor’s world to say but, unless something really weird is going on to bypass this (ie: “all hail our robot (SMAI) overlords” type thing or a world so ravaged and depleted that their choices are “take over someone else’s resources” or “die”), this point almost certainly hold true for them as well.
  
  If the threat Kor’s World is running from is this highly magical society, which we will call “Utopia”, then it begs the very frightening question: What threat unified Utopia, what is on the Far Side of Utopia?
  
  PS: Please don’t hate me for my fan theories, they are interesting to think about if nothing else.
  - EnderDDT
    
    June 22, 2018, 4:19 pm | # | Reply
    
    And, to add one more level to this theory: what if the Pure Magic society is being attacked by a Pure Science society where the science is so strong that magic cannot sufficiently disrupt it, the Pure Magic society then attacks the Hybrid Magi-Tech society where the watered down approach can be just completely dismantled by a strongly pure magic approach, and the Hybrid Magi-Tech society then attacks the Pure Tech society where the hybrid approach allows for greater feats then science alone does, Provoking the Pure Science society to attack the society where their tech is so scientifically based that it is functionally immune to the pure magic machinations of the Pure Magic society.
    
    Literally it becomes: what goes around comes around.
    
    Enter some kid who figures out what is going on and decides to stop the cycle.
    - Amaranth
      
      June 22, 2018, 7:12 pm | # | Reply
      
      I think a lot of this speculation is spot on (including that something probably attacked Kor’s World originally to make them the way they are, causing them to attack Central, and setting Central on their own path). If you look at history, frequently a nation (in this case world) wants to conqueror or control other nations to build a buffer or support structure after they have been threatened.
      
      There is a tidbit in the lore that worlds connect to some worlds more closely than other worlds through dimensional boundaries, so the concept of “border worlds” makes perfect sense.
      
      I am not sure about the idea of pure magic being unable to interfere with pure science though, as the magical system and science seem pretty interchangeable in the comic setting, magic is just a short cut to operating scientific principles (though notably cheating conservation of energy). Magic in the setting is more like “data hacking” than anything truly supernatural. If you assume that Eidos is real (and not just a construction mages use to use magic), then the world really is fundamentally data that can be changed by magic or science or both. I guess that is one of the fascinating questions to me is if “is Eidos real?” and a lot of things hinge on that as far as how magic and science really interact.
      
      Ah, look at what you have done, now I am back down the rabbit hole of how magic really works in the setting. I really love that part, but at the same time I really want to know more. Even if we assume Eidos is real, the big question becomes “what is mana?” and why does it exist. Mana (or psonic particles as they are called occasionally) seems to be the key point to cheating conversation of mass/energy, but where does it come from? I have my theories, but this is straying far afield now.
      
      I really agree that Peter is meddling in the bigger picture though, particularly after Miko and Arron’s conversation. We know that Biana/Sophie want to start a war so that they can prove to Palindra that they would win the war, and get Palindra to fall back into line, but we still do not know what their log term goal for Palindra is. We also know that Central is trying to resettle its people, so whatever happened during the incursion was potentially very bad. We also know that Central’s Secret Societies had magic that is impressive even by Palindra standards – the only characters we have seen that are likely associated with them are Kally, Nathan, and Elizabeth. While Elizabeth is the weakest of those, she took a blast from one of Malsa’s best mages with just a scratch, and then literally blew her away, right before implying that if she tried to fight Nathan it would be entirely one sided, and of course, Kally is apparently those secret societies reaction to Kor’s World – a mage powerful enough to utter decimate a battlefield.
      
      Definitely some interesting things going on with these secret societies, not to mention that Sophie and by extension Atter seem to be associated with them too, and Atter seems like yet another entire thing to unravel.
      
      Was interesting to read your take on things. A lot of the points line up with my take on things, few differences. Credit where credit is due, it is all testament to the ridiculous depth of the comic setting, and the way clues and data points are layered through out.
      - EnderDDT
        
        June 24, 2018, 7:06 pm | # | Reply
        
        That final one (what goes around comes around) was mostly a joke anyway, but the earlier ones have some real merit.
        
        Part of my own personal theory about universal world-building in stories is that they all tend to fall deviate from our world in certain definable ways along certain continuum. That may inform why I look at each world in this comic (pallindra where magic is everywhere, central where magic was a forgotten secret society thing until they got attacked, and Kor’s World where AI and Robots with normal guns and where the only two instances of direct magic we have seen are in the edos cards and inter-dimentional travel) and I wonder why? Why has technology (and the tech of magic) varied so wildly between these worlds. For instance: If magic is useful than why would an entire world basically forget about it completely (minus the secret societies)? One explanation is that the worlds aren’t actually the same and that subtle differences in how physics work make one world more likely to develop in one direction or another.
        
        In fact if you use the right bunch of variables, almost every fictional world can be understood in how certain things are possible. So lets look at some of the variables that I have found to be most common:
        
        One such continuim is “science vs magic” which can also be termed as “information density of matter”. In every world where “magic” is possible power (often mana or psyons or something similar) is applied to change the rules of how the world works but sometimes this can be as easy as saying a certain word of power or magical phrase, or it can require complex formulas and specialized materials and celestial events (etc) to make it work. On the high science side you have most of star-trek and “Skooby Doo”. Overall this is how hard vs easy is it to just change how the rules of physics work.
        
        Another issue is Power Efficency which both encompasses the power necessary and usual limits on what magic can do but also encompasses certain limits of physical activity too (though when this happens with physical activities in a low Information Density world (ie: high magic) the explanation is that the attacks in some way incorperate “magic” and go beyond normal human limits). The unifying point here is that is low power efficency worlds have less spectacular feats of explosive power (even in explosions) where high power effecency worlds allow small but focused movements/abilities to have extreme effects on the world around them. Low Power Efficiency worlds tend to be more peaceful because it is harder for any particular action to throw everything out of it’s normal more restful state.
        
        A third important continuim is the hardness of matter. In low hardness worlds you get cartoons where being flattened by an anvil is a regular occourance, but being unflattened is not too dificult either; where in high hardness worlds a spray of bullets way badly wound but it is nothing like in RL where a single stray bullet (if it hits and starts bleeding) will be most likely fatal. Also high hardness worlds allow for really giant mecha and such where in RL the Square/Cubed law makes them impossible. A less extreme example of a low hardness world is in most episodal TV series where a sprained ankle is a big issue during this plot but is completely forgotten by the next episode.
        
        Another very common continuim is for Chaos vs Coincidence where in some worlds it just becomes obvious that any new character who shows up is somehow related to someone else, where in more chaotic worlds the universe itself seems to actively try to shut down any overly complicated plan. The daytime soap opera (with 3 evil twins, 4 amnesiacs, and where those two people seem to be familialy related to pretty much every other character) is an example of a high coincidence world, and nobody feels a disconnect when you find out that the two arch-nemisis are actually sisters. An example of a low coincidence world are most hard-boiled detective novels where everything related is related for a reason, there are no coincidences and the only breaks you get are the ones you make for yourself.
        
        These aren’t necessarily all the variables, but you can see how it can apply to understanding the universe of everything from DBZ to “Duck Dogers of the 21 and a half century” to Seinfield. None of these are at all like real life but all have enough internal consistancy so that the latest happening doesn’t break suspension of disbelief. You might also notice that the RW (Real World) falls near the low-average in each of these categories. Part of this is because certain extremes are more fun to write about, and part of this is because it is easy to start with real life and modify it in some direction based on either our views about how life is or should be. This means we get a range that has reality at a somewhat center point but that tends in the more interesting direction.
        
        This even can be used to work with the seeming exception of certain “kitchen sink” worlds that throw everything together with no thought of universal power interactions. These worlds can be treated as though every character carry with them their own rules of physics that are bounded by themselves and their own stuff excepted when they interact with someone else directly. Why doesn’t the super smart guy create a drug to cure cancer for the entire world? Because that drug only works when they are using it. Why can Superman blow through a building but Batman can fight a mind controlled Superman without becoming paste? Because Batman’s Low Power Efficency, High Matter Hardness, above average Coincidence world means that he never gets squashed and always gets knocked into something relatively soft enough to weaken the blow. Why does the anvil that falls on Roger during that one scene of “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” only fall on Roger and not Eddie? Because the high Coincidence that caused it to fall only affected Roger and due to the higher Matter Hardness of the detective (compared to the toon) it wouldn’t have flattened him regardless.
        
        Anyway, that is just one more thing to think about.
  - Kevin Mark
    
    June 22, 2018, 6:00 pm | # | Reply
    
    > PS: Please don’t hate me for my fan theories, they are interesting to think about if nothing else.
    
    Anyone that hates on fan theories has come to the wrong place. The comments and theories on this comic are half the fun.
    
    All of this makes sense to me (I mean, in broad strokes). I think there will be big reveals about Kor’s World and stuff. I mean, even the fact that it is called “Kor’s World” seems odd, right? Central is a reasonable name, Palindra sounds like a reasonable name (even if I am sure it means something that flies over my head like most things), but “Kor’s World”? Notable that “Kor” and “Core” sound the same, so it could stand for “Core Worlds” + Mistranslation? There are any number of theories on just that alone, but I am the wait and be amazed sort, not the figure out sort.
    
    Maybe there was literally a person named “Kor”. Who knows.
    - Pittsburgh
      
      June 23, 2018, 1:40 am | # | Reply
      
      Certainly in agreement about the value of the comments. As each comic is released I find myself reading it multiple times (looking to catch all of the grammatical treasures), but I come back several times a day to see the new comments. This is a marvelous group of readers, your insights are almost as important as the comic itself. @PastUtopia, hope that you are well soon.
  - PastUtopia
    
    June 23, 2018, 5:39 am | # | Reply
    
    > PS: Please don’t hate me for my fan theories, they are interesting to think about if nothing else.
    
    I mean, at one point Amaranth launched a hostile take-over of the Contact page to better post long form theories, and they got that idea from Delta-V, so the precedent goes way back.
    
    Personally, I certainly don’t mind theories and speculation, I just only comment on how correct they may or may not be if it somehow manages to make more confusion 🙂
    
    It’s the downside to having an inside peak into the world, most anything I post can be considered spoilers, haha 🙂
    - EnderDDT
      
      June 24, 2018, 6:03 pm | # | Reply
      
      So… What you are saying is that I should cross-post this to the Contact Page? :p
      
      If you wanted to throw out theories about theories without it being taken as “word of god”/Author Explanation then you could always just sign on with a new profile so that it wouldn’t be linked with your PastUtopia account.
      
      Then again, maybe you already have. That might explain the extreme accuracy of some of my theories.
      
      PS: that was a joke, I am (as a point of fact) not the author with a different pseudonym. For one thing he (she? possibly an AI trying to indocterinate us all about how cute and fluffy MIUM is?) is a MUCH better artist than I am. Also they have managed to stick around MUCH longer than I would expect, as I worry I would get bored of the project after far fewer years than this comic has been going. Also I’m a philosophy and metaphysics buff and have almost no real-life experience with programming or website design.
    - Jindra34
      
      June 25, 2018, 1:03 am | # | Reply
      
      Maybe you should just make a small page with Comments enabled called ‘THEORY AND SPECULATION’
Sandman366

June 22, 2018, 6:14 am | # | Reply

So my first question is if he’s even talking about Peter in the first place. Odds are good, but it would be funny if he actually weren’t. (Betting he could at least play it off in such a way anyway, if he wanted to. Curious as to who “Other Otte” is supposed to be…)

But I do like how he manages “curious” to heckling to “It’s about time you took my heckling seriously!” to…is that threats? Feels like implied threat at least. Which is cool, considering it they make it sound like he’s supposed to be out-ranked here (by orders of magnitude?) and he’s still dictating terms. (Of course, when he gets called out for it, then he lays them out.)
- Tgape
  
  June 22, 2018, 1:11 pm | # | Reply
  
  I’m pretty sure the other Otte is Nick’s father, but I don’t have a name for you off the top of my head.
  - Amaranth
    
    June 22, 2018, 7:14 pm | # | Reply
    
    Nelson Otte. He is the one playing devil’s advocate right before firing the Sky Hammer trying to prevent Karov form interfering as Ricci and Arron tell him to stop Biana. He is apparently a representative of IDS Headquarters, and seems to be at least somewhat aligned with Biana’s camp.
- Amaranth
  
  June 22, 2018, 7:24 pm | # | Reply
  
  I do not know if it is accurate to say Kyle is out ranked here, and more that there seems to be bad blood. Kyle is from Civil Services which, as far as I gather, is supposed to be beuacratic functionaries, but is in, in fact, much more. This inference comes from the fact that they a repeatedly referenced as a faction, and it seems that Kyle is pretty important in that faction, and has broad leeway in his actual powers.
  
  For reference, when someone made fun of his daughter, he actually had Query pull their file, and implied that not only could have them sent to a dirt plantation, he could make a dirt plantation so they could sent there. While he was almost certainly joking, Peter’s sister did feel it necessary to berate him. He also has his own bodyguard and people wanting to assassinate him, which is usually a sign of success in being important.
SeanR

June 22, 2018, 4:30 am | # | Reply

I started to write something flippant pointing out how little you owe us. Nah. Plain is better. You owe us nothing, but we’re naturally grateful that you give us this to enjoy.

Get well. We’ll be here when you get back.
- Sandman366
  
  June 22, 2018, 6:08 am | # | Reply
  
  Think Kyle has the flippant covered for you.
- PastUtopia
  
  June 23, 2018, 5:45 am | # | Reply
  
  Well, now you know how I feel most of the time, suppressing in the urge to write flippant replies to things is a full time job… particularly at my full time job where most of the people are morons saying moronic things.
  
  In all seriousness though, appreciate the kind words! The readers are what keeps the comic marching along 🙂
Magnema

June 22, 2018, 3:04 am | # | Reply

Wah on sickness. Good time to have a buffer, though, even if it eats into it a bit.
eldestdawn

June 21, 2018, 11:31 pm | # | Reply

Health first, comic second. If you have to miss a deadline because of illness, then do so. We will understand.
Tgape

June 21, 2018, 4:35 pm | # | Reply

I’m sorry you are sick, but glad to know about it.

I think your usual type checkers have taken a break, thinking that you would do better to not be aware you’d made a couple very minor mistakes. But if I were in your position, I think I would prefer to know so that I could correct it when I was feeling up to it.

Panel 4: I think you mean for the first sentence to be something more like,

“Kyle, why did you even attend if you are ~~you~~ just going to heckle Special Agent Otte?”

That is, remove the third you, and add a ‘to’ between going and heckle.

For what it’s worth, if I was part of this civil service, I wouldn’t need any instruction from my boss to not want to touch this with a 10-mile pole, so long as it felt like I could get away with it. My suspicion is he less used his influence to make people not show up, and more just didn’t use his influence to make people show up. But that’s a subtlety that nobody in situation containment would get.
Segev

June 21, 2018, 3:23 pm | # | Reply

Sorry to hear you’re sick. Get feeling better.
Uhl

June 21, 2018, 12:53 pm | # | Reply

Get well. The comic can wait.
Charidan

June 21, 2018, 6:22 am | # | Reply

Ah yes, this one is a Kepler all right. The family resemblance is unmistakable.
willis

June 21, 2018, 4:24 am | # | Reply

I love the comic. also, take some time off to get well.
- PastUtopia
  
  June 23, 2018, 5:42 am | # | Reply
  
  Always great to hear; fortunately we are mostly still in buffer, so we won’t miss an update, but we are sort eating through buffer time. Only managed to take Thursday off-work and Wednesday/Thursday were pretty much entirely a lost cause, and Friday ended up being wasted on catching up from work.
  
  We’ll march on though, the comics made it through worse 😉
EnderDDT

June 21, 2018, 4:22 am | # | Reply

I hope you feel better soon.
- PastUtopia
  
  June 23, 2018, 5:40 am | # | Reply
  
  Thanks… doing a little better. Still sick, but doing better. Hoping to wake up tomorrow in the clear.