Comic for Thursday, November 15th, 2018
About to leave on travel again… how does this keep sneaking up on me… crazy month. I am starting to sympathize with Miko on the whole leaving the house thing being very overrated.
So we see person that we haven’t seen in a bit… Lifting even half a third of a person like Rovak is doing is probably not possible for a normal person, but Rovak is… well, not quite normal. Pretty sure “all mushy” is the technical medical term.
I’ll probably post a short story sometime next week with just the wordy parts, assuming I think posting the finished product is a good idea. It’ll sort of be an experiment, but its not a new format or anything, I just won’t have my drawing tablet and will have sometime to kill. Monday/Thursday comics will be as normal, but Monday, the 26th, will be missed day. I expect that there will be a comic the 29th, but wouldn’t put a lot of money on that as it’s not done yet.
I know that no one is impressed at this point by my apologizing for my schedule being a mess, but I do apologize. Somehow at some point I think I thought that October and November had more time than they turned out to have. Well, more likely I thought they were a long way away, and I could just schedule whatever I wanted and not have to deal with it till later. At least the work parts of it are sort of an investment for the future, as traveling for this project was me betting this project would be less of a colossal pain than some of my other options (like my last client ended up being).
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…..I suppose it was asking for too much, for Martin to make any sense at all when we got real info on him….
If he’s not a hallucination, maybe he’s playing a similar trick with the holograms that Peter did when he visited the IDS? (But why is only the coat ever shown?) But what’s the source? He apparently has some freedom, and why is he kept so secret? (Is he supposed to be kept safe from Peter? Or Mium? Or is there somebody else after him? Or is he just reclusive and weird, like Miko but pops his face around some of the time like Peter?)
Martin is definitely acting as another Peter. Which is annoying because Peter is already a bit too much of himself for one comic already.
I kinda want to see Peter and Dr. Martin be themselves at each other, assuming they aren’t both Peter…
Even then it could be pretty interesting, if it were staged for a third party
I’m a little surprised so many people are still considering Martin and Peter might be the same. Martin seemed determined to stop, possibly kill, Ila. Peter has brought her into the family as sister to Mium.
Yes the addition of a sister doesn’t seem to have been high on Peter and Mium’s probability chart, but it certainly seems to work for Peter’s interests.
Sister ended up equaling more high quality allies so I can see why Peter (after she showed loyalty/baitability) currently agrees with her being around. If she ended up as a liability things might have turned out VERY different.
Does Peter really have liabilities? Or just assets he hasn’t figured out how to manage, yet?
My read of Dr. Martin is a bit different here. I do not think he cared if Ila got killed here particularly, I think he is just testing prototypes. Some experiments result in the test subject being destroyed, in this case it was not the test subject he expected that got destroyed, so he is annoyed by the anomalous test results.
Obviously there is not a lot of evidence for that character interpretation yet (we have only seen him twice and he wasn’t exactly easy to get a read on), but if you look at what he has done in that context, it is fairly plausible he is just continuing his experiments and does not really care who wins or loses.
Am I the only one who is surprised that Rovak apparently not only can resurrect his minions, but apparently does so regularly?
The i-code thing must work on others as well as himself?
Unrelated bit, edit time is back at 5 minutes instead of 60?
I don’t know if it’s the I-Code or not, but he could also heal Ila after she got pretty messed up by falling out the sky. Rovak seems frankly ridiculously strong, he tanked a high powered blast from Ila, instantly regenerated a lost arm and almost casually takes on entire military units by causing basically instant explosions.
I think the only reason he sort of looks anything besides ridiculous is his opponent list: Ila, Tyler, Mium.
Ila he withdrew without really fighting, but I’m not sure he would have lost,
Tyler the fight got interrupted. He was at a disadvantage, but fighting Tyler head on seems almost impossible due to his overwelming innate power.
Mium… do we even have to count fighting Mium?
Honestly I think Rovak might just be the lower rung of the top tier whose been getting unlucky with his opponents. We’ll see if he ends up fighting Kally next… that might one even he can’t survive.
Well Rovak, being relatively indestructible, probably gets his team into more trouble than they can handle regularly… so I’m not surprised he’s got good at fixing them. I mean, if you were standing there and one of your team gets killed, if you COULD bring them back, you would right?!?
As for Rovak being “strong”, I think the term “immutable” is probably more appropriate, given the whole magic thing: I think of it as innate magic to resist change (a.k.a. being stabbed, blown up, dismembered, etc). Perhaps you mean overpowered? He is: but how would he fair vs the Kor’s World foot soldier? Because that’s probably what we should be comparing everyone to (and is probably the reason we see so many OP people).
And I do not think Rovak would survive being breathed on by Fluffy… it would be a case of “regenerate from what?”.
In terms of Rovak vs Kally, I would think that Rovak would be able to escape fairly easily. I don’t think Kally has any magic powerful enough to trap him, and only a direct blast of her most powerful magic has a shot at killing him, which probably takes time to calculate so it is easy to dodge or hide behind something that she wouldn’t casually destroy, like a small city. I also imagine that his I-code gives him unending physical endurance, and so he could probably dodge at top speed for weeks on end, while Kally would probably tire out after a few days.
In other words, I agree with Miko that Rovak is basically impossible to kill, even if you are quite a bit stronger than him. Although Illa may have a good shot, because of her superhuman speed combined with tactical level strength, which is probably why Rovak for once took the less risky course here.
Fluffy can’t stomp on Rovak to trap him?
Kind of the point of constructs like Fluffy would be that certain things then need less calculation (time & complexity): I would expect breathing dragon fire is an innate ability of Fluffy, so the only thing you need to cast is the instruction “breathe dragon fire at Rovak”. But yes, as long as Rovak stays in populated civilian areas, Kally probably will leave him alone if he leaves her alone. But in the open… he’s not going to be able to dodge dragon fire: I suspect it would be similar to trying to dodge a HVW strike (you do remember Kally/Fluffy taking a pot-shot at a HVW strike? (didn’t get lucky: but close enough to have plausibly stopped in the narrative Peter engineered)) (even Mium didn’t try to dodge a HVW strike aimed at him: he simply jumped into the ground… I wonder if Rovak can do that trick).
Personally my guess is that Kally is sort of a cut above the rest. The IDS treats her like an armed bomb, where the people that are “in the know” (like Elizabeth) thought the idea of a specialized “Monster Hunter” squad taking her on was a lack of good judgement.
That said, I think one of the interesting things about this comic is that the stronger person does not inherently win. It is all about what skills, experience, and set up they have. Tyler is, best I can tell, a monster on his own right in raw power and innate talent, but got knocked out quickly by the pragmatic monster hunters.
The IDS tendency to use knock out gas highlights this perfectly. It is a trivial trick magically speaking (as far as I can tell) but it can take out the strongest mages if they cannot defend against it.
Or Jayce as another example, where he is definitely a lower tier mage, but even Rovak respects him due to the fact that he was one of the few people that seems to fight with tactics.
And ‘Martin’ just happens to show up when Rovak mentions him? Yeah thats very fishy. Suggesting he is either another part of Rovak, or he somehow escaped in digital form and is interacting with Rovak through some kind of implants.
The last time might have been coincidence, but again? Speaking of again, we are again not seeing his face, which all but guarantees that is not a just an oddity of panel layout, but I still do not know for sure what it means.
If we think about it, “Martin” is almost certainly not a Malsan last name. It also means he probably not Miko’s father, as Miko (by appearance) is probably half Asian and Martin is not an Asian last name. It certainly could be Palindran last name though, as there are are definitely Caucasian analog natives to Palindra (like Tyler Weber).
It could still be Peter though. The build is fairly close to Peter. But he does not quite talk like Peter… Peter does not usually find things “fascinating” (at least, not in his usual persona).
But I agree, digital ghost or hallucination are the most likely candidates. Do have betting pools yet?
pastutopia.com/comic/comic-for-thursday-january-11th-2 (not a link, I leave that to my betters.)
Dr. Karov Martin?
I don’t know, is it a coincidence? I haven’t read the wiki or other official or unofficial information pages. Sometimes I don’t even read all the comments. I tend to be very off in my guesses. So I’m sure you can dispel this easily. Kind of an Oxcam’s Razor sort of thought, though…
I wouldn’t say I’m anyone’s betters, but making it a link is within my powers so… linkification!
I should note that this comment makes me suspect you are seeing the old version of the page and I’ve been caught in a typo. Originally the page said “Karov” and in one of the speech bubbles instead of “Kardus”, but both times Rovak speaks, he’s supposed to say “Kardus”.
Kardus is the name of the Orish warmage that Rovak is talking to… or, well, talking at, I suppose being more accurate.
I saw the version that said Karov too, but be honest I just confused that with Kardus when I saw it, and assumed it was the warmages name.
Rovak casually chatting with the mangled pieces of his associates corpse seemed so in character I didn’t even question it.
Aw, damn it. Now I have to remove that line between Rovak and Commander Karov in my Far Side of Utopia org chart. It *does* make a bit more sense without it, but I was starting to figure out ways it could work. The second Karov should have clued me in about that error, but I guess I haven’t been sleeping enough lately.
There are other possibilities.
Dr. Martin is also a demon, anchored to Rovak, and name-sensitive.
Dr. Martin was killed, but Rovak happened upon him before he was quite so squishy. He managed to revive him, at least briefly, but there was damage even Rovak didn’t know how to repair. As his final act before dying a second time, Dr. Martin tied his spirit to Rovak, so that he would stay connected to the mortal plane, rather than going off into that long goodnight. He now lives as a specter, only visible to Rovak, and only when Rovak mentions his name.
Dr. Martin really likes Rovak, so he follows Rovak around wherever he goes. But he knows he’s not as tough as Rovak, so he generally stays out of sight.
Dr. Martin gave Rovak another button device, which is a holoemitter, much like the ones that Tyler gave Peter. Except it’s better, either by design, or by plot magic, so we can’t see the background through Dr. Martin’s projection like we can through other holos.
This has only been twice, so it could still be coincidence. If it happens a third time, but only that, then it’s enemy movement. A fourth time would be M.Y.M. screwing with you. If it happens five times, then we know Peter’s been here the whole time all along.
If I was a ghost that couldn’t be exploded, I might follow around Rovak too. He is definitely one of the more entertaining people to follow around.
Even as a ghost I wouldn’t dare follow Peter around.
Existing as a ghost and have to choose between being stuck to Rovak or Peter? Hmm. I’d choose Peter. Slightly fewer explosions and moderately less death and dismemberment. Slightly more terror, moderately more annoyances (Peter and MYM would definitely decide to use me as a resource), and way more awesomeness! After all, who wouldn’t want to watch someone save the universe?
Honestly I’m not even sure “fewer explosions” is true. They are both in the category where as soon as you see them and a building at the same time, you can safely assume that building is probably going to explode.
Maybe “the cause of” few explosions, but even that is debatable.
I definitely think Peter would find a way to harness a ghost. Who knows what he’d do with it, or how he’d compel it serve his agenda, but there’s no way he’d just leave a ghost to haunt him peacefully… he’d have it out running errands before the day was through.
I think you malign both of them. Let’s take a look:
– Peter’s house at the start of the comic. Boom.
– Almost all of the buildings on the Levenworth campus: Peter’s seen them, but I think only one of them has actually had a major explosion in it.
– The mall. No explosions, despite Peter hanging out there for 18 of 26 pages of chapter 5.
– Tyler’s house. No explosions.
– Peter’s second house in the comic. No explosions yet. Of course, this is his house, so we all understand it’s just a matter of time.
So Peter definitely doesn’t deserve this reputation. You’re just remembering the places that have blown up more. I think that’s called confirmation bias.
There was also the apartment where Atter attacked Peter. Maybe the whole thing didn’t go boom, but he did at least grenade one room, so I would say it counts.
The parking garage was also totaled by Mium’s boobytrapped tanked, which it is safe to say we can blame on Peter’s presence as well, as Atter was chasing him.
At one point Mium enumerates the suits and ties and everything that he is lost to buildings being blown up to the Consul as a way of explaining his rather damaged attire. I would expect that Peter had clothing Etc in all of those locations as well since they don’t room separately. They have a lot of fake addresses which have also been blowing up or raided. All of those should be added to Peter tally as well. I would just assume that seven or eight suits at every location depending on how often people are doing laundry.
The fake addresses is something of a fair point, but I’m not aware of having been shown anything that even hints at the explosion rate of the fake addresses. One would presume it’s at least non-zero, or Peter probably wouldn’t bother with quite so many of them…
Unless, of course, my headcannon is accurate, and Peter secretly owns at least one real estate company… If true, that would probably have made things a bit more complicated for Tamara finding out where Peter was living, as well as explain how it was that Peter was able to move into a new, furnished home in less than a week after his previous home was burnt to the ground by the IDS SC situation builders.
“I would just assume that seven or eight suits at every location”
I’ve never owned that many suits at one time.
Rovak: Is it safe to assume buildings seen in his presence will go boom? Let’s check.
– Former Dys+N building: Boom. But not by Rovak; this was demolished by the Kor’s World HVW.
– Dr. Mir’s lab building: Boom. But only a little boom. Most of the building is fine.
– These. I think they’re fine. Unless those are also these, in which case they’re not fine. But not Rovak’s fault.
– The next building he was in. Boom. Technically, that was Arpon, but they were coming after Rovak.
– The ones from chapter 12. Rovak only blew up one of them. He was on screen with several of them.
Ok, Rovak may warrant that reputation a bit.
“If you think what I’m doing is interesting now, just wait to see what happens when I [redacted]. Of course, you’ll have to wait, because while that would be easy for you to make happen, since you’re a ghost, I don’t know how I’d ever manage it.”