Follow TV Tropes

Following

Fridge / Erfworld

Go To

Fridge Brilliance

  • Parson's purpose to fundamentally change the nature of Erfworld can be completed within the rules of the world. If all the territories are allied or if only a single side exists then everybody's turn will occur at the same time. A panel of the comic states that the Coalition members experience simultaneous turns whilst they are part of the coalition and this is even taken advantage of when charlie un-allies with the coalition and plans to re-ally with Tranylvito to manipulate the turn order in book 1. If everyone is in one alliance, regardless of if it occurred due to conquest or alliance, then everyone would have their turn at once, with no other "turn blocks" existing. With no real time, "off turn" move points would become irrelevant, as would hex borders. Everyone world move in real time, just like in real life, and if you felt like it you could walk across as many hexes as you pleased. This means Parson can achieve most of his purpose without having to change the rules. He just has to conquer everyone.
  • Read this update. Marvel at how Parson keeps screwing around with Charlie. Then notice how Parson just swore uncensored. Like he did at the end of Book 1. What could this mean about how the natural Thinkamancy of Erfworld is now affecting Parson? Apparently, Parson can do this at will now. "Beats the shit out of a coconut..."
  • The ongoing stream of asspulls that kept screwing up Parson's plans and allow him to be defeated by Ansom despite Ansom's stupidity and pride seem irritating until it is revealed that the whole scenario is SUPPOSED to be an Unwinnable Training Simulation, that the GM is supposed to cheat, and that only way for the player to win is to cheat better, instead of merely exploiting the system. Parson realizes this and decides to reanimate a volcano.
  • One of the first things that Parson says when he really starts getting into the Chief Warlord job is "And I always did like to play the bad guys". And, sure enough, his maneuvers include breaking a truce.
  • Wanda's livery is a skull with a pink flower on it. In her backstory, she is emaciated to nearly skeletal proportions by Dame Branch's heroine buds... highly addictive pink flowers which are placed on the head. This adds a whole new level of Signamancy.
  • We probably all thought Charlie was a Thinkamancer until The Reveal that he was actually a Carnymancer. This actually makes a lot of sense. Charlie stays behind the scenes, pretending to play by the "rules", but is actually manipulating people in ways that benefit him. He's been "rigging the game" the whole time.
  • Jack's realization of the precise implications of Charlie's backstory. To quote:
    Jack: [Charlie] summoned a perfect warlord. One whose Fate was to destroy the 'Wicked Witch' of the story. And she did. It was inexorable. Charlie must have set her loose in the world, then watched her hunt down Overlady Blair, the most powerful Ruler in the land, letting nothing stop her.
    Parson: And now he's got one of those coming after him.
  • Wanda's lines in Book 1 when incapacitated seem to unnerve Ansom to a strange degree if they were nothing but a taunt. "...More than what you took from me. Come down. Touch me. Touch me with them." The first part, "More than what you took from me" could be regarding Jillian's choosing him over her, could be regarding his possession of the Arkenpliers, or something else. "Touch me with them," however, is clearly responding to the presence of the Arkenpliers. Ansom realizes that a) she means "kill me with them," freaky in itself, or b) she literally means "touch me with them", which would reveal the fact that she, not Ansom, was attuned to the great Arkentool of the house of Jetstone.
  • A lot of Jillian's conflicted personality and desires in the main comic are explained when you discover that Charlie and Betsy pretty thoroughly Mind Raped Jillian in the "Inner Peace Through Superior Firepower" storylines. When Betsy tried to forcibly rewire Jillian's mind to remove her aggression, it did almost exactly what Charlie predicted, it left Jillian's mind shattered. Now she's got the remnants of her original impulses, what she had before the Mind Rape, but she also has impulses based on her new, edited, memories, and on top of that are the alien impulses Betsy tried to impose on her, and all of these are pulling her in different directions. This also specifically explains why she's so schizophrenic towards Wanda. She does still Love Wanda (not even Charlie and Betsy could get rid of that), but she no longer remembers why she loves her, the foundational experiences that caused her to fall in love in the first place.
  • In Lord Crush's story, we learn that each fallen side gets a book published about their experiences up until the point their side was destroyed. One might wonder why Jillian didn't look for Faq's book when she reformed her side. In this book, she would discover that Wanda killed King Banhammer. You may wonder why she doesn't know why Wanda isn't willing to turn to her, but it makes sense that she hasn't looked. She believes what she wants to believe and it's not like she is much interested in reading. Besides that, it's possible that Faq's book didn't appear in her side's library and even if it did, she would have had to spend a good amount of time looking for it. This may even be related to the previous Fridge Brilliance. Jillian's mind was altered. It's possible that she is confused about Wanda's origin and doesn't think to question her loyalty to her father. Even if she had reason to suspect Wanda, she's too in love with her to think of it and too focused on war to consider reading a musty old book.
  • Charlie proposes to Parson that one way to disprove Toolism would be to croak a "Tool". He speaks hypothetically, but it becomes Fridge Brilliance after you learn that he already knows it to be possible, since he remembers how Judy Gale croaked Bell and Blair, both attuned to their Arkentools.
  • Given that Charlie is fated to fail and, for all he's the Big Bad and hugely scary, has actually been The Chew Toy on a number of levels for quite awhile, his signamancy as Charlie Brown is less fridge brilliance and more 'We really didn't see it coming?'
  • So, Parson gives to the Erfworld that speech about cruelty and booping out profanity, and then his ban is lifted just as he shouts "Fuck you!". It is usually seen as a small recompensation for what he's going through, but also it could have a more direct meaning: the only way for the world to say "Fuck you!" to Parson - he's to get the job done, and no matter how much he swears, the world doesn't care about him and his complains.
  • On it's face, Ansom ordering the Superfluous Elves to be a reserve force is a joke about how many elf subtypes fantasy games love to have. However, once you learn about their special ability it becomes a stroke of genius. Superfluous Elves magically know when they're not needed and when it's the best time to say Screw This, I'm Outta Here, which conversely means that they'd be able to instantly tell when rushing in to reinforce Ansom's troops would turn the tide of battle if it came to that.

Top