Girl Genius

I think it has something to do with what Vi is best at: the sneaky and useful switch.

Remember when she snagged Theo (who has to weigh at least as much as she does) and left a rag doll in his place? That looked like him, yet. And she snagged the weasel from Tweedle, replacing it with a vial from his lab that contained a perfect substance for a smoke screen and choking but stationary cloud.

AND Vi somehow got Tarvek out of a Wulfenbach Empire hospital -in Mechanicsburg, yet- with the guards not realizing in enough time for them to dodge them and into DK.

Whatever other Smoke Knight skills Vi may or may not have, she has the sneaky part down.

The interesting aspect of what y'all (such a useful internet abbreviation) have been discussing is that individual anticipation seems to be much more tortuous than any practices that the Empire may or may not allow.

An example: Von Zinzer, knowing that he was doing something dangerous, chose to attempt deception (against the rules) instead of being up-front with who he really was (unknown results) and suffered emotionally because of it until he was caught.

You can see from the rumours and reactions that people made up [spooky voice] horrible things [/spookyvoice] about what The Baron would do that rarely proved out, yet the habit, and the fear, persisted.

edited 25th Feb '15 8:45:56 AM by Corgi

Corgi:

Not one of Klaus' finer moments.

Moloch lied simply out of fear of the Baron.

But more importantly he was a constant reminder of how lazy and careless Klaus had been in Beetleberg —- and that is what earned him a one-way ticket to the Waxworks. http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20030509

Candi- Your basic point stands, but it's quite possible that Vi was carrying that vial as part of her standard equipment.

The novel clarifies why Moloch was sent to Castle Heterodyne too — apparently it's the traditional punishment for impersonating a Spark. Which raises questions of its own — did Klaus have a lot of trouble with fake Sparks? What were they doing that led to him prescribing such a draconian punishment?

So it is the deception that leads to Moloch being punished — but it's still a very over the top punishment from someone who has no problem bending the rules when he knows they don't fit the situation.

Hm. I can see situations where a fake Spark could be a serious problem. There are probably projects where it's vital to have the Spark burning brightly in the people working on it. The thing is, Spark-Moloch was just supposed to be noodling around seeing what he could come up with, not doing anything important.

Torture is notorious for yielding unreliable information. Human memory has proven again and again to be extremely malleable even without fear and pain.

Brain coring aside, Klaus doesn't tend toward cruelty. All leaders are forced to evaluate constantly what ends justify what means, and I could see him expending a lot of thought on the question of torture, if it was a question. But it's simply ineffective, and if Klaus knew that, I think that'd be the end. It is for me, anyway — Nope. Doesn't work. Never justifiable.

I wonder if anyone in Girl Genius uses torture for information? You're right that it's unreliable and Aaronev uses a truth serum on Agatha, so if they're something widely known torture would be redundant. (There are ethical problems with truth serums too, but different ones.)

That seems backwards. The Castle needed sparks and most of the fellow prisoners seemd to have been sparks of some degree. How useful would impersonators be?

I kinda think so many of the prisoners are Sparks because Sparks are more likely to be involved in extravagant crimes, not because they're more useful.

And if you can fake being a Spark, you've probably got some mechanical know-how.

Even improisoned Sparks need minions.

"Den hyu gets us to ponch somebody until dey tells us."

...Although the ineffectiveness of this information-gathering tactic appears to have been largely because Klaus didn't send anyone who actually knew what was going on.

Ilaine — Maybe sort of a Don't Do The Crime If You Can't Do The Time thing...? Like, if you wanna pass yourself off as a Spark, you can also enjoy the consequences?

Or maybe it's just Klaus' way of ensuring the validity of his brain coring results... ;)

Pretending to be a Spark is probably some sort of con- "Pay me and I will build you anything!" Then they abscond with the money.

Impersonation in general is usually some sort of con, but I can see cases where, say, a technologically adept but non-Spark sets up shop in some backwoods and claims to be Sparky to drive up business for their technological marvels. In that case, the customers are still getting what they paid for, it's just that the proprietor is exaggerating their own abilities.

The point of this being that the impersonation in itself doesn't sound like a crime heinous enough to merit automatic condemnation to der Kestle.

Given the hostility that sparks get, esp. in rural areas, I'm guessing some degree of intimidation is also involved: "Pay me or I will destroy you all!" [takes money and runs]

The vial in Tweedle's hand looked more like something out of a laboratory then what Vi could comfortably carry in her outfit.

I think part of the pretend-to-be-a-Spark thing involves either actually breaking the law, or ticking off Klaus. Still seems overkill to send Moloch specifically to DK, though.

I can understand not wanting Moloch around Agatha, considering that as a newly-appeared female Spark, oh yes, Klaus would have wanted to keep her around (at least until her bloodline came up). But DK in its half-mad and broken state... overkill.

The novel version points out that it's not just the Spark-impersonation that got Moloch his sentence- "The man was an enemy soldier who had confessed to threatening Agatha’s life at least twice, as well as, if you were going to be technical about it, assorted incidents of robbery, blackmail, threats of violence, assault, and burglary."

That would do it, yeah.

None of this makes any sense.

There can't have been a "tradition" of sentencing imposters to the Waxworks. The Empire itself is no older than Agatha.

Klaus abducted Agatha and Moloch from Clay Mechanical without knowing anything about the past of either one of them.

The only witnesses to Moloch's threatening behavior on board were Agatha and Gil —- and Gil conspired to maintain the illusion that Moloch was the Spark even then.

While Moloch was shipped out long before Agatha was a blip on Klaus's radar.

Von Zinzer was shipped out after Klaus started chasing Agatha(see next page).

It seems he confessed everything beforehand.

And 10 years is more than long enough to start a tradition.

And for the burglary charge, he had Agatha's locket, with her name on it, in his possession on Castle Wulfenbach. But yeah, I suspect the real reason he got shipped off wasn't his numerous but relatively minor crimes, or even his trying to fool Klaus- it was because he Knew Too Much about Agatha. A truly ruthless and pragmatic leader would have just killed him, at least Klaus gave him a chance, however slender it was.

edited 26th Feb '15 12:49:25 AM by Geoduck

Moloch was a lot nicer in DK. In fact, I started reading GG at the page where Agatha enters DK, and when I went back to reread the whole thing, I was surprised they were the same person, even allowing for his grief. He got character growth out of the deal, at least.

Being an enemy soldier wouldn't be enough to get you sent anywhere if Klaus was dealing directly with you. Remember that when Gil zappy-sticked the invading clanks outside Mechanicsburg, he offered the soldiers -who had just shot him- either jobs or a months pay and transport home.

I'm going with the Moloch knew too much about Agatha thing. Even without Mother Dearest around, Agatha's existence was a potentially destabilizing force.

Glad they have a magnet using person/clank trying to chase and kill them all.

In regards to 'What a Spark-Impersonator would even do'- I could easily see somebody commiting atrocities (brutal murder, imprisonment, whatever else) and intimidating people into not immediately going after them by claiming that their atrocities were FOR SCIENCE and that they would turn all who opposed them into ducks. It could work, especially if the person in question had engineering experience and/or construct minions (real or disguised 'normal' people is anyone's guess).