Girl Genius

LOL Gil looks so much like Darth Vader arriving on the Death Star. Attitude is similar, too.

*snerk* Yes.

Gil, you don't actually run the railways, it's not your business if they're in disarray, and you shouldn't be bringing it up as if taking underlings to task for failure to maintain infrastructure.

edited 27th Mar '15 6:16:22 PM by khil

Well he has an empire, so he probably feels responsible for what happens within it's borders. Although I would have started the talks differently.

"My dear abbot. What a beautiful collection of stormlord dirigibles you have hanging over your fortress. And is that an army of bears and one of sparkhounds hanging around this elevator shaft? We simply have to go over there and take a closer look. <list of units> will guarantee our safety......"

(provided Castle Wulfenbach and accompanying fleet are above them of course )

edited 27th Mar '15 6:40:10 PM by blauregen

I am getting the distinct feeling that we've had enough of a timeskip that there actually isn't an army of bears or of Sparkhounds near the elevator shaft anymore. But I'm kind of hoping I'm wrong....

In the previous page there were still dirigible with golden insignias above the fortress.

That, yes. And there was still smoke rising from various locations. But Gil refers to "um... wreckage" rather than, say, "explosions", and between that and the monks' message and the way the Abbot comes out to greet them — I think Gil actually might have arrived after enough of a timeskip that the crisis is over and the most incriminating bits cleaned up. The bears could be in the woods, the Sparkhunds could all be back in armor, and Agatha could be almost anywhere — from the catacombs to one of Tweedle's ships (goodness, I hope not) to a few miles out toward Paris.

It is possible. The top dirigible in the previous page is hauling something. Maybe a wagon with the party. But it would be a little disappointing to get the outcome of the fight and the Tweedle/Krosp-negotations only in narration.

If the Abbot caves and gives away the fact that Agatha is there, I will lose a lot of respect for him.

I don't really expect the Tweedle-Krosp negotiations to be all that interesting — well, actually they'd probably be hilarious — but I'll be disappointed if we've missed Agatha's conversations with/decisions about the Beast once it's subdued.

edited 27th Mar '15 8:24:58 PM by Schefflera

Well, a number of tropers have been complaining about how long the episode is taking, so having the recap take place in the cab of a reformed Chewie would speed the trip to Paris. That is what we're looking for, aren't we?

edited 27th Mar '15 9:05:01 PM by AnotherBear

Yet another random and completely irrelevant thought:

Lady Selnikov's body (presumably with head mutilated beyond salvage) is in the vault.

The last time we saw Baron Selnikov, he was a head, sans body, in a jar.

Now I'm wondering: what would happen if some terrible, terrible person put the leftover parts together?

I still think we need a confrontation of one kind or another now. The pacing feels off for a chase.

eta: Good lord, that opens up a world of tasteless jokes...

edited 27th Mar '15 9:19:10 PM by mona.soyun

I am not sure I want Agatha having Chewie and the bears. I am actually hoping she doesn't take either with her. Her Sparkiness works better without all-devouring monsters and hardly beatable armies.

Real hard problems finding a style that matches the body and the head.

Up to now, the arc lacks closure.

edited 27th Mar '15 9:16:36 PM by blauregen

The bears would be difficult to work into her travel plans, but I'll be pretty disappointed if she doesn't get Chewie.

Edit: On second thought, I could see the bears being her travel plans for a while — they seem to have stayed rather effectively under the radar to date and might be able to spirit her off toward Paris as invisibly as Dimo and co. got her to the Clankshead station.

edited 27th Mar '15 10:56:58 PM by Schefflera

Instead of moving forward a bit, they might have moved back a bit -a few minutes pre-Chewie-debrained, as it were.

If so, there will be an off-panel kaboom that will draw Gil's attention.

I think the book and key are sufficient reward for a side quest. No need to give her the all-devouring +5 locomotive.

edited 27th Mar '15 11:49:25 PM by blauregen

We've just spent months of pagetime and a volume title on a Heterodyne transportation monster, with connections to the comparatively recent family backstory, introduced by Ulm's concern that Agatha would sympathize with it. This all seems a bit much to me if its role is basically a chattier version of the crab monster she shot up to protect the circus.

Hmm. That would be an interesting option. Although in that case, wow, the Abbot trying to brazen out that everything is under control while just around the corner there's a desperate battle going on against a creature that threatens to escape and gradually devour the whole world....

edited 28th Mar '15 12:45:21 AM by Schefflera

Yeah, sometimes you have to know when to hold 'em, and know when to fold them, and a potentially hostile armada hanging over your head while your own defenses are in disarray seems like a bad time for excessive displays of vertebral fortitude. Is this the track you want to die on?

Agatha frequently spends months on endeavors of little consequence. This one gave her the book, a bit of tweedly characterization and possibly a corbetitte alliance.

This is true, and the Foglios did cast a highly effective pall of futility on all her efforts to date by taking away Mechanicsburg. Good thing she's the persevering type!

However, the Corbettite alliance is highly questionable since they don't actually want to have a political alignment and may be forced to kowtow to Tweedle anyway; Tweedle characterization really isn't worth spending months on IMO; and the book/key will presumably be interesting at some point but doesn't get her any closer to Paris.

Chewie is fun. And, as noted, has an awful lot of setup suggesting that there's more going on than a one-off fight. It does seem likely his abilities will be curtailed even if he does survive, what with his out-of-body experience, which is a bit of a shame because frankly they were pretty awesome. On the other hand, those could be about as much of a problem as a solution for Agatha. She wants to stay largely under the radar and request assistance, not terrorize people over the possibility that she might feed their city to a train. I'd really like to see some more conversations with him at the least, and I'd really enjoy Agatha traveling in a self-fueling, self-modifying conscious vehicle, but he clearly can't maintain the appetite and the attitude unaltered as part of Agatha's party. She wouldn't be able to take him into Paris and certainly wouldn't be able to leave him outside if she can't trust him not to start nibbling on the walls.

I do expect the bears to remain allies, just probably not long-term travel companions. If Agatha meant to travel with an army, she has one of her own, and I cannot imagine the Master of Paris would take kindly to one visiting all at once. I really wonder if Krosp's going to have a conflict here, though. Leaving them under Tweedle's command seems like a problem, not solely because they appear to be sick of him. Might they just melt into the woods and hold a territory for themselves? Might they be upset about being left? What are they expecting of him?

On the subject of things to be introduced for Act II, I really hope it isn't too much longer before they (re)introduce Dimo's statement that Wulfenbach is at war with Lucrezia. Where is she and what is she doing? (Or they, of course.)

I'm imagining the bears and Jaegers as allies. Fighting side by side, performing pincer maneuvers, playing dice around the campfires...

Ok, I could live with a severely stripped down Chewie, but I still don't see it as a that interesting character. For party banter, I'd actually prefer Wolkerstorfer.

That works. Sending the bears back to the Jäger, gives her a better army, once she gets Mechanicsburg back at the end of the story, and may be a an incentive for Gil to cooperate with them in the meantime.

Bears can get drunk, you know. And, there are hints that some individuals go out to find fermented fruit, what some idiot left in plain sight and even aged honey-and-rain-water to get drunk on. Particularly older bears. Much like with elephants and chimps... for similar reasons.

So, I'd add drinking to the dice.

edited 28th Mar '15 7:38:42 AM by Euodiachloris

Fight Nights at the underground Jaeger bar hall just got a lot more interesting.

Mama's going to have to add to her bar supplies. "Mead or elderberry wine, sir?" "Growf!"