Erfworld Thread XI: Finally, it's HAMMER-TIME!

[DigoDragon]

New comic.

Another problem resolved by brute force cheating.

Spoiler: Page 346 Update

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All these new towers are a cancer on the story. :/
I was happy when it was just Jed. Because in a way, I felt Jed filled a spot that Bogroll left. That assistant that would keep Stanly busy while Parson enacted an idea, or help Parson find something he needed, or just a voice to listen to. At first anyway. I concede that Jed has left that position and does something completely different now.

Cherri's expression is amusing in this page, but poor Jack. Well, not dusting means Parson could fix it... unless another tower cheats that. :x

[Aquillion]

Honestly, while this is blatant totally-new-rule-from-nowhere silliness, it doesn't bother me quite as much as the previous instances. At least it feels like it's getting the plot back on track by a bit?

But it does make me wonder why we went through all that convoluted ridiculousness. Huge parts of the last few months of TV updates no longer matter now.

(Also, remembering the rules for self-sacrifice wish-golems, we do know that someone deliberately sacrificing their own life in a dramatic way can bend the rules a bit.)

[Yana]

Spoiler

Show

So what was the point of the past year of TV updates if Caesar just up and commits suicide? We get a rando on the throne of TV instead of someone like Vinny?

[-D-]

When was bunny body destroyed? I don't remember when that happened.

[DataNinja]

When was bunny body destroyed? I don't remember when that happened.

She was entirely "unmade" by the Great Mind's Baddie-Contingency spell, if I'm recalling correctly.

[Jasdoif]

When was bunny body destroyed? I don't remember when that happened.

The destruction of her body was one of the terms of the contract...well, unless they gave her body to Charlescomm instead.

[keybounce]

We have prophecy fulfilled.
Erfworld has been broken.

...

Okay, so what has happened:

1. Caesar committed suicide.

2. Sky is now the ruler.

3. The towers have demonstrated that they not only can steal mana, they can do so at will. In other words, not only are they physically able to, they have free will to.

4. We know that this is worse than having a gun.

So what happens when this escalates? Shirley has pointed out to Charlie that he has been stealing. Now Transilvito is stealing. I'm pretty sure that we have both FAQ's Tower and GK's tower watching this. So who steals next? How much do they steal?

I think FAQ will steal next, and then Jed will see that and steal as well.

Pretty soon, every tower is going to be stealing because they see their neighbors stealing.

Where does that end? With the equivalent of ecological destruction of the landscape.

[deuterio12]

More asspulls aside, I really, really like that design of vampire queen with golden rifle.

I can also symphatize with the whole: "So you keep saying I'm a cheater and criminal? FINE! Then I'll actually act like one."

[tomaO2]

New comic.

Another problem resolved by brute force cheating.

Took the words right out of my mouth. I was looking forward to find out what happened with a kingless side but NOOOO, more cheating. I know Parson is prophesied to break Erfworld, and maybe that the point of all this madness, but it's driving me NUTS. It's just not a satisfying way to win. These are some of the most empty feeling victories that I have ever read.

Also, did Hue erase a contract? That's honestly more shocking to me than making Sky the new leader. I can understand how Sky was promoted, since we know that there is a mechanic for it, and Hue just substituted the source for money, but breaking a contract is different. This was not just for Caesar, it was binding for the entire side, a new ruler should not matter.

Also, on another note, how fast do those bats eat? My God. It took them maybe a minute to chow down on Bunny? I was sure he's kill himself before they made the body irrecoverable.

[deuterio12]

Also, on another note, how fast do those bats eat? My God. It took them maybe a minute to chow down on Bunny? I was sure he's kill himself before they made the body irrecoverable.

Tee Vee certainly has hundreds if not thousands of bats, so it would be more like a bunch of flying piranha.

[-D-]

The destruction of her body was one of the terms of the contract...well, unless they gave her body to Charlescomm instead.

Hm. Ok. But in what update did they destroy it?

[whitehelm]

Did Rob just pick a random page to slap "End of Book 4" on? We're in an epilogue, and he's just quickly resolving all the Book 4 cliffhangers with deus ex machinas? If it wasn't obvious already he clearly only cares about dragging the story for as many updates as he can get his fans to stick around and pay for, and the books are an afterthought so he can get some bonus money for selling those.

[Aquillion]

Also, did Hue erase a contract? That's honestly more shocking to me than making Sky the new leader. I can understand how Sky was promoted, since we know that there is a mechanic for it, and Hue just substituted the source for money, but breaking a contract is different. This was not just for Caesar, it was binding for the entire side, a new ruler should not matter.

My reading is that HueHue falsified Caesar's signature on the contract, which meant that the agreement was technically under his control in a way that it wouldn't usually be. And that wouldn't normally matter, because towers can't lie (so he couldn't have just yanked the football away on a whim), but Caesar unequivocally rejecting the contract let HueHue say "whelp, I guess this agreement is void, then." As he explains it in this update, the signature was actually dittomancy (which he was able to do as long as he thought it accurately represented Caesar's will.) On finding out that it didn't, he was able to just cancel the dittomancy and negate TV's agreement to the contract.

Also, it occurs to me that he can argue it was justified and fair along the same lines - no matter what the towers said, the agreement still ultimately required Caesar's agreement, and Caesar couldn't give it while a prisoner. It's not his fault Shirley bargained with him, and acted on the contract, in a way that meant that Caesar was (and had to be) already free by the time that rejection was clear; and it's not his fault Shirley didn't realize that final acceptance of the contract depended on Caesar's agreement.

(OTOH I don't see how he can justify appointing a new heir, which is straightforwardly a cheat.)

[Jasdoif]

Hm. Ok. But in what update did they destroy it?

Closest I found was Benjamin saying "All taken care of". So presumably, before that.

Did Rob just pick a random page to slap "End of Book 4" on? We're in an epilogue, and he's just quickly resolving all the Book 4 cliffhangers with deus ex machinas?

Not at all. He ended the book after killing Caesar and Wanda, now he's killing the arcs he doesn't want to deal with in the next book.

[-D-]

Closest I found

Not at all. He ended the book after killing Caesar and Wanda, now he's killing the arcs he doesn't want to deal with in the next book.

Oh, ok. It seems they got foraged off screen. Great. I like that we wasted so much time developing those characters, for literally nothing.

Also Wanda is coming back, but probably not as a leader of Decrypted. Her body wasn't destroyed.

[Lizard Lord]

While I actually do like Sky I also can't help but feel like Rob is trying too hard to make us like her. Is that weird to say?

[-D-]

While I actually do like Sky I also can't help but feel like Rob is trying too hard to make us like her. Is that weird to say?

Well, quite honestly she is as undeveloped as characters get. I mean we spent a lot of time with Ceasear and Don and Bunny, and not much on her. She is essentially background character.

[Smurfton]

I mean, last time a ruler without an heir committed suicide, it was to prevent the spread of decryption. As a result, she
• Effectively stalled growth of Gobwin Knob
• Caused Book 2 to be something more than steamrolling Jetstone, through Vanna funding GK's turn
• Helped along the current Magic Kingdom conflict and death of Wanda, through Jeftichew
• Caused the almost-fall of the only side to ally with decryption, through Roger


Suicide is really strong. While the method is admittedly new, this needed to result in TV mattering and CC having a bad day.

[guttering flame]

That picture is gorgeous. So good I don't care I wasted 2 minutes of my life reading the added text to get to it. The text somehow manage to make death, despair, self loathing and snatching victory from defeat yawn worthy. That's impressive.

[Anteros]

So now sides can literally just choose to not end when they're defeated. The rules don't matter at all anymore and every single bit of worldbuilding we've ever gotten is worthless. What a great comic. Just fantastic writing.

A kindergartener could churn out a better story than this slop. You can't just ret-con every single rule in the setting that turns out to be inconvenient because you couldn't plan your story out ahead. It's really sad that Erfworld has changed from an interesting setting with clever characters to quite possibly the most poorly written deus ex machina filled piece of garbage I've ever read.

[-D-]

A kindergartener could churn out a better story than this slop. You can't just ret-con every single rule in the setting that turns out to be inconvenient because you couldn't plan your story out ahead. It's really sad that Erfworld has changed from an interesting setting with clever characters to quite possibly the most poorly written deus ex machina filled piece of garbage I've ever read.

Oh, no. You absolutely can write break rule of you earlier made. However, when you do that you generally **** up tension. Oh, Charlie has Parson in inescapable trap. Welp, Erfworld will bend ass backwards to free him.

End result is I can't really get invested into the story.

[Narkis]

Hm. Ok. But in what update did they destroy it?

Another thing he vaguely knew was that them bats out in the hallway all flew away into the palace right when Benjamin, Cheri and Skyy showed up. Disband it. It shouldn't matter, but...

Nothin' mattered, but...

He narrowed his eyes and shook his head. "No," he said. But he knew where the bats were and what they were doin'.

"We have to comply with all terms as quickly as we can, Caesar." The Moneymancer folded his arms behind his back and arched up on his tiptoes for a second. "Forage counts for that. And we'll be short on unit upkeep for a long, long time."

I believe this is it.

And I'm done. This latest asspull was the last straw for me. I can't even be bothered to snark about it.

[JavaScribe]

I realize that cheating is a major theme of the story, but I prefer my cheats clever, or at least foreshadowed. In my opinion, it's just like the Great Minds themselves said, the story is just descending into chaos.

It looks like most of the people on the Erf forums are fine with it though. Mostly, they're getting hung up over the definition of "Deus ex Machina" and explaining why it isn't that.

[Braininthejar2]

When was bunny body destroyed? I don't remember when that happened.

You can read it between the lines in the text update where Cesar offs himself - She had to be destroyed, so the moneymancer commanded the bats to eat her body for upkeep.

[Braininthejar2]

The towers are cancer, just as intended. They are the next big problem for the protagonist to solve.

[Lizard Lord]

The towers are cancer, just as intended. They are the next big problem for the protagonist to solve.

They are cancer to the story, but in universe I can't think of any reason why Parson would want to get rid of Jed or Huehue.

[Braininthejar2]

They are cancer to the story, but in universe I can't think of any reason why Parson would want to get rid of Jed or Huehue.

Because if the arms race escalates to the point where every side steals energy from the source like Charlie did, they might literally break the world.

[Gez]

I am amused on a meta level that Balder's inability to refrain from pulling giant twists that uphold the entire world by rendering irrelevant everything we've been painstakingly exposited about previously, has caused this book's epilogue to entirely undermine this book's climax.

What I'm saying is that this page makes a better climactic cliff-hanger for the story than the one where Caesar was running to the portal to suicide. But within a couple of text updates it's going to be entirely negated and made irrelevant by some other Charlie counter-contingency plan, and then a couple text updates later will undermine that, and so on.

Erfworld has become as narratively satisfying as looking at two kids playing cops and robbers, except these kids are extremely wordy about it.

"I shoot you! My medieval knight had a gun all along! Also strings strings strings."
"Nuh-uh, my woodland outlaw is wearing a bullet-proof vest so your gun don't work. And besides signs signs signs."
My bullets are explosive and incendiary and they have laser guns to melt your armor. Strings strings signs signs!"
"My skin is made of mirror so your bullets' lasers are reflected back at themselves and they explode right in your gun, killing you. Strings signs strings signs."
And so on and so on.

What I'm saying is that Axe Cop had a better, more engaging, and better thought-out plot.

[Braininthejar2]

Oh, ok. It seems they got foraged off screen. Great. I like that we wasted so much time developing those characters, for literally nothing.

Not at all. This book was a story of how they died. Not everyone gets a saga for himself.

Erfworld has become as narratively satisfying as looking at two kids playing cops and robbers, except these kids are extremely wordy about it

Still not as bad as J.K.Rowling's thing with the connected wands.

[-D-]

Not at all. This book was a story of how they died. Not everyone gets a saga for himself.

Sure, it's a saga of how they died. However, is it something we, the audience needed to know? I don't think so. It just seems like padding, for padding's sake.

Still not as bad as J.K.Rowling's thing with the connected wands.

Umm. That part was foreshadowed and fitted within the larger story.