July 9th, 2021
9 Jul 2021 · page 1068 of 1306
That doesn't narrow it down, Rattaker
Cast: Patience Rattaker, Verity Cunningham
Comments (48)
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First switch! Mwahahahahahaha!!
That was just the light.
Needs a Girl Genius GIF
Friday update! Whoo!
"Damn near Anythin'" sounds ominous though...
With what Pryce said about the 4th anchor being a big hole, or deep uncderground, I'm half expecting a transformation into a giant submarine or something.
Wouldn't it be awkward if the last Anchor was at the bottom of the Marianas Trench?
If the anchor is in the middle of the ocean I feel bad for whoever the witch winds up being.
Lei is aiming to pay off her bad karma...
Worst case scenario: Poor Lei who didn't even want magic suddenly becomes the chosen witch for this new anchor. (Sure it seemed like witches were born like that, but that was for established anchors. Who knows what happens when one pops up)
I estimate an above 50% chance the author knows. But being an author myself, knowing what happens to the end of the current arc is certainly not guaranteed. Sometimes I don't even know what will happen in the next 1000 words until it does :P
Well if the author doesn't know, I'm sure at least the dice do :P
I just parsed 'Rattaker' as 'Rat-Taker' and now I'm wondering if that means anything. (Edit: 'Cunning-ham' is also rather descriptive, too.)
I mean last names used to be descriptive (I think the tradition was to help people know which "Jack" or "Peter" you were referring to, when there were multiple in the village).
You have lineage names: Jackson (literally Jack's son), MacLeod (Son of Leod), O'Banon (Grandson of Banon), Olafsdottir (Daughter of Olaf).
You have trade names: Smith, Baker, Miller, Carpenter, Rattaker (probably the local rat catcher)
There are also descriptive names: Grossman ("big man"), Drinkwater (either poor or diabetic), Shaw (the person living next to the thicket)
Cunningham appears to be the Anglicization of an Irish last name that indicates descent from a Scottish leader. Language is awesome!
I must tell my friend Una Managementconsultantovna, she'll be fascinated.
Damn. Pryce has himself a leashed mad scientist. For now.
Meanwhile, up in the lounge both Lei and Thea are pumping out huge quantities of uncertainty. It's probably not enough to drown out the certainty of a literal boatload of idle rich, but it is the sort of ironic fly in the ointment that I'd worry about with this magic system.
On the other hand, strap verity with a miniaturized version and you could power widdershins' electrical grid at least half the time.
For SCIENCE!
I understood that reference [insert Captain America gif here]
When you're certain, you can do anything?
That sounds like Supernormal Step-verse magic. Time for a WDS SNS crossover?
It's beautiful. It uses the rich as fuel.
Alas, certainty is just a by-product of the rich, not the actual rich people themselves, and they have an endless supply of that...
Of course, one can dream the engine to be working outside specifications.
Is certainty an eighth deadly sin?
...Perhaps it is NOW...?
Oh, I'm sure a certain quadrupedal bird-like Sin has already dominion over an excess of certainty...
But is the engine just skimming off the top, if you see what I mean, or is it draining all the certainty from everyone?
Finally back up to twice a week? This is a good sign. I hope the head-straightening has gone well. 😃
I believe every other week gets a second update, assuming I read yesterday’s author note correctly.
Hmmm...an engine that runs on certainty? That sounds awfully familiar but I can't think of what exactly. My first thought is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy's Heart of Gold with its Infinite Improbability Drive but that's not quite the same thing...
The IID runs on Brownian Motion.
Incidentally - in case anyone who might be interested doesn't already know, you can play the Infocom "Hitchhiker's Guide" - written by Douglas Adams himself, coded by Steve Meretsky, who's a bit of a wise arse himself - [online at the BBC](https://tinyurl.com/wfmnyn4d "https://tinyurl.com/wfmnyn4d")
Don't take the towel from Ford, eat the peanuts, drink lots of beer three times {i think; maybe two} but no more, buy the sandwich ...and remember, you have five senses.
And save early save often
Pretty sure some Orcs from some popular franchise with which I personally am not familiar and thus cannot think of the name have war machines that run on belief - as long as they BELIEVE they work, they do - which is, arguably, the same concept.
Misplaced certainty is what drives ships slap bang into lighthouses...
OTOH certainty, confidence is sexy; could be folks will be so preoccupied they won't even notice.
Seems like the move would be to have a certainty engine and an uncertainty backup engine
Maybe that would work.
That seems like a recipe for failure: if you have a backup, that just means that you're not sure the main one will be sufficient. Do you really want to be that uncertain about your own certainty engine?
But if you're not sure, that's fuel for the backup engine. No matter how you, the crew, or the passengers feel, you've got juice.
For true security, put an ambivalence engine right in the middle :)
I don't think they make engines tough enough to safely harness uncertainty.
… nor could anyone be bothered to figure out an apathy engine …
It's an Ork-engine.
"Oi! I finks iz gonna work! I iz lotsa sure ov it!"
I didn't know there were female Igors.
{She's obviously fairly young because she doesn't seem to have any cherished family hand-me-downs ... well, come to think, we can't see her wrists...}
You must not have read Monstrous Regiment. (The term is Igorina, incidentally.)
Oh - right. I'd forgotten that one...
"Da Only way iz coul' be more sure be if wez strapped it wit lotza Dakka and made it RED! Problem is, It ain't on a good part of da kruiza fer it." - Mek Boy
She forgot the cackle and the tesla coils...
...she took off her Mad Science! goggles just to talk to her boss over her phone.
Nah, she pushed them up on the last page to more effectively glare while yelling "What's yer problem?!" at the guy interrupting her fight of flirtation with Vee.
I'd say these two need to get a room already but they technically already have one.
They didn't tell her it was impossible, so she went ahead and did it.
They're headed for ludicrous speed.
("It's Good Intentions! She's gone *plaid*!")
Um... well, first off, good line, so credit where credit is due, but that doesn't actually answer the question.
Certainty only makes you THINK you can do anything. When you find out you can't it's a hell of a crash.