Book 2 – Page 99

[balder]

New One is up.

[Shai_hulud]

Jack seems rather grey again.

Edit*
Lawlfirst

[NYbear]

Woot, he's through the portal!

I love the: "Course it's a trap" line. Jack is awesome as always: "Do you smell smoke?"

So, who thinks Ace is croaked? I'm not calling it till I see a body with the X's in the eyes. Though that could be a good way to test what happens to a decrypted caster if Wanda ever gets back this turn.

(and was almost first, curse you work connection)

[joosy]

YAY!! He is finally through! I am having a mini party here to celebrate!

And Jack - so clever
but.. no Wanda so no Plier or Croakamancer bonus.

and poor Ace Hopefully they are able to decrypt him somehow - I can see him and Parson being a formidable team.

And.. autopilot? really? Nice.

So, the roof is on fire. No casters to speak of on either side, and there is a race to the throne to switch capitols for Jetstone effectively trapping Parson before GK can control the garrison.
I wonder what the rest of Charlie's gambit is to kill Parson. Whatever it is, I am sure it will be a glorious failure!

[Jorgath]

No Wanda = no decrypted Ace if he croaks, too.

[sanjmerchant]

Delurking just to say:

Omygodomygodomygodomygodomygod! He's in SPAAAAACE[rock]!

Glad Cubbins got out of dodge, but sad to see Ace taken down. Still, as others have said, you can't count anyone out until you see the body. And even then it's probably Foolamancy anyway.

[effataigus]

Nice progress in this update! Still very puzzled by Isaac's choice to not let the casters that came out of the portal go back into it.

[GKBeetle]

HOLY BOOP! HE'S THROUGH THE PORTAL!!!

That is all.

[Sixty]

Oh yeah baby, hot Parson on Portal action!

[Owenator]

Finally! Nice update but I hate the dragging on as much as I love the suspense.

This battle needs needs more Wanda.

[Salem]

I wouldn't count Ace out of decryption. I want him to just live. I love him and I dislike red more now for simply doing her duty because it included hurting Ace.

But my strategy here would be, move the capital of GK to spacerock, to decrypt to shore up losses suffered from not having Wanda. Then if we wanted to much the capital back which would make sense, do a super protected dwagon relay back and forth. Granted this creates risk for Stanley. With an heir it would be the best choice for the side. We also know that Maggie has no qualms about telling her overlord which droids he is and is not looking for. Maybe she'll mind control him into making an heir.

That in hindsight sounds dirty.

[splexis]

HOLY BOOP! HE'S THROUGH THE PORTAL!!!

And on my birthday, too! Thanks for the present!

[effataigus]

Happy birthday, splexis!

[name lips]

"I can only conclude that I must have used a trick of some sort."

Out of juice... tricky indeed. So was he really out of juice? Or did he simply use a trick that didn't require juice? A scroll perhaps? Or maybe he just hid behind Parson? Or perhaps he left some time ago and has been waiting for Parson in SpaceRock... when is the last time we actually saw Jack on the MK side?

edit: I checked. He's been gone for quite some time.

I think I finally spotted him in the back of Parson's entourage on Page 83. That's before Maggie showed up! On Page 90 you get a very good picture of Parson and the group he's stacked with, and Jack is nowhere to be seen.


edit2: I must also say that the pink flowers on Wanda's livery seem even more creepy now that we know what they are and where they came from.

[LogicsFate]

I think I finally spotted him in the back of Parson's entourage on Page 83. That's before Maggie showed up! On Page 90 you get a very good picture of Parson and the group he's stacked with, and Jack is nowhere to be seen.

Look further down on page 90. He is clearly there behind Parson. On almost the same shot 4 pages later he is gone. Hiding under parsons cloak perhaps? Cloaked.

[cloudbreaker]

Jack's trick confuses me, as it should. I am wondering if he was ever really completely in the Magic Kingdom to begin with, or if he was just half in, half out and never actually stopped his head-roll illusion.

[bladestorm]

several predictamancy bets just fell into place.

[Aquillion]

I wouldn't count Ace out of decryption. I want him to just live. I love him and I dislike red more now for simply doing her duty because it included hurting Ace.

But my strategy here would be, move the capital of GK to spacerock, to decrypt to shore up losses suffered from not having Wanda. Then if we wanted to much the capital back which would make sense, do a super protected dwagon relay back and forth. Granted this creates risk for Stanley. With an heir it would be the best choice for the side. We also know that Maggie has no qualms about telling her overlord which droids he is and is not looking for. Maybe she'll mind control him into making an heir.

That in hindsight sounds dirty.

Remember, like she told Parson, Thinkamancy can't make people do things they wouldn't have the potential to do anyway. She was able to make Stanley appoint Parson as chief warlord because in his heart, he actually does think that Parson is competent, even if the guy makes him uneasy; and because he could rationalize it to himself as getting his money's worth out of the Summon Perfect Warlord spell.

She can't make him appoint Parson as his heir, because that's not something he would ever consider doing, and not something he could really rationalize to himself.

(Incidentally, this presumably shows a difference between Thinkamancy and Turnamancy -- Thinkamancy can do a wider variety of more subtle things, but you can't make someone switch sides with it unless they were already considering it and have low loyalty. Turnamancy can force people to switch sides regardless of whether they'd ever consider doing so.)

[Zeku]

ohmygodportal

The real questions here, are how did Jack know pre-emptively that there would be an arrangement that no casters go through the portal with him? (Page 94, Jack is already missing)

How he actually snuck back into Spacerock is less important than the fact that he definitely arranged it ahead of time, and thus knew something about what would happen in the Magic Kingdom.

[cheeseaholic]

He may have hid just in case things grew violent so he could work his magic.

I think Parson could be named heir simply because the summoning spell forces him to obey Stanley. It also helps to protect Stanley since a decapitation strike is harder then.

Of course you'd have to word it right.