Inner Peace (Through Superior Firepower) – Episode 061

[balder]

New One is up.

[Angband]

ZOMG NEW ARKENTOOL omg omg omg

Let the wild speculation begin! It's an article of Clothing, so dollamancy maybe?

[atalex]

Ha! I literally SHRIEKED so loud it made my roommate look up when I saw the word ARKENSHOES!:)

[Azukar]

Aha! Did not see that coming at all!

So Wanda was very busy last night, apparently! I'm sensing a climax here - but Orwell... Hmm... I wonder how he'll change things up.

[name lips]

The scarecrow and tin man... back to being free-willed golems?

Is that what the ArkenShoes do?

[Silvan]

Well this was a surprising development. The arkenshoes huh... it somewhat makes you wonder where they GO after this. I mean, Wanda must of known where they were yet Stanley didn't decide to try and take them? Seems somewhat odd.

My guess is that they have to do with life in some aspect. I could imagine Judy being attuned to the shoes which symbolize life at their fullest being something that would tick off Dame Branch. In fact that probably was what started her taking control of the side, being jealous of her ruler getting the arkentool of life, she might of tried to make the side most dedicated to life so that maybe the arkentool would attune to her instead.

On Orwell, do we know he lives? I don't believe we have confirmation that he survives until Faq falls to Stanley.

[No one in particular]

Bum bum BUMM~!!!

So, too much to speculate about the Shoes now...

Do we think Orwell's gonna get croaked, and Faq's going to use Wanda as the new lookamancer? This might be where Jillian learned that Wanda hates it. (re: Book 1, pg 36)

[name lips]

Woah. Just realized how Wanda has been operating behind the scenes, against Olive's orders.

Judy is her Ruler... not Olive. Olive is simply a CWL, and heir. If Wanda truly believes something is directly threatening her Ruler, or her Side, she is free to disobey any order, and to operate with her own free will to eliminate the threat.

[Wednesday]

So thaat's why she's called Judy!!!!... I love this story.

[name lips]

ANOTHER woah moment.

Jack can see what other people see. It's the passive power of a Foolamancer.

He allowed the Lookamancer to be turned. And then looked at him. Closely. Seeing what he saw.

[Frogpop]

zomgArkenshoes!

We need a Carnymancer to solve (or rig) this shell game.. Do they stay in a Haffaton city, get taken back to FAQ only to be *yoinked* when Wanda joins GK and then hidden away, or did they sit in a FAQ ruin waiting to be found by Queen Jillian when she re-founded?

..or did Fate palm them?

I'm gonna go look at the early sightings of The Wicked Witch in the Magic Kingdom.

[vintermann]

Heh. I bet Jillian's determination to "take the hard way, always", isn't necessarily so bad this time - or ever. She always ultimately follows her nature, no matter what predictions say. If I was an abstract force trying to guarantee certain outcomes, I could deal with that.

[vintermann]

On Orwell, do we know he lives? I don't believe we have confirmation that he survives until Faq falls to Stanley.

We don't, but a lookamancer is part of the trio of casters Faq needs to stay hidden. So if he croaks, a replacement pops - possibly Misty, possibly even Hubble (if he managed to escape to the Magic Kingdom).

[danielkaplan123]

Speculation: Can the Ruby Slippers, the arkenshoes, take Parson home as they did Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz?

If one can infer anything about the arkenshoes from the movies (or books), it is that the ruby slippers have the power to possibly take Parson over-the-rainbow and back home to Earth (much as they did Dorothy) or at least back as far as Kansas. From there he'd have to hitch.

[zbeeblebrox]

Can the Ruby Slippers, the arkenshoes, take Parson home as they did Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz?

If one can infer anything about the arkenshoes from the movies (or books), it is that] the ruby slippers have the power to possibly take Parson over-the-rainbow and back home to Earth (much as they did Dorothy)[/b][/u] or at least back as far as Kansas. From there he'd have to hitch.

We were told that Judy came here from another world. Perhaps the spell used to "PLOT" Parson here was directly tied to the shoes, meaning they're currently being protected by the casters in the magic kingdom. Either that or they really do just make inanimate objects come to life. That would align pretty cleanly with what all the other arkentools do.

[s-dub]

I screamed for joy...on the inside. What if Ace ends up with the Arkenshoes? And they turn into big red honking boots?

[Zeku]

Some people already said dun dun dun, so I missed my window there. Always happy for the continuous updates, and actual progress in the overall narrative and creativity.

So, the question is going to be, what are the actual powers of the Arkenshoes? We are familiar with the primary abilities of the pliers and the dish, and the hammer is sort of clear.

The stupidworld abilities of the shoes are transportation, and worldwide retconjuration. Given Judy's association with intelligent dolls, I'm assuming it has the ability to create thinking, living golems. But, the scarecrow and friends were explained in-comic by some other kind of magic. Still, I'd be surprised if it didn't have some unit-control power, just to be consistent with the other 3 tools. There are a lot of other possibilities, but a dollamancy mastery insures that all 4 tools coincide with the "Motion" of "Fate," assuming the Hammer is Carnymancy.

Still, nearly ANY discipline not clearly established could be the governing field of the shoes, since there's no need for any kind of overall order to their design.

Weirdomancy is pretty likely, given it's loose association with unit augmentation and movement. With the shoes, the entire stack could travel anywhere very rapidly.
Signamancy is possible, simply due to the role of the shoes as a flashy foot covering.
Date-a-mancy is another unknown. Given that the arkenshoes are in fact TWO objects, it could have power over pairing.
Changeamacy is an unknown field in general.
Retconjuration is obvious but unlikely.
Carnymancy seems unlikely as well.

Couple more random ideas. If the tools are Motion+Fate, then they could each represent a transition along the creation of life:
Shoes, Dollamancy, : moving objects not yet alive
Hammer, Carnymancy: the collection of all factors into a living thing
Dish, Thinkamancy: a living thing developing into a thinking creature
Pliers, Croakamancy: the great equalizer

[sheepfly]

So this seems to be headed toward Judy disappearing herself with Olive's instrument so that Jillian can croak Olive and end Haffaton. Maybe she'll even order Wanda to turn, first.

At least Banhammer got laid. Dude needs to get out more.

[LTDave]

Oh Boop! The Fourth Arkentool! Is a woman's red shoe!

Dish, Pliers, Hammer, and Ruby Red Shoes?

[Saladman]

The scarecrow and tin man... back to being free-willed golems?

I'm guessing still regular golems. An ad hoc combat stack pulled together to deal with treason would be reason enough to bring them. Judy's most likely a Warlady as well as a ruler, since she's not known to be a caster, and even if she is from another world Parson's a Warlord (or at least has Leadership which is practically the same as far as Erfworlders are concerned). Two golems and a caster led by a leveled Warlord (she fought two casters and became a ruler) should be a reasonably formidable stack.

Though I suppose the other is possible if the shoes have been kept from Judy continuously since Dollamancer Barton's death. [Edit: which, actually, seems equally likely after re-reading 55 and 56. I still think stacking with regular golems for safety would be reason enough to bring them, so I'm still calling it a toss-up.]

Is that what the ArkenShoes do?

At least in the hands of a Dollamancer, but possibly only an attuned Dollamancer, yes. Episode 56 is worth re-reading now we know the shoes are an arkentool. Long quote:

Spoiler: show

“So, um... so you want to cast a Dollamancy spell?” An idea dawned on her. “Oh, you want to make those shoes! Don’t you?”

With a sigh, Wanda lolled her head to the side defeatedly, though she did not pause in her climb. “No, I don’t have Dollamancy like that. Perhaps no-one does, any more. Do you...understand why Judy was shouting at the scarecrow?”

“No.”

“It was Maxwell’s. When Maxwell was alive, he helped create many things, both wondrous and terrible. One of them was that scarecrow, which he made with Barton when Haffaton was a small side. Before my time. You know that a scarecrow is an ordinary unit of Dollamancy, like a cloth golem...”

“Yeah,” said Jillian. She had some experience fighting them, in fact.

“Well, this one was more than that. It spoke. It ate. It had opinions. It danced and sang. And it had the upkeep cost of a warlord. Something that Maxwell did during its creation gave it Life. It bothered Olive to no end,” said Wanda. Though she hadn’t turned around, Jillian could hear the smile in her voice. “She said it ought not to be possible. So just to show her, Maxwell created others like it. He made a living lion out of a cloth golem. Then he made a metal golem with Komatsu that was the same way: alive, aware. Olive put a stop to it, on the grounds that Haffaton couldn’t afford their upkeep, but the point was made. Judy loved all three of the things dearly. They helped her become Ruler.”

[Second edit] Its obvious, but just to be the first to state it: think what Sizemore could do with the Arkenshoes. Living, dancing (and dance-fighting) warlord-type crap and stone golems. With Parson to point out the bonus potential of a Dirtamancer-led bonus + leadership bonus + dance fight bonus golem stack.

I ship Sizemore + red shoes!