>Tree>MikailaFinally the real Aldish protagonist arrives.>Can’t believe some of y'all thought Will was sweaty ‘cause he was up there partaking of the pleasures of the flesh! Will is a virginal and well-behaved Ssaelit boy!>~Ashleyl
>>154021283You won't die from a punctured spleen. You big baby.
>>154021283Our little drummer boy sure has grown up.
>>154021293You absolutely can if your luck is shitty enough.
>>154021283>virginalHe hasn't yet joined in the Merry Task? That's embarrassing, no wonder Will Sr. wants nothing to do with him.
>>154021283God, Will and Mikaila grew up well.I need at least a 10 page doujin of these two engaging in glorious, gold-and-silver male-and-not-quite-third-option caste-mixing, stat. Each one, trying to top the other.Repeatedly.It's kind of fun seeing both Adeliers' influence over him, too. Lemon's hard knocks, Duane's devotion to Ssael, and both's self-assuredness in their own ways have made him into quite the figure. If he can rise to meet the occasion, that is. But he has courage, and courage redeems this world.>Desperately asking the guy that got hit by the exploding bomb vest squad questions and checking his cheat-sheet list of notes like its a school setting right before the final exam.Courage!
>>154021341Maybe you would but I'm different.
>>154021569Mika sucks homeless men off in dirty bathroom stalls for the fun of it.
What's with all the female gaze?
>>153968060Other thread ended before I could chip in, but Duane is 100% not a gruftgrammerGruftgrammery is a really cool aspect of the khert magic system over all, since it was the first real insight into the khert hubs and how that all worked in the old wiki, before we met F.R.E.D. and the secret master coppers in the story proper. But Gruftgrammery also only comes up like, once, in the story proper. And that's in the duel between Duane and Quigs.Matty outright says his dad's ingenious and is able to write his own spells, a topic that Duane chides him on and dismisses as cheap tricks. Despite it being an insanely dangerous task that Quigs was able to accomplish through a mix of his tutelage and his nature as a plat. Quigs could make his own custom spells that others weren't able to see coming cause it wasn't one of the normal ones (everyone uses a fireball spell sphere, this guy metamagics his to ice and also its a circular sheet plane of double the radius), and able to be drastically more diverse and quick on his toes as a result.Meanwhile Quigs similarly ribs and chide's Duane for 'every spell above board' and others (I think it was Elka) commented that every single one of his spells feels like its straight out of a textbook. Cause they are. Duane's got his cheap tricks as far as perfect-recall and tacit casting, and quite literally pulls the spell exactly how it was taught straight from the kherthub. But even before death, he was INSANELY well read, and was/is a self-admitted materials master. That's why he's occasionally tossing tanish words for materials to other wrights so they can properly input the parameters into the khert's shortform entries and get the correct spell. He doesn't gruftgrammer to pull off all of his shit. Instead, he's able to have literally every spell prepared at all times that he could feasibly pull from the nearby khert hub.Quigs has meta-magic and Ring of Grammarian, Duane has the entire spell list prepared.
>>154021794Thank yee for your lore scribing, anon.
>>154021283>What did you miss on the khert-lines though, where'd you go WRONG?>Methinketh... you likely... doomed...Asking a dying man what he did wrong so you have tips for your up coming test is pretty poor form, Argenti. It's fun that Lilleord recognizes it too and just tells him he's boned. Sorry man, too busy dying.
>>154021283Also, hey, is that a marriage tattoo I spy on Will's chest there?
>>154021794You are fluffing Quigley and slandering Duane based on your own headcannon
>>154021887You're taking it too personally, anon. He talks up Duane pretty well there. Duane, even before death, was outcasting plats, because he was just that good at it. Tacit casting was a neat trick, but that's not the reason he could do the shit he did.Quigley is good in another way. He doesn't have the time, or the dedication really, to memorize it all, but he's good enough to be able to cobble together his own spells.
>>154021794Duane can write his own spells too that's why he was going to be a spell composer. If I remember correctly, gruftgrammery are just illegal shortcuts. Shortcuts that hasten your casting but they come with a bunch of draw backs if you fuck it up.
>>154022105This
>>154021867>is that a marriage tattoo I spy on Will's chest there?Who Will fuckin'?
>>154022105>>154021794My understanding was that with the proper knowledge, anyone can just cast with "Take the heat aspect from X coordinates relative to my hand then cast it to Y coordinate to incinerate this Crescian scum", and that the shortcuts are to access pre-programmed spells for a predetermined effect with a lot of the busywork taken out. But because Duane has such a thorough knowledge he can do the former without issue, on top of tacit casting massively increasing his speed since you can think faster than you talk.I recall Ashley stating that during times of war, countries will regularly fuck around with common shortcuts, either removing or booby trapping them to mess with enemy wrights.
>>154022105>Shortcuts that hasten your casting but they come with a bunch of draw backs if you fuck it upIt's also just like, state control. Half the point, most of the point really, is basically Weapons Control by the country you're in. Or at least that was the sense I got. Obviously, just like real life, you don't want people using unlicensed explosions because they'll blow things up by accident, but it's also because even if can handle it correctly, society does not want you to do it regardless.
>>154022161He may not be fucking anyone, really. But remember Silver's crap out in their... 40's? 50's more like, probably. And coming from a prominent family, he's probably been pushed to marry an eligible Silver girl, regardless of his many lamenesses.
>>154021867>>154022161No, that’s from him being Rited.
>>154021283Will’s looking good.
>>154021283You think they’d at least take poor Lilleord’s helmet off.
>>154021569>Papa, I like Will’s treasure trail and the sculpted curve of his obliques>His thighs and shoulders aren’t bad either
What's with all the mantiddies?
>>154021887>You are fluffing Quigley and slandering Duane based on your own headcannonIt's what Cope would've wanted
>Papa, what do you think of the way rivulets of sweat run down over Will's adam's apple when he's been working out?
>>154021283>Ald introduces himself on-panel via dramatic soliloquyThey are NOT beating the allegations. Looks like another trainee is bowing to the statue behind Will: I'm guessing that's a stylised depiction of Sonum Ssael? The book being Northsongs. But maybe it could be a Vaosa as well? I'm interested in what the little loop is top right, looking a bit like a heart.
>>154022197Pymary is probably the most confusing system for me because while I understand the principle wrapping my head around casting the coordinates is hard. How specific does it have to be and what if you target other factors? If you target someone on weight or height do you get hit with backlash if you get it wrong?
>>154022245Huh, didn't realize it gave you, or you get, a tattoo after doing that. A weird place for one. Figured it be on your hands or something, since that's what gets "opened."
>>154022466It might well be someone else since the statue doesn't have Ssael's cat scratches but I don't remember if all of his depictions like statues are supposed to include them
>>154022531I don't think it does in Cresce, but in Alderode they stab you as part of the ceremony.
>>154022510Not always a backlash, sometimes it just fizzles out. Backlashes are more likely the bigger the fuck up you made or the more agitated the khert is to begin with.But yeah, it's actually as complicated as its simplicity seems. That's why the shortcuts are a thing. You're calling for a precalculated spell so you don't have to think about it. That's also why Duane keeps impressing everyone who isn't too pissed off at him to pretend their not: even before he was dead and had perfect recall, he could do that shit in his head.Of course, cannier spellwrights, of which Duane is one too, would also know when you didn't need to bother. If you want a super specific target, you need to get detailed, but you can also just "take X joules from this water and shoot it along Y khert line." Whatever it hits in the way will get that aspect, is my understanding. You don't necessarily need to target anything.This is also why Delicious Lizard could catch Duane's spell. It's just a described aspect on a line, so if you're also good enough, you can, on the fly, tell the khert to grab that thing coming along Y khert line.
>>154022562True, I forgot that. It's probably not Ssael if it doesn't have the claw marks.
>>154022565Ah the Aldish, notoriously perverse.
>>154021283Whether it's ladies or lads, silver sexo~
>>154022574It bothered me enough to re-read Phantom Pains and neither the big statue outside the Temple nor the mosaic in the meeting room have the marksSo maybe only clerics paint them on for ceremony and I've forgotten the whyThe "loop" is almost certainly a Khert line imo, since this is a pymary training ground
>>154022105There is a bit of that, but also as >>154022197 >>154022211 say."Writing your own spells" and Composer are a bit of a difference in (man made) authority, and impact. It's like a sanctioned gunsmith with a loisense vs a WWATN tinkering his glock to have a giggle switch without a tax form. You can be a really good WWATN who has all the knowhow to *be* a gunsmith, but until you pass the test you're verboten. Additionally, your gunsmithing dude is now also qualified to systematically change everyone's bullets and powder mixes in the entire country, in real time.More to the point, Duane *could* write his own spells, and has all the qualifications to be a composer. But he doesn't/didn't, because he *wasn't* made a spell composer. So doing so would still be illegal for him. He follows the steps, even if he can do them verbatim rather than calling upon official shortcuts. Both because that's how he is, a very lawful man, but also out of practicality because it's waaaaay safer and doesn't get neighboring wrights or farcyte scryers turning their heads at your spells. Course, this does mean that Duane can cast 'official' spells outside of the khert hubs its in, just because he knows how it fundamentally works. Say one region doesn't have fireball pre-installed, he can still fireball from first principles, and would cast it like they do in Durelyne.>>154022197I'd probably equate it to something like learning math and physic derivations in college. You do it to understand the "why" something works, but once you are out of academia you use the same shorthand everyone else uses for sheer ease and speed. Said fundamental understanding also probably helps with your example of fucking with the khert hubs in wartime, because you can sus out the booby traps and work around those pitfalls to still be effective in battle.Two-bit wrights like Anadyne or Bett, they learn basic algebra, proper wrights learn calculus. That's also probably a big part of spell-catching.
>>154022623>So maybe only clerics paint them on for ceremony and I've forgotten the whySSAELISM: a secret lie, a religion invented to cover up sinister FURRY practices?????? Read more in tomorrow's paper, my Gefendur friends!
>>154022665>WWATNDoes this mean something other than its usual meaning in the thread? I follow your explanation, but I don't understand the relevance of this to firearms.
>>154021283>dirty mindedyeah sure okay ash
Website comment:>Can’t believe some of y'all thought Will was sweaty ‘cause he was up there partaking of the pleasures of the flesh! Will is a virginal and well-behaved Ssaelit boy!>~AshleyPatreon comment:>He needs a tutor... and a drink.>Just in case you forgot, this is William, as seen in several flashback chapters, now a grown-up. Well, technically a grown-up. He's doing his best.
>>154022665>That's also probably a big part of spell-catching.Ran out of characters. I imagine that the more robust understand of pyramy you have, the better you can safeguard your spells from interference or manipulation, by virtue of specification. Going "I cast fireball from that lantern's heat to this pissmop's face" only to be countered by "take the heat from khert line no. 37 at this exact point before my face, and then redirect it 180° before sending it back with speed modifier of 3x, into the offender's skin".>>154022510It's a lot like coding, cause it's an intentionally glaringly artificial system overlaid over reality. >wrapping my head around casting the coordinates is hardAnd that's exactly why they do the shortcuts in the hubs! Let's say for example we have a Khert hub preloaded with: Shield.The 'raw code' any proper wright could do to make a shield would be something along the lines of >"Oh Khert, heed me; >take the solidarity metadata from X material at Y place in space;>position it to the air material in Z place in space; >at a curved plane following W equation; >for T duration.>Kisses, mwah."Enough wizards accidentally cut their hands off by placing the shield too close or got shot in the face for casting it in the wrong shape, until it became standardized enough.Then, a composer 'burns' that officialized code into the khert hub, and provides a function prompt for everyone to use:>"Oh Khert, Heed me;>Shield(X,Y,Z,W,T);"Shield is now an official spell, so wrights can still do the above method for more nuance, but the function method is miles easier.A gruftgrammer could do something along the lines of:>"Yo khert;>take the *luminosity* metadata from the light at Y place in space;>position it to the air material in Z place along W curve equation;>for T duration, thankies;to jury rig a blinding wall of light instead of a shield. Or conjugate phrases in the spell, that risk agitating the khert more, but save on verbosity.
>>154022225Silvers live for 50 years. Ashley wrote somewhere that Will's dad is on his last year and his internal organs are rapidly degrading now.
Need tall copper mommy...
>>154022796Thanks for the thorough explanation. What differentiates what's preloaded in the hub vs. what's evoked by gruftgrammary? Let's say I'm in an area with no khert hub at all: can I still cast? Or let's say I am in an area with a regular khert hub, and I'm not a gruftgrammer, but I've got the traditional Tainish vocab to cast a blinding light shield anyway. Can I still do it? I just don't get any shortcuts in doing so?
>>154022844The way Ashley drew Will on this page gives me a lot of hope for Elarosny.
>>154022844Why would you want an insane, buff lady dimitre-yeah no okay.
>>154021569>imageSilvers would kill it in the real world too. Golds, Jets, Bronzes and arguably even Plats all have colourations you can see IRL. But Silvers are a really unusual phenotype in their combination of skin + hair + eyes which you would probably only see on Earth in a couple of very specific ethnic groups: some Afghan mountain tribes, some former steppe peoples in China, not much else I can think of off the top of my head. Not that I'm claiming to have the comprehensive haplogroup knowledge of a dedicated /int/ or /his/cel.And of course we have messy, not magically influenced genetics so theoretically we could get to a Silver phenotype pretty easily via crossbreeding.
>>154022875Different anon: Pymary works everywhere, or everywhere that has a khert. Even the dhammakhert. Gruftgrammary is just telling the khert to do something in a way that's not been "approved" by the state. It's an entirely artificial, even by khert standards, distinction. But because it hasn't been officially approved by the state, it stands out as suspicious and can be "tracked."Pymary leaves traces, some physical from the actual spell, some lingering agitations and currently vague remains on the khert itself. But if someone does something approved, it can still be traced, but it won't in it of itself standout as being anyone in particular, outside of garden variety forensic logic, because it'll just be a generic spell that anyone could've cast. "Rolling you own" would, logically, make you standout as unique because it's unlikely anyone else would've cast it in the same way.
If it's forbidden to give money to the temple or for temple to fund the priests, how do the temples maintain their military, full time personnel and grounds?
>>154023079I might be wrong here but I think the existence of the Lions of Mercy as an organisation is distinct from priesthood and the Temple. So I think Duane didn't pull down a salary for being a rector of the Temple, but did for being spellmaster of the Lions of Mercy.
>>154023079>>154023126Even if it's not funded by the state, the Lions could still be funded privately by wealthier Ssaelit citizens. But it seems more likely they're a state-sponsored force; the more I think about it I doubt Alderode would want any military force completely detached from government oversight.
>>154023282I guess ssaelit have all sorts of charitable foundations doing logistics, construction rtc. for the temples pro bono but themselves taking basically the equivalent of tithes from citizens. Geffies can just take the money because religion doesn't forbid it.
>>154022955>But because it hasn't been officially approved by the state, it stands out as suspicious and can be "tracked."That's backwards. An on the fly fire than forget spellery would be harder to track, especially if you cast it differently each time. Like the difference between your average smart phone and a pile of burners you dump every few calls. Though if that is the case it stands to reason a standardized spellcasting style would be way easier for them to track. Which means bad thungs for Duane's OpSec.
>>154023282My understanding is Alderode has the forces under Vits but its other armies are religious in nature (so, two for the Ssaelit and at least two for the Gefendur I'd guess). There might be regional forces as well, like each province raising or having the ability to raise its own militia? Maybe even each ghers is required to provide X fighting men.
>>154023359Yeah and it's easy to imagine how quid pro quo can work around that. Like>I, wealthy patron of ssaelit ghers 34, agree to fund the building of your new barracks and pay the wages of its domestic staff>in totally separate circumstances, we, the temple of song, recommend you, wealthy patron of ssaelit ghers 34, for this big ssaelit-associated merchant contract that has come upIt also contributes to a lot of the clergy being independently wealthy. And if you consider how Duane's career was supposed to go his schooling was paid for by a wealthy Soud. That creates a system of patronage which a lot of poorer Alds probably have to buy into.
>>154021569Given the operatic self-introduction we see here, I think the curse on Will is that despite presumably having many more years with the hardbitten badass Lemuel and the impulsive Mikaila, he is fundamentally a big fucking dork just like Duane.
>me when I'm Aldish and anything, literally anything, happens
>>154023661Now you see why duane loves opera so much.
>>154022926Haplogroups don't have effects on your hair color for one, otherwise 50% of african americans would have an Englishman's complexion because they have y-haplos from their direct paternal ancestor.
>>154023715And what about the hundreds of other direct paternal ancestors from Africa? There's no way a single trace of European Y-DNA could show up except by pure chance in physical features, unless it was very recent.
>>154023959You can only have one direct paternal ancestor (your father's father's father's father's father's father etc). That's why people obsess with haplogroups, because they descend completely along the direct paternal or maternal line so they are the only thing that remains unchanged when people move around and reproduce with different groups. But combined they're just about 2% of your genome, and the genes affecting physical features like pigmentation are in recombining chromosomes.
>>154022225Argenti Sr. seems to hate his kid so much that I won't be surprised if he has a backup he wants to carry the name, instead.
>>154023621Freud would have a field day.
>>154022444>that's not something I- Ssael, Jon was gay, wasn't he?
>>154024831he probably had that thought after dying and seeing things clearly
>>154024831Very funny post anon, well done.
>>154024813Yeah, I'm pretty interested to see their relationship now Will's grown up.
>>154024951I wonder if Duane's panic attack would've been even worse had he known Jon was in love with him.
Funny to think that the professor who tried to warn Duane that Sarthos would ruin him more or less caused what he predicted. Had he not, Duane would've gone on oblivious beyond the "huh, I feel a bit of a weird feeling for this silver boy."
>Will is still a shit wright despite being a Silver
>>154026968Argenti Sr. was always right.
>>154026919sir I know it's pride month buyt third options are biofems
>>154023427No, almost no one is making an entirely new spell every single time. That would truly be insane. What Gruftgrammary is is rolling your own and then using that one every time. It's building your own code and then running it every time you need it. It's not just about changing a few variables, but the entire logic of what you're doing. That'll get noticed and tracked.
>>154027429Duane literally did not know until told.
>>154027532Women are surprisingly good at being effemminate mena lot more than men try being women I'm afraid to say
People who become infatuated with Duane have bad luck.Jon - dead.Sarthos - took the blame for a death, expelled, fled Alderode.Leysa - widowed by her husband's brother, who is proving to be an apparently pretty bad family patriarch.
>>154026968He seems a little dumb.
>>154022466Am I missing something or are you mistaking the dude in green with a fur cloak for a statue? He walks off in the third panel.
>>154028798No he doesn't? You can see the outline of the statue with the candles still in front of him in panel 3. It's the guy who was bowing who walks off.
>>154027590Lemuel was neither the guy who killed Duane or the guy who planned for Duane to be killed. He was just a gullible sap who had to be lied to to make it happen. It does probably suck ass to be Leysa right now though.
