Grrl Power #1322 - Headboard room dealings
Added 2025-01-16 11:00:10 +0000 UTCThank you for the support! You guys are awesome!
Sciona's bootynm might be "Vaguely Threatening Platinum Latina"
Platina? Yeah, I'm a sucker for a portmanteau. "Vaguely Threatening Platina."
Honestly, I think Sciona might be just a little bit sweet on 6x Guy. She as much as said there would be a second time. Also she didn't take all his blood. The fact that she was conspicuously "the last one seen with him" usually isn't a factor for her, but she's managed to position herself fairly high and somewhat publically in Earth society instead of lurking in the shadows like she used to. Granted, her half-an-Alari-head on top of a Troll body look was not optimal for the public sector. (Actually it was an orc body but had a slurry of blood in it that had useful properties.)
As I was writing this page, I was trying to think how Alari culture would function, given Sciona's derision of the "extant administration." So the Alari don't have a president or king or emperor. They have houses that more or less declare their own nobility when they have sufficient political, military, or fiscal power to make it a hassle for other houses to reject their claims. Houses then ally with each other on various issues, but those alliances swing wildly depending on matter. Several houses might form a mutual defense pact on one continent of a given planet, but could be at each other's throats on a different world, or agree on limiting a trade deficit with one species but disagree on mineral rights for an asteroid. It makes for convoluted politics, but importantly, most of the negotiating takes place privately, and by negotiating I mean bribes and favors and assassinations and political marriages and all that. To Sciona's sensibilities, all this lobbying out in public is crass and lacks wit and subterfuge. But she's appreciative of the unlimited dark money certain governments (not naming names) allow for. Only because it enables her agendas, not because it allows for any level of sophisticated intrigue.
Comments
Platina is just the Latin word for Platinum
tsukiouji
2025-01-26 03:40:33 +0000 UTCThere would be banners and parades marking the occasion of the final victory... 🤦🤬 Oh #$@%!
eddi_TBH
2025-01-19 04:06:30 +0000 UTCMaybe someone already did?
Marc Vun Kannon
2025-01-18 15:08:26 +0000 UTCI have so much trouble seeing Sciona as a "villain". Sure she's an alien blood mage whose moral compass - from an Earther's perspective - is considerably skewed, but she's just so damn personable when she wants to be. Oh and hot, so damn hot!
CD Bingham
2025-01-17 23:41:38 +0000 UTCDoes anyone else want to see the Succ-Off between the new-and-improved Sciona and Dabbler? I'm guessing Sciona is basically a tantric energy geyser at this point.
Person
2025-01-17 15:30:56 +0000 UTCXuriel is an exceptional case. We’ve seen plenty of other demons, some of them definitely into the world-conquest thing, but they seemed to go for good old-fashioned military power. Of course, the point is that these demons aren’t after people’s souls, whereas Sciona, in a metaphorical but definite sense, is.
Philip Masters
2025-01-17 13:54:16 +0000 UTCThe fourth panel from his POV would be nice...
Kevin Wright
2025-01-17 05:44:27 +0000 UTCThis is how to take over a country with nobody noticing.
eddi_TBH
2025-01-17 04:18:24 +0000 UTCXuriel is under official orders to keep it in her pants. Except under limited circumstances.
eddi_TBH
2025-01-17 04:13:21 +0000 UTCShe has closed that door by offering a sweetheart deal involving off the book money and sex.
eddi_TBH
2025-01-17 04:11:52 +0000 UTCIt might be easier to convince people she's an alien now that aliens are public knowledge and a large settlement of them are living here on Earth.
Stefan J Neylon
2025-01-16 18:11:46 +0000 UTC"Bootynym" has just been added to my vocabulary. Thank you. Alari sound a bit like pre-Chinggis (Ghengis) Central Asian steppe nomads. Constantly shifting alliances, occasional larger groups, potential for consolidation under a strong leader, potential for being manipulated by more established nearby empires...
Hugh Eckert
2025-01-16 17:04:49 +0000 UTCYeah, in kleptocracies your ability to bribe is more connected to who you know and how dangerous it would be to just take your money. And in America, there are lots of levels of government officials to bribe. You don't have to be rich to bribe the local selectman or whatever...
Hugh Eckert
2025-01-16 16:59:43 +0000 UTCHe no longer has a bleeding scratch across his chest. Either Dave forgot to add it, or Sciona healed him. If the latter, she REALLY likes him.
Erin Palette
2025-01-16 16:15:42 +0000 UTCIt's noticeable that, while demons in this setting are mostly played for laughs, Sciona is actually quite good at temptation and corruption.
Philip Masters
2025-01-16 15:54:06 +0000 UTCAssuming you have an amount of money with which to bribe them and they don't just take it from you because they can. Not saying the assessment is necessarily wrong, just that there are still SOME barriers to bribing officials, lol
Jacob Bissey
2025-01-16 14:26:52 +0000 UTCI'm not sufficiently versed in real history, let alone real historical politics, to know of examples of historical cultures they could be compared to, but to me the Alari have always read as Space Drow, and this description of their internal political structure largely fits in well with that. Matriarchal, imperialistic, treat being power hungry, cunning, and backstabbing as a virtue (when done competently), engage in magics that are generally considered evil-coder, are culturally a race of starscreams, have pointy ears, silver hair, blue, purple, grey, and black skin tones. And now we see they are largely divided into houses constantly scheming, jockeying, and vying for power and influence, authority is almost always a direct result of power, the fact that betrayal is an inherent part of their culture actually makes them more likely to cooperate with their enemies when it is convenient or advantageous, if only because they are already scheming to betray them and are prepared to counter such schemes from the other party. Personally, I like it when a writer manages to make a culture that encourages and perpetuates what we would consider evil as realistically as possible, putting actual thought into how it might work and how they might have gotten there, rather than simply making them evil for the sake of evil, but also without trying to make them seem misunderstood or like the heroes of their own story, they are the bad guys, they aspire to be the bad guys, and they do it because it works well for them.
Jacob Bissey
2025-01-16 14:24:34 +0000 UTCPretty much.
Thisguy
2025-01-16 14:02:26 +0000 UTCI like her reasoning for agreeing to his bootynm suggestion.
Anton Schleef
2025-01-16 13:42:50 +0000 UTCFed up with the chaos and creating his own empire with via the splinter group that wants more solidarity and less back-stabbing. At least, if I'm remembering what Drizzt is like correctly, it has been a looooooong time since I ready any of those books and I only read a few of them.
Anton Schleef
2025-01-16 13:39:58 +0000 UTCThat depends a great deal on how well they can unite to fight off threats from outside general Alari territory. If they're like a 'good' rambunctious family, where they constantly fight with each other but as soon as an outsider messes with one of them the rest defend without any need for negotiation, then they'd be viewed by their collective strength, which could be fairly high.
Anton Schleef
2025-01-16 13:37:24 +0000 UTCThat view of Alari society does seem to share some common ground with pre-Prussian Germany, or pre-reunification Italy. Though both of those were seen not being particularly powerful by other more unified countries at the time. I get the possibly mistaken impression that Alari are seen as somewhat more powerful than that within space society. Although that could also be a past thing since at least one of their worlds has been taken over by space-Cthulhu.
Mark Magagna
2025-01-16 13:31:13 +0000 UTCFunny thought: "Yeah, no need to tell people about the crazy alien lady since they won't believe me. They didn't with the other four, so why should they with you?"
Czarzhan
2025-01-16 13:12:15 +0000 UTCIt's mission prep, Max calls him a hostage, Anvil and Dabbler have a whispered conversation and Sydney spends the rest of the month with bugged eyes.
Chris Giesy
2025-01-16 12:34:14 +0000 UTCI like the idea of "Six Shooter", it's shorter and it has double entendres.
Carlos
2025-01-16 12:28:51 +0000 UTCIn America, only the rich can bribe a government official. In Eastern Bloc nations, ANYONE can bribe a government official. Ergo, Eastern Bloc nations have more freedom than Americans.
You_With_The_Face
2025-01-16 12:27:27 +0000 UTCIn one of Spider Robinson's Callahan"s Lady books, one of the clients (who soon became an employee) at Lady Sally's bordello had experimented on himself and accidentally made himself continually horny with no refractory period. His nickname, since he multiplied his sex drive by six, was Colt.
Czarzhan
2025-01-16 12:16:41 +0000 UTC"Yeah sure bro, she was a magic sex alien"
Julian
2025-01-16 12:10:59 +0000 UTCDabbled refers to him as "Is that all?"...
James C
2025-01-16 11:46:55 +0000 UTCPlease don't kill me. My friend will be insufferable
Brittany Huckey
2025-01-16 11:46:05 +0000 UTCI like to think he goes and tells his friend she’s an alien anyway. With the full knowledge that she won’t believe him.
Thisguy
2025-01-16 11:41:59 +0000 UTCSo basically feudal oligarchy.
Justaguy
2025-01-16 11:13:56 +0000 UTCAlien Drow society, but where is Drizzt? ;-)
Thomas Dorner
2025-01-16 11:12:29 +0000 UTCPlease . . . Please, PLEASE let Sydney meet and know him as "Six Times Guy".
Chris Giesy
2025-01-16 11:05:18 +0000 UTC
