Vaarsuvius and Laurin Shattersmith engage in an epic caster fight.
Cast
- Haley Starshine ◀ ▶
- Elan ◀ ▶
- Vaarsuvius ◀ ▶
- Blackwing ◀ ▶
- The Vector Legion
- Sabine ◀ ▶(in flashback)
- The Crew of the Mechane
Transcript
- Panel 1, Page 1
Felix and several pirates fall behind Vaarsuvius as they prepare to duel Laurin.
Andi: Everybody, stay back! You know the captain's orders: No interfering with third-act duels!
Vaarsuvius: While I respect you clear mental discipline, I will not allow you to injure my allies.
Laurin: Don't tell me what I'm "allowed" to do, elf.
- Panel 2, Page 1
Vaarsuvius: Cone of Cold.
A burst of icy wind erupts from V's fingertips, Laurin dispels it.
Laurin: You people up there in your lush forest while the rest of us have to fight for scraps—
- Panel 3, Page 1
Laurin assaults with psionic energy.
Laurin: —you can shove your false respect, because you don't know anything about me!
Vaarsuvius: I know...you fit...in a Forcecage!
- Panel 4, Page 1
The forecage forms around Laurin, but she teleports out, "pop!", and reappears just outside it, "pop!"
Laurin: Only momentarily.
- Panel 5, Page 1
Haley is being tended to by Carol.
Elan: Haley, please tell me
Haley: I'm fine—I'll be fine. You need to help Vaarsuvius.
Elan: I think the crew has the right idea—I'd just end up blocking V's spells!
Haley: Then sing!
- Panel 6, Page 1
Tarquin: Damn it, Shattersmith—the elf isn't important! Just nova it already!
Laurin: Will you shut up and let me fight??
- Panel 7, Page 1
Bandana: Oh, hell no. No way, no how is some crazy old dude gettin' back on our ship after breakin' a lady's arm.
Bandana: ROUGH SEAS AHEAD, PEOPLE!
- Panel 8, Page 1
The Mechane flies loops in the air. Julio Scoundrél hangs on by the ballista line.
- Panel 9, Page 1
Elan (singing): ♪Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on everyone who's not trying to murder anyone!♪♪
- Panel 10, Page 1
Vaarsuvius: Dimensional Anchor.
- Panel 11, Page 1
Laurin dispels the Dimensional Anchor.
Blackwing (off-panel): You wanna dispel something? Dispel this—
- Panel 1, Page 2
Blackwing: BIRD TO THE FACE!
Blackwing: Caw! Caw!
- Panel 2, Page 2
Laurin attacks Blackwing psionically.
Blackwing: Ow! Ow! Ow!
Blackwing: I made a poor decision!
- Panel 3, Page 2
Laurin: You must be feeling drained so late in the day if you're sending your familiar in to attack me.
Vaarsuvius: I assure you my companion's decisions are reflective of nothing—
Vaarsuvius: —least of all, rational planning.
Blackwing: That's certainly true...
- Panel 4, Page 2
Vaarsuvius: Resilient Sphere.
- Panel 5, Page 2
Laurin: You already tried putting me in a box, wizard!
Laurin: You're wasting everyone's time!
- Panel 6, Page 2
Laurin: I can counter any spell you have left, so why not just save yourself the pain and—
Vaarsuvius: I have in excess of twenty-five spells remaining. Not counting cantrips.
- Panel 7, Page 2
beat
- Panel 8, Page 2
Laurin disappears with a "pop!"
- Panel 9, Page 2
Vaarsuvius: Blackwing, are you well?
Blackwing: My feathers hurt. How come my feathers hurt?
Felix: She booked? Why?
Mechane Crewman with Five O'Clock Shadow: Yeah, I thought she was winning.
- Panel 10, Page 2
Vaarsuvius: Whether or not she could, indeed, counter any spell I cast, the fact of the matter is she was very low on energy with which to do so.
Felix: Ohhhhh. How'd you know? A spell?
Vaarsuvius: No, merely a combination of observations, calculations—
- Panel 11, Page 2
Flashback to the Abyss. Vaarsuvius and Blackwing lie restrained on a table while Sabine sweeps up the remains of the HDTV with a dustpan and brush.
Sabine (whispering): —and that bastard has a Ring of True Seeing now, so don't try illusions or invisibility.
Sabine: If you end up fighting Laurin, watch out. She's not afraid to pull out the big guns early and often. If I had to guess her level, I'd say—
- Panel 12, Page 2
Vaarsuvius: —and superior intelligence.
Blackwing: Also, I totally snagged a bauble!
D&D Context
- Cone of Cold is a 5th level spell which for V deals 15d6 damage in a cone.
- The psionic attacks Laurin uses in page 1, panel 3 and page 2, panel 2 are unclear.
- Laurin resists the Cone of Cold with Energy Adaptation a 4th level psychometabolism power which converts the cold energy into harmless light.
- Forcecage is a 7th level spell and a favorite of V for containing powerful adversaries.
- Psionic Dimension Door, which Laurin uses in page 1, panel 4 and possibly in page 2, panel 8, is similar to the magical spell of the same name, allowing teleportation over short distances.
- Elan uses his song to Inspire Competence and grant +2 to skill checks.
- Dimensional Anchor is a 4th level spell which prevents any type of extradimensional travel, such as Dimension Door.
- Laurin counters the dimensional anchor with Dispel Psionics
- Resilient Sphere is a 4th level spell which creates a globe of force around a target. It is named "Otiluke’s Resilient Sphere" in the Player's Handbook, but the SRD omits names on named spells for licensing reasons.
- Laurin shreds the sphere with a Psionic Disintegrate.
- Unlike wizards and sorcerers, which have a set number of spell slots per day, psions have a single large pool of power points, and use their powers by drawing points from that pool, with the amount of points spent on a power depending on its starting strength and how much a psion is willing to sink into it to augment it, up to the psion's level. This enables a psion to "nova": a fan term for using a large number of high-cost powers in rapid succession, often adding in Overchannel to forcibly raise their manifester level and augment their powers further, which depletes their supply of power points rapidly. Laurin has already spent many of her points on repeatedly manifesting Wormhole in the prior chase, not to mention the fight itself, leaving her with the common psion weakness of running out of power points long before her caster opponent runs out of spells.
- The "bauble" which Blackwing steals from Laurin is one of her Ioun Stones. Laurin's stones appear to be colored red, green, and orange corresponding to +2 to Dex (or possibly Intelligence, which would be more advantageous to her), +1 to competence, attacks, saves, skill checks, and ability checks, and the orange one which would give +1 to caster level, but is now in the possession of Blackwing, potentially boosting V as well.
Trivia
- The reason Sabine gave Vaarsuvius advice on how to fight the Vector Legion was to get revenge on them for killing and disintegrating Nale in Independent and Last in the Coffin. Furthermore, in the latter strip, she had thrown a couch at the IFCC's HDTV after seeing Nale's death, hence the reason she was sweeping. This would also explain how Vaarsuvius knew to attack Miron first in "Go", being likely informed by Sabine about his Contingency.
- This is the first appearance for four of the Mechane's crew: Andromeda (aka Andi), Felix, the Crewman with Five O'Clock Shadow, and the Crewman with Eyepatch and Beard.