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Fighters don't get Dexterity proficiencies on saving throws, but moms sure do.

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  • Level 14: #9

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Level 14: #2

Chapter: Level 14 — The Mother of Invention
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Discussion (37) ¬

  1. Legacy
    April 23, 2025, 12:10 pm | # | Reply

    I just had a thought – the assumption is that the Viscount and associated devils/demons are working against the interests of the heroes. Which is reasonable in general, however, usually such entities desire control/power or what have you, and there’s not going to be much of that left to go around if all the assorted planes are destroyed.

    The Viscount’s actions (mostly in the ballgame arc) can be interpreted as attempting to let lose one of the plane eating Mehs into the prime (or whatever the main world is called), but if they were already going around shredding other planes and no one knew, this could also be interpreted as a very direct way of bringing awareness to that.

    So while it’s of course still on the table that the Viscount is working against the heroes and reality, it could also be that they’re trying to move things along in getting it preserved in a particularly on brand manner. After all, no one can rule the playground once it’s gone.

    Very interested to see how this unfolds.

    8
    • Mary Catelli
      April 23, 2025, 10:19 pm | # | Reply

      Though they may also think they can exploit the situation in a manner which they — can’t, really

      2
      1
    • Verycoolname
      April 24, 2025, 12:13 am | # | Reply

      My assumption was that the Viscount’s ‘friends’ want the Mehs banished/destroyed, but only AFTER as many heavenly and heaven-adjacent realms as possible are destroyed. If they run the only afterlife(s) left, won’t they be in charge by default?

      3
    • evileeyore
      April 24, 2025, 2:07 pm | # | Reply

      Yeah, the idea that the trio calling the shots with the Viscount are trying to preserve reality is an old idea, as The Tick says in regards to destroying the Earth, “EGADS! I hope not, that’s where I keep all my stuff!”

      The scheme only real scheme is how much they delay the saving whilst (as Verycoolname mentions) destroying their enemy’s stuff and maneuvering them into a ‘winning’ position.

      2
  2. Brandon
    April 23, 2025, 12:29 pm | # | Reply

    Huh. So that triangular shape on the last page was in fact a snout and not negative space.

    3
    1
    • evileeyore
      April 24, 2025, 2:08 pm | # | Reply

      Snout holes can be very negative.

      1
  3. Oldarmourer
    April 23, 2025, 1:27 pm | # | Reply

    Kids learn to lie at an early age, the first words out of my youngest’s mouth was ‘kitty did it’ when he’d broken something and didn’t know I’d seen him do it. It’s a natural method of self preservation, the only problem is that some never outgrow it or care about being caught in a lie and become lawyers then politicians or go on to be ‘journalists’ for cnn and cbc.

    10
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    • evileeyore
      April 24, 2025, 2:11 pm | # | Reply

      CNN, MSNBC, FOX ‘News’, OAN, etc. All journos are liars or propagandists. You have to pick your sources and do your own research as you can.

      2
      7
      • UnboundMotion
        April 28, 2025, 12:07 pm | # | Reply

        nah, some journalists are honest. they’re rare and can typically be differentiated by how many hit lists they’re on though

        2
  4. Paper Tiger
    April 23, 2025, 1:48 pm | # | Reply

    Aaargh, it really was a creature with a cloven foot!

    …slung over the shoulder of the human who caught it.

    …Fine, I guess I was flinching from shadows last week. This might actually be heartwarming instead of horrifying. (Nobody rolls for Sense Motive as amazingly as a mom!) We’ll have to wait and see.

    4
    • Mary Catelli
      April 24, 2025, 4:56 pm | # | Reply

      Could be building toward horror, by making a heartwarming family to suffer.

      OTOH, her mother doesn’t sound approving of her magic. Perhaps she’s the prodigal daughter who ran off to master magic against their will, and spending too much money on it.

      2
      • Zero
        April 29, 2025, 12:19 am | # | Reply

        She doesn’t approve of a tiny child using magic without supervision. That’s not the same thing as disapproving of magic.

        1
        • Mary Catelli
          April 29, 2025, 11:56 pm | # | Reply

          That’s why the “perhaps”

          1
        • Brandon
          April 30, 2025, 1:09 am | # | Reply

          Yeah, for all we know magic’s saved her bacon before.

          1
  5. Morthasa
    April 23, 2025, 2:08 pm | # | Reply

    I’m already in love with Mama Presti as a character and as a design

    5
    • Brandon
      April 27, 2025, 7:02 am | # | Reply

      Looks like she brings home the bacon in the family. And the pork chops, and the ribs.

      3
  6. Fellow
    April 23, 2025, 4:21 pm | # | Reply

    Oh no, what if the boar is the prodigal daughter? She’ll have to come back undead!

    1
    • Brandon
      April 27, 2025, 6:55 am | # | Reply

      Sounds like the boar is destined for prodigal slaughter. It’ll taste good on slices of bread.

      1
      • C T
        April 27, 2025, 2:17 pm | # | Reply

        Is Brandon the rhyming demon?

        1
        • Brandon
          April 28, 2025, 2:02 am | # | Reply

          I can assure you I’m no rhyming fiend, friend;
          Just good at rhyming sentences now and then.

          1
  7. divgradcurl
    April 23, 2025, 6:47 pm | # | Reply

    She’s not lying.

    Presti: (gestures toward the fourth wall) “Somebody WAS watching me. We have SO MANY readers!”

    6
    • HKMaly
      April 23, 2025, 7:33 pm | # | Reply

      But we didn’t actually watched her getting up there.

      5
      • divgradcurl
        April 23, 2025, 7:47 pm | # | Reply

        True. I was thinking of her earlier use of magic to stack her toys. As far as any of us know, maybe she really DID climb. (Though I know it’s unlikely; cross-class skill for wizards and all.)

        5
        • Mary Catelli
          April 24, 2025, 4:56 pm | # | Reply

          A useful technicality: I thought you were talking about magic to climb!

          1
        • Scarlet Knight
          April 24, 2025, 9:05 pm | # | Reply

          As a parent and grandparent, I can tell you positively, that a child of Presti’s age can climb that high without magic.

          They have an innate ability to MacGyver a ladder out of a chair, a toy piano, a baseball bat and a colander to almost any height!

          6
          • Zero
            April 29, 2025, 12:21 am | # | Reply

            It’s easy when you’re not very heavy.

            1
  8. Whimsical Echidna
    April 23, 2025, 11:41 pm | # | Reply

    I almost mistook Presti for a drop bear in panels 3 and 4… *shudder*

    2
    • C T
      April 24, 2025, 11:59 am | # | Reply

      The silhouette in panel 3 does look like that, and the jump in panel 4 does match, but the colo(u)rs in panel 4 are wrong for a drop bear.

      2
      • evileeyore
        April 24, 2025, 2:13 pm | # | Reply

        Ninja drop bear, they have disguise…

        1
    • Brandon
      April 29, 2025, 4:20 pm | # | Reply

      Maybe she was inspired by stories of drop bears? Kinda like when kids pretend to be dragons, or goblins, or what have you.

  9. Philistine21
    April 24, 2025, 7:52 pm | # | Reply

    Based on the alt text we have confirmation that her mom is a Fighter. Guesses on her dad’s class?

    2
    • Scarlet Knight
      April 24, 2025, 9:11 pm | # | Reply

      Since Presti seems to be a sorcerer, I’m putting my money on the Viscount…soooo, upper class?

      • Fellow
        April 25, 2025, 8:49 am | # | Reply

        It says wizard on Presti’s cast page. Aside from that, she had to study for her magic, while with sorcerers it’s an innate power.

        If she were a sorcerer, Calamitus would be a candidate.

        6
    • Brandon
      April 28, 2025, 3:20 pm | # | Reply

      I imagine he is/was a Wizard himself. Or he could be/have been another Fighter and Presti’s just the magic sheep of the family.

      2
  10. EmptyMenagerie
    April 24, 2025, 8:51 pm | # | Reply

    On my kid’s second birthday, I lit a match for her cake and then lit the candles. When I turned around I saw that she had pulled out a match from the box, lit it, and was watching it with a wide eyed expression of “woah! Cool!” I can only imagine Presti’s mother is feeling like I did, amplified about a hundred times as she thinks about her daughter pulling a burning hands inside the house….

    5
    • Brandon
      April 29, 2025, 4:16 pm | # | Reply

      In a world of magic, you gotta teach the kids not to play with fire spells. And to not stick metal objects into electric crystals. Having your home warded against magic in general is probably a good idea. Though house warding services likely cost some steep coin.

      • MerlinoftheTower
        April 30, 2025, 5:29 am | # | Reply

        Actually it’s not so bad – typically a magic insurance policy will include a nominal fee for casting the wards and will only charge a higher fee if they need to activate.

        Of course if someone in the house is magically gifted this becomes more complicated, particularly if there’s no adult mage in the house to balance things; typically such a gifted child in a responsible home will be the cause of a contract with a local mage’s guild for such matters in exchange for the rights to teach the child and have the child work for the guild – for a time at least – on graduation.

        There are many magic users of many, many disciplines who got their starts that way as they work up to the big score – a Wizard’s Tower of their very own.

        1

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