Secondly, as much as I wanted to make the Mighty Milestone a serious figure… ridiculous is so much better especially for a little one-and-done card. How ridiculous?
Day… I don’t know, days are starting to blend together in here. I have made modifications to the AEGIS encounter suit where is both fits my own specifications and isn’t obviously identified as AEGIS equipment. I would like the chance to try it out, but I doubt I will ever be given the opportunity… hold on, what is that sound? An emergency klaxon? End recording.(1)
Continued to make some changes to the Charade design (and also Alycia’s but to a lesser extent). This time I did a little backward exploration, figuring out what a hypothetical AEGIS field uniform would look like and then worked from there to iterate into something functional for what Alycia does [stealth, physical combat, electronic warfare(2)]. Utility jacket kept because A) I like jackets as an accessory (see Mercury and Alloy above), B) utility belts are so yesterday, and C) helps breaks up the design into some fun shapes.
The new mask is a take on Cassandra Cain’s (Or would you call it Helena Bertinelli’s? No Man’s Land was a bit of a mess in places.) original Batgirl mask. I’m surprised with how well expressions are working with it. Then again, I’m cheating in places, but similar places the artists of Deadpool and Spiderman comics do, so I don’t feel too bad about it. Could add more elements to it, but I think simplicity works into Alycia’s style more.
Third, what’s up with those boots? Kick pads. Why? Looked cool and I figure Alycia would probably throw some roundhouse kicks and, given the toughness of her opponents, a little cushion so she could kick harder probably would be welcomed (or maybe she loads them with something?).
Finally, what are those things on the back of her belt in the bottom right image? The shock batons. Figured a back holster for them both worked better and would be less troublesome than letting them dangle on her belt.
(1) Have you read my idea for the Menagerie Annual 2? That text would basically be the lead into Alycia learning about the Rook villains breaking out and calling in the rest of the Menagerie. Given how quickly I’m finishing environment decks(3), more details come 2022.
(2) Yes, that references two separate things Alycia does and is a pun. I was proud of it.
(3) Speaking of environment decks, I’m one picture away from finishing the first one. Here’s some of the completed ones:
Akin to the Katana Space popularized in fandom of Highlander, which is basically where all the Immortals carried their long blades, regardless of what they were wearing.
I don’t have a lot to say on the Alycia redesign. It all looks good, makes sense, and I could see Alycia in that outfit. I’m not wowed by it as a costume in a comic book sense, but as a practical garb for someone who does the things Alycia does, it’s perfectly logical.
I do love the sports center cards, and am amazed by how fond I’ve become of the Mighty Milestone so quickly.
(I also realize there’s an alternate universe where he’s named Major Milestone, but let’s not worry about that at this late date.)
That by the way, is the final card for the Stanley Sports Center deck that needed to be complete. Here’s the rest of the cards, which I didn’t share previously because they didn’t involve anyone’s characters and aren’t that interesting other than being nice to look at (though Orion does reference a character from a story Bill wrote way back when).
Funnily enough, it does require a little more noodling to see whether the pose expresses everything I need to for a particular picture and can’t fall back on facial expressions.
And if I ever think of something better (or anyone else has suggestions) I will happily work through some design iterations to try and make it work.
The goal is that all the cards tell a story. The unfortunate bit of that is that for the whole story of Menagerie Annual no. 4, you’d have to examine cards from Ghost Heart’s deck, cards from the Stanley Sports Center Deck, cards from Concord’s deck, more cards from the Stanley Sports Center, cards from Radiance’s deck, more cards from… you get the idea. I wish there was a better way to show this in the cards (Magic the Gathering started doing “story cards” last year in one of their sets, but that is just labeling cards in set “Story Part 1,” “Story Part 2,” etc and it’s not a great answer) but at that point the answer is “make a damn comic of it.” It’s not like I haven’t drawn enough panels to do so already.
Prelude: Ghost Heart goes to Oakland Cemetery and collects a number of roaming spirits (as seen in Toll the Dead).
Cut to the Menagerie having their big last hurrah in Quill Tech’s private box at Stanley Stadium before folks go and do their own thing following graduation/the end of the game (not depicted anywhere yet, but probably a Jason Quill card).
After some initial hiccups (rustiness, such as Jason’s being overtaken by one Ghostheart’s major specters and being saved by Mercury in Play of the Game), Concord blasts the sprinklers to try and banish the ghosts (mentioned in Sprinkler System and followed up in Teamwork Breakdown). This doesn’t work and the Menagerie needs to regroup (depicted in a Radiance card which was originally part of the environment named “Team Huddle” but there was already two cards with Team in the name, so it got repurposed).
While this happening, Orion Connelly is on the phone with Anita DeGroot telling her about Ghostheart (depicted on his card).
Also while this is happening, Mercury tries to herd some folks who are sticking around to watch the fight (depicted on Cheering Crowd).
Seeing Charlotte panicked, Radiance moves in to protector her long enough for Charlotte to work a banishing spell (depicted on Radiance’s I’ll Cover You!)
Charlotte’s distraction was just what Ghostheart was counting on, allowing him to snatch the Staff and work his own ritual: to open up a portal to the Underworld so Malphas and his demonic servants can flood the mortal world (see below).
Who wants to name something? Near as I can tell from researching it, the hospital from Issues 33 and 38 did not have a name. It’s going to become relevant fairly soon, so it needs a name.
This is personal preference, but I wouldn’t mind hearing @fragolakat or @Margie’s suggestions first since I don’t feel like they got to name a lot over the course of the game so I want to give them a chance here.
Alycia: I love the taste of an energy blast in the face in the morning. It tastes like napalm.
Jason: How do you know what – actually, never mind, I don’t want to know.
I guess I haven’t finished wanting to tinker with Charade’s outfit, particularly the mask. The faceless look is fine, but I was wondering if I could handle it in a different way. And so, a sketch dump of 14ish different designs. (Not saying any of these need to supplant the current design, just spurn some brainstorming).
1, 5, and 13 are basically the original Charade design with some minor changes. Funnily enough, shortening Charade’s hair made me like these designs a bit more (or perhaps I’m waffling).
2 and 6 are a lot of fun, but I don’t think they’re Charade’s style. I am holding on to them for other characters (a few I already have in mind).
7, 9, and 10 are basically delving into more of a gunslinger/old west look for Charade. Not a big fan of any of them, but I did enjoy getting to reuse the Ignore Me hat.
3, 4, 11, and 12 were starting to delve into some white mask designs to add some contrast to Charade’s design and bring the focus more to the face. 12, however, I slowly realized just makes Alycia look like Joker from Persona 5.
8 is basically the current design by way of Batman Beyond.
This is a character meaning “face”. I think it could be neat to see a mask based on this, with the upper part being a visor and the bottom being a gas mask or filter component