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Podtastic

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    Good reads

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted

    On 1/6/2022 at 5:02 PM, Thom said:

    Another one I'll be rereading is the Belgariad, by David Eddings.

    That was good. I still have to find time to read the Mallorean, I never got further than Guardians of the West 

    As for Dragonlance, other than Chronicles and Legends there were few gems. I enjoyed the books by Douglas Niles and Richard Knaak though.

    Good reads

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    One of the Fantasy series I would recommend is the Stephen Donaldson Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever. Read it back in the eighties, before a lot of unoriginal DnD/LOTR high- fantasy-generic-quest type clones started swamping the genre.

    Here we see an awesome character from book 5 The One Tree, Nom the Sandgorgon.

    488615176_NOM(2)_(1).jpg.8ef6346ee65407d52eda56ae94e90752.jpg

    "Sandgorgons answer their release swiftly. Distance has no meaning to such power. Behold!" His voice sharpened. "Though the Doom lies more than a score of leagues hence, already the answer draws nigh." 
    And out from under the virga came a plume of sand among the dunes, arrowing toward the Sandhold. It varied as the terrain varied, raising a long serpentine cloud; but its direction was unmistakable. It was aimed at the spot where Ceer and Hergrom stood against the Sandwall. Even from that distance, Linden felt the radiations of raw and hostile power. Then the beast itself appeared. Bleached to an albino whiteness by ages of sun, it was difficult to see against the pale desert. But it ran forward with staggering speed and became clear. It was larger than the Haruchai awaiting it, but it hardly had size enough to contain so much might. For an instant, Linden was struck by the strangeness of its gait. Its knees were back-bent like a bird's, and its feet were wide pads, giving it the ability to traverse sand with immense celerity and force. Then the Sandgorgon was almost upon Hergrom and Ceer; and she perceived other details. It had arms, but no hands. Its forearms ended in flat flexible stumps like prehensile battering rams-arms formed to contend with sand, to break stone. And it had no face. Its head was featureless except for the faint ridges of its skull beneath its hide and two covered slits like gills on either side. It appeared as violent and absolute as a force of nature. Watching it, Linden was no longer conscious of breathing, Her heart might have stopped. Even Covenant with all his wild magic could not have equaled this feral beast. Together, Hergrom and Ceer stepped out from the Sand-wall, then separated so that the Sandgorgon could not attack them both at once. The creature shifted its impetus slightly. In a flash of white hide and fury, it charged straight at Hergrom. At the last instant, he spun out of its way. Unable to stop, the Sandgorgon crashed headlong into the wall. Linden felt the impact as if the entire Sandhold had shifted. Cracks leaped through the stone; chunks recoiled outward and thudded to the ground.

    I'm currently reading  Catfantastic, a lighthearted anthalogy by Andre Norton.

    What will Hasegawa do next?

    in Model kits

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    3 hours ago, kajnrig said:

    But... clearly it is. In scale, that is.

    "Come up to the Regult's knee"? A VF-1 should come up to a Regult's knee???

    Do you think the Regult is (or should be) 30 to 40 meters tall or something? And that thus a 1/72 model kit is/should be nearly half a meter tall?

    Even allowing for the vagaries of anime magic, the size of the model still comes out to be in the right ballpark. Perusing the first couple episodes of SDFM, it jumps around in size all the time, from roughly the same size as the VF-1 to maaaybe, charitably, twice as tall. And looking through some scenes from the first episode of Delta, the modified Regults are right around the same height as the VF-31s, which tracks with official stats.

    The scale is objectively correct. It's correct as far as the official stats are concerned. It's correct as far as the math is concerned. It's correct as far as the majority of the animation is concerned. (Or maybe not, the animation on that first show was... eeeuuuggghhh. But you get my point.)

    The only way in which it isn't correct is as far as your emotional memory of it is concerned. I imagine you want it bigger (significantly bigger, apparently) simply because that makes it more intimidating relative to the VF-1, which is how you remember it, and which is - and here's the twist you might not have expected - a totally reasonable ask, considering the VF-1 was handled with a similar "fast and loose" approach to its proportions and size and such for the sake of making it look "best" in each of its three modes.

    But just don't mistake your subjective aesthetic desires for objectivity.

    Actually I base it on the numerous scenes in SDFM where a Zentraedi soldier is shown eye to eye or mb a head shorter to a battroid.

    And

    A scene in Delta where a Zentraedi soldier comes up ro a Regult's knee.

    Plus

    The reasonable conclusion I would think that:

    . Mistakes in scale would be less likely when comparing 2 humanoid figures than with a non-humanoid figure 

    . The pilot is more likely to fit

    . Max's Batrroid was able to fit in a Zentraedi uniform

    . Nonsense about Klan being larger than other Zentraedi can also be eliminatedetc

    Anyway the kits not being in scale isnt an issue because its always understood that the larger size pod wouldnt be practical as a kit toy

    You seem invested in the official stats for some reason. If you want to see it as being in scale then do so. You dont have to right a long post as to why I'm wrong just because I have a different view.

    What Current Anime Are You Watching Version v4.0

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    Stuck in Macross Delta again. Freya won't sing because who cares blah, blah.

    Blah, blah feelings yadda yadda singing.

    Someone tell me this picks up again. I find it annoying that the writers seem to expect me to care about the characters waffling on interminably about the most insipid trivia.

    I am determined to finish this but damn its boring.🥱

    What will Hasegawa do next?

    in Model kits

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    11 hours ago, kajnrig said:

    ...because they are? 🤔

    So we are finally getting a Regult that's large enough, and a Battroid that's small enough, for them to be in scale with each other?

    The Regult didn't look that large to me.

    A Robotech comics of Zentraedi fighting the Invid.

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    7 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

    That's not what we were talking about... that's a one-of-a-kind in-universe character, not the designs shared

    The only Invid mecha that is different in size between shows is the Regent's Malar vs the Regis's. The former scale with the Regent who scales with the Regis.

    5 hours ago, jenius said:

    This whole back and forth is still nonsense... All of it is changeable, especially when Seto builds arguments around canon original series doctrine. Robotech is a mess. The invid were feared by everyone... The Masters warn about them... I think even the Zentraedi do. Sure, they may have seemed like clumsy bugs in the show, but that doesn't mean they couldn't have been more formidable in the past or even that they're just poorly represented. Even in what we see, the REF is like "meh, we'll never beat them, let's just blow up Earth." So, if you want them to be stronger than the Zentraedi, then they were. If Seto wants them to be the weakest, that's easily arrived at also.

    Exactly so.

    1 hour ago, Invid99 said:

    Oh did the Sentinels comics had any Zentraedi mecha fighting the Invid even though they were a part of the UN Spacy?

    I cant recall. I cant check my comics either as I'm n my hometown for Christmas.

    And on that note.

    Happy Christmas everyone.🥳

    A Robotech comics of Zentraedi fighting the Invid.

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted

    11 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

    What's a "Tou Redir"?  

    The smallest class of Zentraedi warship. We see 2 of them being destroyed at the beginning of Macross.

    Saying a Zor fortress is no match for a Zentraedi warship means ANY Zentraedi warship, even the least formidable.

    11 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

    hey're not "immensely powerful".  We're shown that the fairly primitive space warships fielded by the Southern Cross Army can tank multiple hits from them without issue or impediment.

    Wrong, one hit and the cruisers are destroyed. I'm referring to the interlacing beam weapons, not their anti-mecha guns.

    11 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

    and there is no size difference it's just dodgy off-model animation from the ultra-low budget Sentinels series.

    They are clearly depicted as larger as shown when the Regent grabs a Tirolian. Also when the Malar-gan tosses the Tirolian the grenade.

    If it is an error It is a good one.One of the things I loved about the Waltrip comic series, despite its silliness, was that they kept these Malar gigigantic. 

    That "ultra-low budget" series contained quite a few goodies. Hellcats. Bioroids vs Invid. Our first glimpse of the Tirolian homeworld etc. And the animation of the attack on Tiresia was superp and I rewatch it often. I just wish we had more of it.

     

    A Robotech comics of Zentraedi fighting the Invid.

    in Anime or Science Fiction

    Posted · Edited by Podtastic

    1 hour ago, Invid99 said:

    I get the feeling the Invid in Sentinels are more powerful than the ones in Mospeada. Like you mentioned, they had more ships and vehicles in the novels and comics. Also, slightly size differences as well. But I agree, the Zentraedi's experience in fire control and warfare in general gives them a huge advantaged over the Invid. 

    Well I preferred them because of the Inorganics, particularly the Hellcats 

    I'm not sure they were necessarily more powerful overall.

    I think it's more of an issue of different focus due to being under different management. The Regent (like me) was big on the war toys and conquest whereas the Regis was more interested in evolving her race to adapt to their new home.

    Possibly the Regent's forces had more military assets.

    The Regis Invid OTH developed the Gamo and Gosu and had (IMO) a smarter leader who seemed to have some amazing transmutation and transubstantion powers.

    Definitely the alien factions are very powerful in the novels. The Zentraedi ships are shrugging off nukes and railgun fire in their initial advance into earth space in the first novel.

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