But not for too long. The issue will be pretty conclusively settled one way or the other in the relatively near future.

Wow, that was unexpected.

Nice to see that she can compete with the big boys again. Really Clockwork, you should not have sent him against her without Scourge's Narrative Field backing him. I mean, come on. He's an idiot and she isn't, plus it's more narratively satisfying for her to win. You should have known that.

I've launched pages for both this wonderful series and its predecessor, because they are awesome and need more love.

As this is a wiki, I call on you, fellow Patchwork Fans, to help these pages grow. Add tropes to the pages as you see fit, and add references to them wherever they could go. :)

Because, seriously, Dr. Ecchs is much less of a buffoonish half-wit than he seems and Ash is a ninja. If anyone could hide his true power level, it wouldn't surprise me if it was him.

Good thought!

Maybe… yes. Yes, it is. I'll go fix that.

(Although it would certainly have been a bigger surprise if it was Timebender and Lucy. ;) )

perhaps its supposed to be…. Lucky?

First Hint: Comic #161 - At this point, it's revealed the Jim's powers aren't pseudotech, psychic, or anything else that Lockdown can stop. On the other hand, Jim isn't a normal human because Lockdown didn't knock him out.

Second Hint: Comic #185 - During the alternate realities storyline, everyone who could be present in a reality bubble always was. The only one missing in this bubble was Jim. This was because the Chitrani weren't stopped on Sayleen, and thus Jim's entire species was dead in that timeline. Jim was also the one who instantly knew about how the Chitrani were defeated - it's a much bigger deal on Sayleen than on Earth, where it is just another one of the League's great accomplishments.

Third Hint Comic #195 - I still haven't decided whether Handyman actually knew that there was Christmas in Wisconsin. Probably he did, but you can call it a hint if you want.

Fourth Hint Comic #200 - Handyman knew about the Justicars. At this point, that was not as dramatically obvious, but it became clear shortly afterwards that only Magister or K'Lara could have told him those stories, the others being accounted for.

Fifth Hint Comic #201 - This would have been a heck of a lot more noticeable if we weren't in 8-bits, but Fixit's mechanics are the same shades of grey, with the same alternations, as Handyman's.

Sixth Hint Comic #240 - Jim really did have a lot of his current persona connected to that hat.

Seventh Hint Comic #244 - Also, he loves Sayleen food. And is vegetarian (well, herbivorous, technically, but you know).

Eighth Hint Comic #311 - K'Lara gives a discussion about Sayleen philosophies. Most of the things she says are a lot like what Jim says about not wanting to live in the past anymore.

General Hint: Jim's total obsession with not taking off his hat. Under any circumstance. Ever.

There were also hints dropped in the serials, but I can't find them at the moment due to my internet being slow and lazy. Suffice to say that eventually Nadia did find out that Jim was an alien, if only because eventually she was going to see him without his hat, what with them living together.

Don't you mean Nadia?

The current blank links are:

A: Academy, Adar Theocracy, Antiheroes, Atlantean Nanoswarm, Avalon
C: Camelot, Cosmic Storm
D: Doyi
G: Grand Shaman Theomacrus
J: Jigath
L: League of Adventurers, Lenken, Lord Liberty
M: Mastermind, Merlin, Mook
N: New Templar Order, New York Disaster
P: Perdotes the Lesser, Pendragon, Pendragon II, Pseudotech
R: Rhinegold
S: Sayleen, Spear of Longinus, Solstice Offensive, Superhuman Enforcement Agency, Steel Magnate
T: Templar Knights, Thule Society, Trox
Y: Yaughud
Z: Zibaniebo

The short answer is "Probably, because I like the idea of Patchwork Heroes being a show on TV".

The longer answer is that the Backstage elements of Patchwork Heroes are not canon for Patchwork Champion, due to their existance on a metafictional level. Particularly noteworthy are this strip and this strip, which discuss the fact that Ecchs was aware at the time he was working that the universe of Patchwork Champions did not exist, and in fact tried to recruit the Patchwork Heroes to bring them back (the latter just showcases Amber and Lucky in their first incarnation). ;)

Now, some elements from that have been retained (Phil, for example, and Salamon appeared as a cameo in early Champions), so it's a little weird. If you wanted the closest thing to a canonical explanation, it would be that while Doctor Ecchs was working on his alternate timeline machinery, he accidentally wandered into a metafictional universe. He stuck around for a while, then recruited Phil away from Salamon Keele and returned to the normal Patchwork Champions universe and never mentioned it again.

"You know, I have to go… water my… cape"

mwehehehe…

I'm also quite fond of

"Aged to death. He aged to death. Who would actually BELEIVE that?"
"I thought it was rather clever."
"You would!"

This is one of the big drawbacks to being a tech hero who didn't build their own stuff.

I could see him giving her a new suit because of April.

I'm worried about her. I don't think a suit of duct-tape armor will give her enough oomph to make it in the big leagues.

Trading insults was the first draft, and it seems to have not been revised. I'll go and fix that. Many thanks.

Want to know how far? Let's put it this way: this guest comic was placed into canon.
http://yeti.comicgenesis.com/d/20060331.html

epic. Just epic.

Yes, indeed I have, although I didn't realize where I'd grabbed that line from until you mentioned it. I just knew that it sounded familiar, and I felt the need to include it. ;)

Ecchs has pulled off some staggeringly powerful tricks in the past, and is usually undermined by random chance, not caring enough, or not thinking things through rather than by a technological failure. Justef was definately right - he once rewrote the entire universe just so that he could outmanuever the Witch Doctor's hostile takeover of his company. Also, for all that he lost control of the ninja zombie trees, he created a stable army of superbeings in the city. Partially by mistake, yes, but he managed it.

I actually try to be careful with the Doctor, because he's the closest thing the comic has to an author-insert character (those who know my Livejournal identity probably already know that.) I have to make sure that he is honestly defeated by the Champions, and doesn't just run roughshod over them until he gets bored or luck intervenes. To be fair, this is a common problem with supervillains in comics (*couDOOMgh*).

Lucky and Hazard were there to make sure that narrative law didn't interfere with the plan by having some random coincidence cause Judgment to get wise. You know how, in comics, something always goes wrong at the last moment and the hero avoids the trap?

That is what would have doomed the city. ;)

As for his potential, He's managed to create a weapon that can create a specific dimensional distortion (so far as to undo the past). That in itself more or less implies that he could control reality as he see fit, well, assuming he ever got the details down (something about not creating megalomaniacs).

He's also managed to make a laser-guarded fortress at the docks for less money than the contract to destroy the building (i mean we're talking handyman lasers-from-duct-tape level genius here). Though some of the earlier material I am suspicious of its complete cannonity with universe, Ecchs is a(n) [evil] businessman and if we note the appearance of the fortress in this last bit, If Ecchs actually stuck to run-of-the-mill villian procedures like lasers and atlantean anti-psi suits (remember senior thesis! …i think) instead of spending his efforts on absurd things like ninja-robot-zombie trees, he'd be playing the part of the oligarchs right now. In fact i wouldn't be surprised that the only reason Ecchs did something as hackneyed as make a flying death fortress was becuase he could HIDE IT IN PLAIN SIGHT (I mean who wouldn't do that, I know I would).

Really, I've really viewed him as more as an anti-hero than a villain. I mean, what kind of villain builds a multi-billion dollar business with the intention of squandering all profits on a war that he has no intention of winning? Oh yeah and half his company is friends with Lucky Ladd. And his 2nd-in-command is his arch-enemy's sister, and they (occasionally) have family dinners still.

Friv's maintainence of Ecchs as the quirky professor even into this critical time (as opposed to just druing lighthearted hijinks time) leads me to beleive that Ecchs is really really powerful, he just can't be bothered to do things in such boring ways.

</rant>

I can give you my opinions as author, but I'm not going to just yet, because I am also curious to see what other people think. Outside perspectives are awesome. After there have been a bunch of posts (or if time goes by and there aren't a ton of posts), I'll chime in with my intentions. ;)

So, at the risk of overloading the forum with posts by its owner, I'll get the ball rolling on this one.

Chances are you all know me, but regardless:

Name: Misha
Webhandles: Almost always Friv, or Friv Yeti.
Location: Toronto
Profession: Aspiring Author

I's the by that owns the site, and I's the by that writes her. I's the by that's totally going to update the Encyclopedia when my roleplaying writing doesn't get in the way. ;)

However, I can't decide whether this is because he and his craziness get to be described in more detail now, or because he (as he said) doesn't have to pull punches against the antiheroes.
Anyone else notice this or have comments to make on it?

You said quite awhile ago that Judgment had found a way to get narrative law on his side. I was wondering how he manged to do that. And, in this installment, we have the payoff. He discovered that Good always Triumphs over Evil, then he spent many years finding out what the criteria for "Good" was and then he always stayed within those bounds while committing his acts of terrorism.

This is not something I would ever have thought of, but it makes so much sense to me now that it has been articulated. It works perfectly. I have said before and I'll say it again: you are amazing at plot twists.

The current blank links are: Adar Theocracy, Antiheroes, Atlantean Nanoswarm, Avalon, Camelot, Cosmic Storm, Doyi, Excalibur, Frere Jacques, Grand Shaman Theomacrus, Jigath, League of Adventurers, Lenken, Lord Liberty, Mastermind, Merlin, Minion, New York Disaster, Perdotes the Lesser, Pendragon, Pendragon II, Pseudotech, Rhinegold, Sayleen, Spear of Longinus, Solstice Offensive, Superhuman Enforcement Agency, Steel Magnate, Thule Society, Time Travel, Trox, Yaughud, Zibaniebo

Hopefully, this forum will be getting off the ground, as things settle down here at the new site, so I figured I would note a few rules. Wikidot forums are a bit odd, so this can take a bit of getting used to.

1) Please keep discussion in the right area. It doesn't matter much yet, but it may well in the future if people start commenting. In general, the "per page" discussions are for questions, comments, or speculation based on the daily update. The "General Discussion" section is for general questions about the serial, such as character or history questions, or random commentary and speculation.

If I run across threads in the wrong place, I will just move them to the correct area without much fanfare. Hopefully that'll keep things organized without confusing people too much. ;)

2) Keep it friendly. You guys are a pretty easygoing lot, so it probably goes without saying, but personal attacks or the like would make me sad.

3) Keep it work-safe. If you wouldn't want people reading it over your shoulder, this is probably not a good forum to post it in. ;)

That's about it. I don't want to overmoderate or anything, but I figured better to have ground rules than not. Any questions about the rules can be posted to this thread; this post will be updated if the rules have to be changed for whatever reason.

The Atomic Noodle incident is not, in fact, going to be mentioned again. It was going to be a running gag, but I discovered about a month after writing it that I had accidentally stolen the name and concept from old Calvin & Hobbes comics, and I dropped it out of embarassment.

As far as buildings… well, technically speaking the buildings surrounding the main Malefico building are in use, so, uh… I never really thought about it, to be entirely honest. Your question may have added a new area to the city - something that looks rather like the PATH system. Near Malefico, people travel via underground, parking on the edges. ;)

Great job! Keep it up.

Thanks for reminding me. Wikidot doesn't use either standard HTML coding or BBCode. Instead, it has its own code system for bold and italics, which I forgot to apply.

That's been fixed now! :)