Warehouse W - Valiant: X-O Manowar, Ken and Randy

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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: Rant Alert!

Post by Jack of Spades »

Woodclaw wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 9:57 am The problem with Solar is that he has been portrayed as someone who can engage an entire alien fleet in direct combat and have a good chance of winning, but at the same time vulnerable to normal firearms. Pegging down his Power Level is the key to defining all the others.
On the subject of X-O Manowar, my old build put him on par with Iron Man based on the idea that Aric is much better fighter than Tony, although I might revise this.
So a lot like Hal Jordan, who can take out an entire alien star fleet but get knocked unconscious by a falling ceiling tile. I'm not terribly familiar with Solar, so I can't offer any suggestions, but I agree with Ares' analysis of Dr. Manhattan; I'd put Dr. Manhattan at PL10 in a world where the next most threatening guys is Ozymandias at PL8.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: Rant Alert!

Post by Woodclaw »

Jack of Spades wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 3:30 pm
Woodclaw wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 9:57 am The problem with Solar is that he has been portrayed as someone who can engage an entire alien fleet in direct combat and have a good chance of winning, but at the same time vulnerable to normal firearms. Pegging down his Power Level is the key to defining all the others.
On the subject of X-O Manowar, my old build put him on par with Iron Man based on the idea that Aric is much better fighter than Tony, although I might revise this.
So a lot like Hal Jordan, who can take out an entire alien star fleet but get knocked unconscious by a falling ceiling tile. I'm not terribly familiar with Solar, so I can't offer any suggestions, but I agree with Ares' analysis of Dr. Manhattan; I'd put Dr. Manhattan at PL10 in a world where the next most threatening guys is Ozymandias at PL8.
That's pretty much the case, with one key difference: HAl doesn't have his GL field active at all times, whereas Solar is constantly in a superpowered state.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: Rant Alert!

Post by Ares »

Woodclaw wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 9:57 am The problem with Solar is that he has been portrayed as someone who can engage an entire alien fleet in direct combat and have a good chance of winning, but at the same time vulnerable to normal firearms. Pegging down his Power Level is the key to defining all the others.
On the subject of X-O Manowar, my old build put him on par with Iron Man based on the idea that Aric is much better fighter than Tony, although I might revise this.
With Solar, a big part of how vulnerable he is in any given situation seems to involve his mental state and the nature of the attack. If he sees something coming, he absorb, redirect or counter most attacks the Valiant Universe could send his way. Even something like a nuclear explosion won't cause him any harm if he sees it coming. He can actually handle it in a way that will negate the attack from doing much real damage to the surrounding areas.

If he's taken by surprise, then any sufficient amount of energy will disrupt his form to some degree. Likewise, things that directly attack his psyche or disrupt his concentration will also leave his form vulnerable to disruption. It's just unlikely that those disruptions will do more than inconvenience him temporarily.

Simply put, it's relatively easy to affect Solar in a way that inconveniences him temporarily. It's much harder to do meaningful damage to him. Him getting shot by a gun likely just made his form go all "bendy and distorted" for a panel or two before he pulled himself together, and any subsequent bullet shots would get melted, have their kinetic energy absorbed, or simply pass through him harmlessly.

That said, sufficient amounts of any type of energy can cause Solar actual damage. People in X-O armor have managed it, the Superman analogy of an alternate Earth managed it, the Visitor managed it, etc. If you hit Solar with enough raw force and he isn't braced to absorb it, then he's in for a bad time. Raw kinetic force in particular seems to inconvenience him greatly, I'm guessing since there's a physical component to the energy that pure energy lacks.

Then you've got things that directly target energy that can really mess him up. Rai's of the future had access to these special swords that could deflect energy, and when used against Mother God (who was only slightly less powerful than Solar), the blade actually hurt her. She commented that if it had hit a certain part of her body (some kind of energy core or matrix) then it might have killed her. Then there's things like alien crystals that absorb and disrupt energy, technology that can absorb energy, etc.

Overall, I'd say the average Valiant hero is probably in the PL 6-to-8 range: Mostly human level people with some relatively low-level powers or technology. Shadowman, Archer, most Harbingers, the Armorines, H.A.R.D. Corps, they most likely fall into this range.

The next level up you get guys like Gilad the Eternal Warrior, Bloodshot, Armstrong, Ninjak, and Magnus: Robot Fighter, who are probably in the PL 9-to-10 range.

Then you get the real powerhouses of the Valiant setting, guys like Peter Stanchek, Toyo Harada and X-O ManoWar. Probably PL 10-to-11 types.

And then you have Solar, who whatever the PL of the other highest heroes of the setting, is probably a PL or two above them. So if X-O ManoWar is a PL 10, Solar is a PL 11 or 12, possibly even 13 or 14.

Overall, Solar is probably comparable to your average Green Lantern, but not one of the more elite ones like Hal, John, Kyle or Guy. Definitely not on Alan Scott's level.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: Rant Alert!

Post by Woodclaw »

Ares wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 4:32 pm
Woodclaw wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 9:57 am The problem with Solar is that he has been portrayed as someone who can engage an entire alien fleet in direct combat and have a good chance of winning, but at the same time vulnerable to normal firearms. Pegging down his Power Level is the key to defining all the others.
On the subject of X-O Manowar, my old build put him on par with Iron Man based on the idea that Aric is much better fighter than Tony, although I might revise this.
With Solar, a big part of how vulnerable he is in any given situation seems to involve his mental state and the nature of the attack. If he sees something coming, he absorb, redirect or counter most attacks the Valiant Universe could send his way. Even something like a nuclear explosion won't cause him any harm if he sees it coming. He can actually handle it in a way that will negate the attack from doing much real damage to the surrounding areas.

If he's taken by surprise, then any sufficient amount of energy will disrupt his form to some degree. Likewise, things that directly attack his psyche or disrupt his concentration will also leave his form vulnerable to disruption. It's just unlikely that those disruptions will do more than inconvenience him temporarily.

Simply put, it's relatively easy to affect Solar in a way that inconveniences him temporarily. It's much harder to do meaningful damage to him. Him getting shot by a gun likely just made his form go all "bendy and distorted" for a panel or two before he pulled himself together, and any subsequent bullet shots would get melted, have their kinetic energy absorbed, or simply pass through him harmlessly.

That said, sufficient amounts of any type of energy can cause Solar actual damage. People in X-O armor have managed it, the Superman analogy of an alternate Earth managed it, the Visitor managed it, etc. If you hit Solar with enough raw force and he isn't braced to absorb it, then he's in for a bad time. Raw kinetic force in particular seems to inconvenience him greatly, I'm guessing since there's a physical component to the energy that pure energy lacks.

Then you've got things that directly target energy that can really mess him up. Rai's of the future had access to these special swords that could deflect energy, and when used against Mother God (who was only slightly less powerful than Solar), the blade actually hurt her. She commented that if it had hit a certain part of her body (some kind of energy core or matrix) then it might have killed her. Then there's things like alien crystals that absorb and disrupt energy, technology that can absorb energy, etc.
That is generally correct, I think.
Ares wrote: Mon May 24, 2021 4:32 pm Overall, I'd say the average Valiant hero is probably in the PL 6-to-8 range: Mostly human level people with some relatively low-level powers or technology. Shadowman, Archer, most Harbingers, the Armorines, H.A.R.D. Corps, they most likely fall into this range.

The next level up you get guys like Gilad the Eternal Warrior, Bloodshot, Armstrong, Ninjak, and Magnus: Robot Fighter, who are probably in the PL 9-to-10 range.

Then you get the real powerhouses of the Valiant setting, guys like Peter Stanchek, Toyo Harada and X-O ManoWar. Probably PL 10-to-11 types.

And then you have Solar, who whatever the PL of the other highest heroes of the setting, is probably a PL or two above them. So if X-O ManoWar is a PL 10, Solar is a PL 11 or 12, possibly even 13 or 14.

Overall, Solar is probably comparable to your average Green Lantern, but not one of the more elite ones like Hal, John, Kyle or Guy. Definitely not on Alan Scott's level.
My current estimations of the relative PLs are:
  • PL2: Faith Herber on the ground.
  • PL3: Doctor Silk (purely skill-based, he's quadriplegic)
  • PL5: Faith Herbert in flight
  • PL6: Rookie H.A.R.D. Corps members, Armorines without suits, Flamingo
  • PL7: Veteran H.A.R.D. Corps members (some might go up to PL8), standard Eggbreakers, Shadowman (Jack Boniface, PL8 in full darkness)
  • PL8: Armorines with suits, Archer & Armostrong, Ivar Time-Walker (fully armed), Ninjak, Shadowman (Maxim St. James), Torque, Elite Eggebreakers
  • PL9: Magnus, Eternal Warrior (PL10 while raging), Bloodshot
  • PL10: Randy Cartier (with the X-O Manowar Armor, PL5 spy otherwise), Pete Stanchek
  • PL11: Aric Dacia (with the X-O Manowar Armor, PL7 barbarian otherwise)
  • PL12: Toyo Harada (usually operates at PL10), Solar (usually operates at PL10)
  • PL14: The Destroyer
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VH1: X-O Manowar, an Outline

Post by Woodclaw »

So, after trying for weeks to build some new characters from the original Valiant universe, in an attempt to put the builds in chronological order, I decided to drop the towel. So I went back to my original notes and rebuilt some old favorites from scratch.


Production History
Aric of Dacia (or Aric Dacia according to his social security) was one of the most intriguing and strangest characters of the VH1, which meant that over time he literally became the company mascotte :P .
The original pitch by Jim Shooter (the most powerful weapon of the universe in the hands of a barbarian) had some definite Starbrand vibes, but most of the details were hammered out by Bob Layton, who put his many years writing Iron Man to good use, creating a good corporation-based supporting cast and some technical schematics for the armor (according to some sources Layton insisted to make the X-O an armor).
Shooter wrote just the first five issues, Layton took over from issue #6 (Unity Chapter 5) to issue #15, passing the torch to Jorge Gonzales, one of the many "Valiant Trainees" and the series official colorist.
Gonzales changed the dynamics of the character quite a bit, adding a layer of government conspiracies, politics and pushing forward the relationship between Aric and his main supporting cast (Ken Clarkson and Randy Cartier). Unfortunately, as time went by his writing dwindled in quality, possibly because he was doing double duties with Armorines, and the stories after The Wolfbridge Affair arc were not on par with his early run. Gonzales handed the reins to Ron Marz in issue #44, a.k.a. Birthquake.
Aric was one of the characters that suffered the most out of Birthquake, the event wiped out his entire supporting cast, introduced a new villain (the insanely 90s Mistress Crescendo) and pushed him to the brink of insanity up to the completely bonkers double issue 50-X/50-O. Marz's writing was extremely solid and the art by Bart Sears (occasionally replaced by Andy Smith) was extremely dynamic... but sadly exxxtreme in style.
Between issue #50 and #59 Sears tried his hand at writing, but most issues were by Jeff Bailey and Marty Golia. At this point, the series had lost its identity for good. Aric devolved first in a full-on barbarian lone wolf, cutting all ties to the world, later in a hobo/superhero that had some serious Spawn vibes.
For the final stretch of the series, Bob Layton returned to writing, sharing the chair with Keith Giffen (who was brought on board to gave the final send-off to many VH1 characters). Although the final run (from #60 to #68) recovered some of the spirit of the original Valiant Universe, it was too little and too late. While the final issue tied in nicely with a possible continuation of the story, the plot itself remains absolutely inexcusable to this day.

Character Bio

A Barbarian by any other name...
Born in the later 4th century AD, Aric of Dacia was a Visigoth and the nephew of King Alaric (yep, the guy that sacked Rome for the last time). After a band of rogue legionaries killed his parents in a raid, Aric swore an oath to butcher every last Roman and raze the Eternal City to the ground. To this end he followed his uncle during the Italian campaign. After saving a Celt woman called Deidre from a priest, Aric married her and converted to the cult of Lugh (mostly out of spite for the Roman Church). Not long after, Deidre became pregnant, but lost her child due to a Roman raid against the camp masterminded by Gilad Anni-Padda. Furious, Aric tracked down the Eternal Warrior and, apparently, killed him... they would face each other again.
Mere weeks before Alaric laid siege to Rome itself, Aric and a scout team stumbled upon a scout ship of the Spider-Aliens. Impressed by the barbarian's strength and rage, the aliens abducted Aric. Unaware of the passing of time, partially due to being put in and out of suspended animation, Aric lived up to 1991, when he met another prisoner called the Map-Giver (a.k.a. motherf***ing Elvis), who explained to him how to get the aliens' final weapon: the X-O Manowar Armor. When Solar attacked the alien armada, Aric had his chance, grabbed the armor control ring and proceeded to blast his way out before planetfalling in the Amazonian jungle.

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Retribution (Shooter)

After an unspecified amount of time, the aliens tracked Aric down and butchered the tribe of indios that helped him. Aric started a campaign of revenge, killing aliens in droves and while he was marching north toward the U.S.A. he met Ken Clarkson. Initially an accomplish of the aliens, Ken betrayed them and sided with Aric, hoping to use the barbarian as a puppet-king to take over the Orb Industries, an industrial complex created by the aliens to cover their Earth operations.
The plot succeeded... in part and Ken lost an arm in the battle.Meanwhile,Toyo Harada became aware of the Orb’s true nature and dispatched the Sniper, one of his agents, to investigate. After the resulting confrontation, Harada and Aric signed a peace treaty of sorts. Frustrated by the modern world, Aric used the armor to educate himself, essentially escaping the grasp of his "friend" Ken. After a confrontation with harbinger A-X, Aric decided that Ken was unstrustworthy and gave him an artificial arm made with part of the armor, essentially implanting a spy cam in his body.

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Unity and the Return (Layton)

Shortly thereafter, Unity came along and Aric was dragged into the Lost Land. Here he became the warlord of one of the many tribes and returned to the battle against Erica Pierce/Godmother only at the eleventh hour, after being mangled by a cyborg allosaurus. When Unity activated, Aric was flung across the time-stream and reappeared in 410 AD, just a few weeks after his original abduction. Unable to remove his armor until he was completely healed, he tried to live among his people once more, but felt completely out of place.
His uncle Alaric, fearful of him, plotted with the Romans to eliminate Aric. The resulting battle claimed the life of Deidre and Aric decided that there was no point in him sticking around. He flew across the world to the future site of the Orb HQ and buried himself.
Centuries later, a few months after Aric’s departure for Unity, Ken found him under the Orb parking lot enclosed in a much bulkier version of the armor. A few weeks later, the Spider-Aliens attacked and Aric put on the armor again, but it was different. It was revealed that the X-O armors are “living technology” and the Manowar class has a reproduction cycle of 2000 years: the armor was “pregnant” and took Aric to a secret alien base to the Moon. The aliens wanted the spore of Shanhara (that was the name of the armor) to make it into a spaceship and return home. Aric duelled their champion for the right to the armor, meanwhile Solar tried to infiltrate their database, but with little results. The two wiped out the base.

Image

Enemy of the State (Gonzales)

Returning to Earth, Aric and Randy Cartier, the Orb new chief of security, discovered that a subsidiary of Orbs was cloning dinosaurs from some tissue samples from South America. This led the barbarian back to the rainforest where he met Turok. The two time-displaced warriors hunted the bionisauri in the rainforest and in New York, becoming fast friends and, eventually, blood-brothers.
These recent adventures brought Aric under the radar of the US Government. A joint task force of the Marines Corps, the NSA and the IRS started to attack him on different fronts: personal and financial. This culminated in “Operation Deep Freeze”, a plan to remove the armor and bury it under thousands of tons of ice in the Antarctic. The interference of Randy, revealed to be a former Canadian intelligence agent, gave Aric time to escape and undo the plan.
Later, thanks to the help of Toyo Harada, Aric got full social security and a fake identity, but the damage was done. Sick of the “civilized world” Aric left and went into hiding in the Peruvian rainforest, entrusting the control ring and the armor to Randy… with terrible results.
Suffering from undiagnosed PTSD, Randy used the armor to “fix” some of her past issues, blasting away the Afghani camp where she had been imprisoned, tortured and raped by the terrorist Kyle Wolfbridge.
Meanwhile, Aric had become part of Yanomami tribe, but a group of mercenaries butcher all his friends as part of a “development project” from the Spectar Enterprises, an Orb's subsidiary.

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End of an Era (Gonzales)

Back to civilization, Aric laid out his new issue to Randy and Ken, starting an investigation about the Spectar, but other plots were moving.
Agent Peter Garrett and Helen Mandrake, the NSA and IRS agent from Operation Deep Freeze, manipulated their former ally Colonel Gardner, the Marine Corps officer in charge of the operation, to send his new high-tech assault team, the Armorines, against Aric. The ensuing battle was cut short by the intervention of Randy, her former colleague Paul Bouiver and Gardner’s CO, General Kendall. Strangely enough, Shanhara underperformed while facing the technically inferior Armorines’ suits.
This fluke was explained a few weeks later, when the Spider-Aliens reappeared after months in hiding. The following battle involved Turok, Randy Paul, Gilad and the Secret Weapons gang and resulted in the death of Shanhara. The leader of the aliens, two infiltrators called Astrides and Marc Anthony, revealed that they had contaminated Aric’s water source with a virus tailored specifically for the armor, so that by donning it Aric killed it little by little. In the aftermath, Paul suffered a spinal injury and Aric sank into depression.
Solar, who Aric had tried to contact during the battle, arrived too late, but managed to get his hands on a X-O spore from the other Manowar-class unit, which he dispatched a couple of years before on Saturn. Knowing that it would take a living organism to act as the armor’s host, Aric hesitated but Paul volunteered, resulting in an extremely traumatic transformation right in front of Randy and the birth of the new armor: Pol-Bekhara.

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The Wolfbridge Affair (Gonzales)

The following months went a bit crazy for Aric. While the rest of the world was under the Chaos Effect, he was involved in a space battle against the remnants of the Spider-Aliens’ armada, alongside the Armorines and the H.A.R.D. Corps. Later he was reunited with his followers from the Lost Land, who had been transported in 1994 Peru.
Meanwhile, Randy reunited with her old colleagues from Dept W, a Canadian special unit created to eliminate Kyle Wolfbridge. As they mourned the death of Paul, as a member of the unit, someone started to kill them all, one by one. Faking their deaths, Randy and two of her colleagues managed to track down the killer… who was sent by Wolfbridge.
It turned out that Wolfbridge’s daughter was responsible and the ensuing battle went completely out of control. Aric had to race a nuclear warhead while suffering from poisoning at the ends of a harbinger working for Wolfbridge, meanwhile Randy and Ninjak destroyed the enemy HQ and killed Helena Wolfbridge.

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Aftermath and Birthquake (Marz)

In the aftermath of the battle, Aric became more and more detached, up to the point that he refused to talk to Randy and threatened Ken’s life. Finally, when the Birthquake it, our Visigoth lost it all: he woke up in a Roman prison in 410 AD!!!
In truth, this was a mental simulation designed by his new (and incredibly short-lived) nemesis: Mistress Crescendo. Apparently a queen from a North-African kingdom (heavily implied to be Egypt) sacked by Visigoth mercenaries paid by Rome, Crescendo survived thanks to unclear means and became a powerful psionic. In short, she decided that since Aric was the last Visigoth she had to destroy his “kingdom” in retribution. Randy was killed and tortured before the battle, Ken died stabbing Crescendo in the back with a dagger (yep, that’s how she died), the Orb HQ was no more and Aric went raging mad, up to the point of telling Turok to fuck off and ending their friendship.
Ever since Chaos Effect the conscience of Paul Bouiver had reawoken in the armor, causing a fracture between Aric and Randy when Paul stopped accepting Aric’s orders and tried to force Randy to order the armor to self-destruct.
When Aric visited the remnants of Shanhara, Paul lashed out, as the grieving for Randy gave him the power to detach himself from Aric and transform the armor in an android body. Aric called him back with the control ring and the two fought, resulting in Aric getting the armor back and Paul merging with the remains of Shanhara as the supervillain Alloy… lasting barely the double issue 50-X/50-O.

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Aric Dacia, Super-Hobo (Bailey and Golia)

At this point, the authors were pretty much spitballing. Aric faced off against various super-villains in a “monster of the week” format, went to space, killed an alien warlord (not a Spider-Alien, mind you) and crash-landed in New York. Here, he started a “Bat/Cat relationship” with the super-thief Gamin and, after a few more superhero shenanigans and some battle orchestrated by the ghost of Crescendo, became friends with a bunch of hobos, the layoff of a tech company. These became his “support staff” as he engaged in more superhero nonsense while living under the Brooklyn Bridge.
This period culminated in a battle with Master Darque (Valiant premiere necromancer and enemy of Shadowman), who tried to steal the X-O armor and use it to prolong his own life.

Image

A Dream Within a Dream (Giffen and Layton)

As the end of Valiant grew closer and closer, Aric started suffering from a series of flashbacks/hallucinations featuring a man with a fez, called Malik. These visions sent him backward along his own timeline, reliving key moments of his own history in reverse order, always with Mallik appearing to deliver cryptic messages. In the end they arrived at the pivotal moment of Aric’s life: the kidnapping. Mallik finally explained himself, he was a wizard from 410 AD in service of Alaric. Due to a miscommunication the king sentenced him to death but Aric, the executioner, spared his life. Mallik was also one of the humans kidnapped by the Spider-Aliens in 410 AD. When he and Aric met on the ship he repaid the Visigoth’s kindness with the gift of prophecy, a full vision of his possible future.
Yep, that was Giffen and Layton’s final issue and explanation about the entire insanity: the entire run of the comic was nothing but Aric’s visions of the future induced by Mallik’s magic, resulting in the final panel being the same as the first panel of the first issue, just with different text.

Personal Notes
The idea of the protagonist being trapped in a endless cycle, forced to replay his life again and again with slightly different details is a pretty solid one. Jack Kirby used it to justify the birth of the Fourth World and the entire epic of Stephen King’s Dark Tower is built on it… but here… I’m sorry it just doesn’t work. Aric was part of a shared universe, he interacted with many different characters, retconning everything as a "dream sequence" simply doesn't cut it. I'm willing to cut some slack to Giffen and Layton, because the final year and half of Valiant were nuts and every series was going completely off a tangent without any meaningful interaction.
Personally, I think that the strongest part of the series was up to issue #36 (Chaos Effect) with some good bit up to the end of the Wolfbridge arc in issue #40. Although Bob Layton was the man that did most of the heavy lifting regarding the character, I think that the series tryly shined the best during Jorge Gonzales' run. Gonzales (who, to my knowledge, never worked on anything outside of Valiant) truly crafted some exceptional stories that could stand on their own, but also created a really effective arc that started with the first encouter between Aric and Randy and ended with the death of Helena Wolfbridge.
There you have it, the outline of X-O Manowar, arguably the most successful character in the original Valiant lineup and the flagship character of the new Valiant universe started in 2012.
"You're right. Sorry. Holy shit," I breathed, "heckhounds.”

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VH1: X-O Manowar

Post by Woodclaw »

After trying for weeks to build some new characters from the original Valiant to put the builds in chronological order, I decided to drop the towel. So I went back to my original notes and rebuilt some old favorites from scratch.

Image

The wizard-boy thought that without the armor’s power, I was a helpless imbecile. Power only makes you more of what you already are. I've always been a great warrio, but with the X-O Armor — ARIC RULES !

X-O Manowar
Aric of Dacia

Power Level: 11; Power Points: 165

STR: +3/+9 (16/28), DEX: +2 (14), CON: +3 (16), INT: +0 (10), WIS: +2 (14), CHA: +2 (14)

Tough: +3/+14, Fort: +5, Ref: +5, Will: +5/+9

Skills: Athletics 5 (+14), Expertise (Barbarian, CHA) 6 (+8), Expertise (Businessman, INT) 6 (+6), Insight 4 (+6), Intimidation 6 (+8), Language 1 (English, Goth [native], Latin), Perception 4 (+6), Persuasion 3 (+5), Stealth 3 (+5)

Feats: All-Out Attack, Attack Focus 2 (melee), Benefit 4 (Wealth), Diehard, Distract (Intimidate), Dodge Focus 3, Endurance 1, Lionheart 1, Power Attack, Rage 1 (5 rounds)

(Minions 6 [Armor AI])

Powers:
Control Ring (Device 1 [hard to lose])
  • Super-Senses 3 (communication link [to the X-O Armor], direction sense, distance sense; Flaw: Limited 1 [direction and distance to the X-O Armor relative position])
Manowar Class X-O Armor (Device 18 [hard to lose]; PF: Minions 6 [Armor AI]; Drawback: Key 3 [linked ring])
  • Anti-Gravity Engine (Flight 7 [1000 mph]; PF: Dynamic Alternate Power 1, Subtle 1)
    • DAP: Super-Strength 7 (heavy load: 76.8 tons)
  • Armor Plating (Protection 11; Extra: Impervious [5 ranks only])
  • Enhanced Strength 12
  • Full Life Support (Immunity 10 [disease, enviromental conditions (all), poison, starvation & thirst, suffocation (all)])
  • Weapon Systems (Array 14; PF: Alternate Power 5, Accurate 1)
    • Base Power: 60 Mghz Ion Cannons (Blast 14)
    • AP: Force Field (Adds 9 extra ranks of Sustained Impervious Toughness)
    • AP: Ion Cannons Small Area (Damage 11; Extra: Area [Line, General])
    • AP: Ion Cannons Wide Area (Damage 11; Extra Area [Cone, General])
    • AP: Telescopic Sword (Strike 3; PF: Improved Critical 2, Mighty, Thrown 1)
    • AP: Tractor Beam (Move Object14 [heavy load: 204.8 tons; Flaw: Limited Direction [Attraction/Repulsion])
Combat: Attack +6 (+8 melee, +8/+10 Armor Weapon Systems); Damage +3/+9 (unarmed), or by power of choice; Defense +8 (+3 Flat-footed); Initiative +2

Saves: Toughness +3/+14 (Impervious 5) with armor, Fortitude +5, Reflex +5, Will +5/+9 [Lionheart]

Totals: Abilities 24 + Skills 19 (38 ranks) + Feats 16 + Powers 79 + Combat 22 + Saves 8 - Drawbacks 3 = 165

Complications:
  • Hatred (Romans and Spider Aliens): Aric hates Romans because some legionaires killed his parents and the SPider-Aliens for enslaving him.
  • Honor: Aric is very much a man of honor, he never breaks his word, hates unnecessary killing and takes pride in execution those who use other as pawns.
  • Pride & Temper: stereotypical barbarian
  • Relationship (Ken Clarkson): Ken is Aric's best friend/worst enemy rolled into one.
  • Relatioship (Turok): Aric and Turok became blood-brothers after facing a bunch of Bionisauri together, this relationship porved very problematic over time.
  • Rivalry (Gilad Anni-Padda): Aric and Gilad have a modicum of respect for each other as warriors, but they clashed often.
:arrow: On a base level, Aric is a PL7 barbarian (PL5.5 barehanded), which makes him an insanely dangerous opponent in a world of PL3-6 fighters, but also very simple. The real kicker is the armor. On the surface, the X-O is just a take on the classic power armor trope with a couple of bells and whistles, but the truth is far more complex.

:arrow: Expertise (Barbarian) represents Aric's general demeanor and his skills as part of the army of his uncle Alaric. The skill can be reasonably used to ride horses, command small units and, apparently, woo ladies with pure testerone-fuelled charm.

:arrow: Every X-O armor is, in actual fact, a sentient being with its own personality, capable of adapting to the needs and abilities of the pilot. This means that, from a gaming perspective it's actually impossible to gave the exact stats of the armor. My build reflects how Aric uses it, but in the hands of a different user it would shift and change accordingly. I toyed with the idea of giving it a level of Metamorph, but decided against it.

:arrow: The above stats represent the most powerful version of the X-O, after coming to her full evolutionary cycle, but are limited by Aric's very straightforward approach to combat. Our barbarian is a decent tactician, but the to favor a very direct face-to-face approach to any situation.

:arrow: I built the on-board AI of the armor as a Minion, a trick created by Taliesin back in the ATT days for his Green Lanterns. Unfortunately the armor has limited self-initiative and is slaved to the will of whoever carries the control ring. She can act in self-defense and use Machine Control to activate her shell, but she has very little decisional ability otherwise. I didn't gave the AI the usual "No Hands" and "Mute" disabilities since the morphic abilites and machine interface usually compensate for them.
Armor AI

Minion Rank 6, Power Points: 90

STR: - (-), DEX: +0 (10), CON: - (-), INT: +5 (20), WIS: +0 (10), CHA: - (-)

Skills: Expertise (Current Events, INT) 7 (+12), Expertise (Science, INT) 7 (+12), Perception 12 (+12), Technology 7 (+12)

Feats: Dedication (to the ringbearer), Eidetic Memory

Powers:
Anti-Gravity Engine (Flight 7 [1000 mph]; PF: Subtle 1)
Datalink 8 (sense type: radio)
Healing 2 (PF: Persistent, Stabilize; Drawbacks: Action 1 [1 minute])
Morph 1 (morph: any form, +5 Disguise)
Organic Robot (Immunity 30 [Fortitude Saves]; Drawbacks: Power Loss 1 [against Spider Aliens Biotech Virus])
Quickness 6 (100x speed; Flaw: One Type [Mental])
Remote Eye (Anatomic Separation 1)
Sensors (Super-Senses 14 [Analytical (Visual), Communication Link (to the ringbearer), Extended 2 (Radar 2), Extended 1 (Normal Hearing), Extended 1 (Visual), Infravision, Radar, Radius (Visual)])
Universal Translator (Comprehend 3 [read, speak and understand all languages]; Extra: Affects Others; Flaw: Broad Group [Database])

Combat: Attack +0; Damage -; Defense +0 (+0 Flat-footed); Initiative +0

Saves: Toughness +0, Fortitude Immune, Reflex +0, Will +0/+4 [Dedication]

Totals: Abilities -20 + Skills 17 (33 ranks) + Feats 2 + Powers 86 + Combat 0 + Saves 5 + Drawbacks 0 = 90
Last edited by Woodclaw on Wed Jun 30, 2021 7:53 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: VH1: X-O Manowar

Post by Jabroniville »

SWEET! It's finally here! A Valiant build!

So turns out X-O Manowar was a Visigoth barbarian given a suit of power-armor. Crazy- I had no idea. I remember the name popping up a lot in those ads in comic books of the time and it definitely had the most attention-grabbing name of the books. Aric seems... kinda like someone things just HAPPEN to. Like it's non-stop "life sucks for Aric" and he appears almost helpless against all this stuff that's happening.

The history of the character is... bizarre. You can really see the "okay, so now what?" of the creative team, as various side characters pop up out of nowhere and become a big deal, and the main setting changes from place to place. Did he suffer overly much from that "line reboot" where everyone went back to their "#0" status? It looks like that's when Madam Crescendo shows up, but it seems like his cast stuck around.

Ending it with "It was a all a dream" is spectacularly weird, to the point where I suspect they intentionally made the entire universe non-canon out of spite.

For stats, looks like he's a PL 10 melee fighter with PL 11 blasts & defensive stats? It takes me a sec to "get" 2nd Edition stats these days- is he +8 accuracy and +14 damage with his blasts, then?
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Re: VH1: X-O Manowar

Post by Woodclaw »

Jabroniville wrote: Sat Jun 19, 2021 10:10 pm SWEET! It's finally here! A Valiant build!

So turns out X-O Manowar was a Visigoth barbarian given a suit of power-armor. Crazy- I had no idea. I remember the name popping up a lot in those ads in comic books of the time and it definitely had the most attention-grabbing name of the books. Aric seems... kinda like someone things just HAPPEN to. Like it's non-stop "life sucks for Aric" and he appears almost helpless against all this stuff that's happening.
This is actually part of the "real world" style of Valiant. Most of the main characters weren't keen on the idea of being superheroes and, for the most part, tried to like normal-ish lives. For the most part, Aric was a milionaire businessman with very little to worry about in life, so he was rarely the one to initiate conflicts, except when the Spider-Alienswere involved.
Jabroniville wrote: Sat Jun 19, 2021 10:10 pm The history of the character is... bizarre. You can really see the "okay, so now what?" of the creative team, as various side characters pop up out of nowhere and become a big deal, and the main setting changes from place to place. Did he suffer overly much from that "line reboot" where everyone went back to their "#0" status? It looks like that's when Madam Crescendo shows up, but it seems like his cast stuck around.
In my opinion, the series suffered tremendosly by the Birthquake pseudo-reboot. Before that there was a supporting cast of 3-4 character (mostly Ken Clarkson, Randy Cartier, one of her former colleagues called Ian), an entire company of extras and a few regular allies that appeared every now and then (Turok, Ninjak, Solar).
During Birthquake, Randy was killed off-panel (we only see the outline of her body crufied to a torture rack), Ken died after stabbing Mistress Crescendo in the back, the HQ of the Orbs was destroyed and Aric lashed out to Turok ending their friendship. For all the intent and purposes, the character that emerged from Birthquake was a different person.
Jabroniville wrote: Sat Jun 19, 2021 10:10 pm Ending it with "It was a all a dream" is spectacularly weird, to the point where I suspect they intentionally made the entire universe non-canon out of spite.
That's possible.
Jabroniville wrote: Sat Jun 19, 2021 10:10 pm For stats, looks like he's a PL 10 melee fighter with PL 11 blasts & defensive stats? It takes me a sec to "get" 2nd Edition stats these days- is he +8 accuracy and +14 damage with his blasts, then?
I have to check my math, but I think he should be PL11 in melee as well.
The totals should be +8/+14 with the Ion Cannons and +10/+12 with the sword.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: X-O Manowar

Post by Sidious »

will you be doing the other X-O Armors? Commando, Wolf, etc?
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: X-O Manowar

Post by Woodclaw »

Sidious wrote: Mon Jun 21, 2021 4:53 pm will you be doing the other X-O Armors? Commando, Wolf, etc?
Hopefully, yes.
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Re: VH1: X-O Manowar

Post by Jabroniville »

Woodclaw wrote: Sun Jun 20, 2021 8:56 am In my opinion, the series suffered tremendosly by the Birthquake pseudo-reboot. Before that there was a supporting cast of 3-4 character (mostly Ken Clarkson, Randy Cartier, one of her former colleagues called Ian), an entire company of extras and a few regular allies that appeared every now and then (Turok, Ninjak, Solar).
During Birthquake, Randy was killed off-panel (we only see the outline of her body crufied to a torture rack), Ken died after stabbing Mistress Crescendo in the back, the HQ of the Orbs was destroyed and Aric lashed out to Turok ending their friendship. For all the intent and purposes, the character that emerged from Birthquake was a different person.
Wow, after all the stuff Randy had already been through? That's rough. And yeah, that sounds like longtime fans would have hated it.
I have to check my math, but I think he should be PL11 in melee as well.
The totals should be +8/+14 with the Ion Cannons and +10/+12 with the sword.
Ooops- I missed the Sword in his array there.
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VH1: Ken Clarkson

Post by Woodclaw »

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Ken Clarkson

Complications
  • Prejudice (Homosexual): Ken is quite open about his sexuality and often gets bullied and insulted for it.
  • Relationship (Aric): even if he often planned to betray him, Ken grew quite fond of Aric and the two became friends.
  • Reputation (untrustworthy): Ken is always looking for his own advantage, so much so that Aric gave him a remote controlled bionic arm, if he was even to betray the barbarian, the X-O armor seize control of the arm and kill Ken.
  • Rivalry (Randy Cartier): Ken and Randy were never on good terms, although their bickering became a lot more tame over time.
:arrow: Ken Clarkson (a pun so obvious it hurts) was the longest running member of Aric's supporting cast, all the way from issue #1.

:arrow: According to various off-page bios, Ken was a low-level executive of the Orb Industries, the conglomerate created by the Spider-Aliens to hide their operations on Earth. After noticing some errors in accouting and unsanctioned trasports, Ken confronted the Orb's board of directors, convinced that they were covering some terrorist or guerrilla operation in South America. Impressed by his cleverness, the aliens clued him in on the truth and decided to use him to get the control ring of the Manowar armor back... of course they planned to kill him afterward.

:arrow: In the end Ken grew pretty fond of the "big hunk of a barbarian" and betrayed the alien, but got shot and lost an arm in the process. After Aric blasted most of aliens out of the Orbs, Ken manipulated the records so that the two of them got control of the conglomerate. Not content with playing kingmaker to Aric, Ken planned to take the armor for himself, but fate got in the way. The harbinger A-X and his gang of cyborgs attempted to steal the armor and Ken was caught in the confrontation. At the end of the battle, Aric decided that his "friend" was no longer trustworthy and ordered the X-O to gave Ken an artificial arm. Being part of the armor itself, the arm was linked to the X-O and the control ring and was at the same time a spy cam and a literal killswitch.

:arrow: From then on Aric and Ken lived in a strange situation. Neither trusting the other and, yet, being extremely fond of each other's company, mostly because there was none else they could talk about their crazy lives. Ken continued being the administrative head of the Orbs, while Aric was the company's face. The arrival of Randy Cartier and Turok caused Ken to suffer some pretty big fits of jealousy. It didn't help that Randy used the X-O ring to boss him around for a while. In the end, they settled for an "armed truce".

:arrow: Ken relevance in the comic came to an end with the "Death of Shanhara" arc. In issue #26, Ken saved Aric's life after mobsters poisoned him and put a bomb in the Orbs' HQ. As a sign of goodwill, Aric ordered the X-O to start regenerate Ken's arm for real. The process ended in issue #29, just seconds before Shanhara's death, this was the "last gift" from the armor. From that moment on, Ken remained an iconic part of Aric's supporting cast, but kind of faded in the background. Gone the arm, gone was the possibility to call the "big guy" for help Jimmy Olsen's style, so Ken was more often than not stuck at the Orbs doing businesswork.

:arrow: Finally we come the infamous issues #44-48 and the final demise of Ken and Randy. While Randy was uncerimoniously killed off-panel, Ken stuck around for most of the confrontation between Aric and Mistress Crescendo. In actual fact, he had a last hurrah: while she was busy torturing Aric with her psionic powers, Ken put a dagger in her back and killed her, dying in the process. Now, as much of a big good scene, this was insanely anticlimatic. Crescendo was the new apparent big bad and she was killed at the end of her introductory arc by a normal human with a dagger! It would be like... I don't know... having Moira McTaggart kill Stryfe before he released the Legacy Virus (which could have been a pretty interesting idea now that I said it out loud).

Final Notes
Build-wise, Ken is a low-end bystander with some good skills and not much else to his name. He's apparently insanely good at resource management and accounting, but not much else. In combat he's really good at running away and with the X-O arm could dish out some significant damage, but even at his best he never got over PL3.
As a character, Ken was really a great addition to the series. It could be argued that Shooter might have had an agenda making him untrustworthy and homosexual, but fortunately he left the series pretty soon. Later writers pulled a much more neutral angle, simply using Ken's sexuality as a general element of his identity. Bob Layton and Jorge Gonzales actually pulled a couple of nice moments between Aric and Ken, showing how Ken was infatuated with the big guy and Aric was actually pretty chilled about that, although he never reciprocated those feelings. This, of course, was also the base of his adversarial relationship with Randy and Turok, who he considered rivals for Aric's affection.
Last edited by Woodclaw on Sat Jul 03, 2021 4:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: X-O Manowar

Post by Jabroniville »

Haha, neat! I flipped through the first TPB of X-O Manowar shortly after I read your build for Aric, and I immediately recognized that Ken was a homosexual- the writing was very "flighty" and effeminate with him, to the point where it seemed like the writers found it amusing. Given how Shooter wrote gays at Marvel (where officially they didn't exist, but he wrote two attempting to rape Bruce Banner once), I wonder what their reasoning was here... and then I read your bits later about Shooter making him untrustworthy but then leaving the book.

The notion of an untrustworthy ally is kind of unique- like Aric knows Ken is in it for himself, but ultimately showed bits and pieces of loyalty. Which actually kind of makes Ken an interesting character, in that he's utterly unscrupulous... but still loyal and selfless at points. A truly complex antagonist/ally.
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VH1: Randy Cartier

Post by Woodclaw »

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I know why Aric calls you the Good Skin!

Randy cartier

Power Level: 6; Power Points Spent: 90

STR: +2 (14), DEX: +2 (14), CON: +2 (14), INT: +2 (14), WIS: +1 (12), CHA: +2 (14)

Skills: Athletics 3 (+5), Deception 4 (+6), Expertise (Soldier, INT) 3 (+5), Expertise (Spy, INT) 4 (+6), Insight 5 (+6), Intimidation 5 (+7), Investigation 3 (+5), Language 2 (Arabic, English, German, Spanish; Native: French Canadian), Perception 4 (+5), Persuasion 5 (+7), Stealth 4 (+6), Vehicles 6 (+8)

Feats: Attack Focus (ranged) 2, Benefit (organizational ties) (Canadian Secret Service), Connected, Contacts, Defensive Attack, Dodge Focus 3, Equipment 4, Power Attack, Well-Informed

Equipment: Arsenal (Medium Pistol, Submachine gun), Mini-Tracer, Undercover Shirt

Combat: Attack +6 (+8 ranged); Damage +2 (unarmed), or by weapon of choice; Defense +8 (+3 Flat-footed); Initiative +2

Saves: Toughness +2/+4 (with armor), Fortitude +4, Reflex +4, Will +4

Totals: Abilities 22 + Skills 24 (48 ranks) + Feats 15 + Powers 0 + Combat 22 + Saves 7 + Drawbacks 0 = 90

Complications:
  • Enemy (the Woldbridge Family): after Randy killed Kyle Wolfbridge, his children started to plot revenge.
  • PTSD: during the investigations on the terrorist Kyle Wolfbridge, Randy was kidnapped, tortured and raped.
  • Relationship: (Aric): at some point the sexual tension between Aric and Randy was so strong you could almost touch it.
  • Relationship (Paul Bouvier): Paul and Randy were colleagues during their years in the Canadian secret service and in a pretty uncomfortable relationship. Paul was the best friend of Randy's late husband, Jean-Luc Cartier, but also in love with her.
:arrow: Contrary to what I said before, Randy wasn't a creation of Jorge Gonzales but on Bob Layton. She was formally introduced in issue #12 as "Orb's chief of security" and for those first issues her role was, mostly, to make life difficult for Aric and Ken. Unwilling to let anyone else know about the armor, Aric was often forced to waltz his way around Randy's attempts to rein him in so that "Ken Clarkson doesn't have another hissy".

:arrow: Randy really started to matter with issue #18, when Gonzales started fleshing out her past a little more. Over the course of Operation: Deep Freeze we are introduced to her ex-colleague Paul Bouvier, we discover her past as a secret agent and the fact that she still has many links to the secret service community around the world. In particular, we get to know that she has a history with Peter Garret, the NSA liason of Deep Freeze, who would become a thorn in the side of the Armorines later on.

:arrow: After she follows Aric to the South Pole and helps him escape Garret's task force, Randy find herself in a rather unique position. Tired of the modern world and longing for a "simpler and more honorable life", Aric disappear in South America, but leaves the X-O control ring to Randy, essentially giving her the "keys to the kingdom". After an initial rejection at the discovery that the armor was sentient, Randy start to discover the perks of the situation, especially when Shanhara heals her wounded arm in just a couple of days and reveals how to use the ring to control Ken Clarkson's artificial arm.

:arrow: Almost immediately, Randy and Ken have a confrontation with the HArbinger A-X, still looking for a way to take control of the Manowar armor. During the fight, Shanhara suffer her first "remodelling" growing spikes on the gauntlets, which Randy uses to rip A-X's face to shreds. Over the next four months (issues #21-24) Randy start to joyride more and more, getting really drunk with power... and fear. In an attempt to cure her PTSD, Shanhara was bringing to the surface her repressed memories from the "Wolfbridge Affair", but this also caused the armor to shapeshift in this asymmetic mess of spikes and tubes (although this didn't affect her functionality). In the end, Randy returned to the Afghani camp where Wolfbridge kept her and wiped it from the face of the Earth... only to discover that it was the HQ of the mujahideen who helped Paul to rescue her. Guilt-ridden, she decided to detach herself from the armor for the time being.

:arrow: After Aric returned, Randy gave him back the control ring and they started to grew closer and closer. About a month later the Armorines had the first outing against Aric. During the confrontation Randy and Paul intervene and manage to stall things long enough for General Kendall to pull the plug. Soon after, Turok comes to visit and the Spider-Aliens attack. After Shanhara start to malfunction, Turok, Randy and Paul go to the rescue, but it's too late, Shanhara is killed,Paul get shot and the aliens got away.

:arrow: In the aftermath Aric and Randy engage in some "pity sex" before receiving the news that Paul suffered a spinal injury and is now paraplegic. Unwilling to live life ina wheelchair, Paul volunteer to become the host of the new Manowar armor and the "rite" takes place right in front of Randy. Of course this drives a wedge between her and Aric. As she is attending Paul's funeral, Randy got two big surprises: Paul made her his sole heir and someone start to kill the former members of the Dept W.

:arrow: From issue #32 to #36 Randy's story become the "B plot" to the series, while Aric engages in a series of battles, she and her colleagues fakes their own deaths to discover the identity of the assassin. This turned out to be a pair of twins, Aaron and Jacob, working for... Wolfbridge. Finally issues #37-40 featured the final confrontation between Randy, Aric and Helena Wolfbridge, the daughter of the man Randy killed "with her bare hands". The story went completely bonkers with Paul's consciusness trying to use Randy to take control of the X-O, Helena Wolfbridge recruiting a group of Harbinger to steal nuclear warhead, Ninjak getting involved and so on.

:arrow: Unfortunately, this marked the end of Randy's importance as a character, she remained pretty active, but was mostly a backgrounder, up until she was uncerimoniously killed off-panel before the battle between Aric and Mistress Crescendo.

Final Notes
Build-wise, Randy is a pretty standard PL6 special agent. In a shared universe she would probably be a bit higher, possibly up to PL8, and a pretty legitimate opponent for the likes of Nick Fury. With the X-O armor,randy climbs all the way to PL10 but, since Shanhara is an adaptative weapon, her stats would be a bit different from Aric's.
Fans of the series might note that I didn't include Randy's initial sight problem. Since the X-O armor fixed that problem in issue #22, I decided it wasn't meaningful enough to include.
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Re: Warehouse W - Valiant: X-O Manowar, Ken and Randy

Post by Jabroniville »

Yeah, Randy's little side-story felt like an interesting addition to X-O Manowar judging by your story. Like the writers suddenly felt like there needed to be a female presence, and ramped her backstory up and up so that it was equal parts tragic, intense and sympathetic- a clear sign a writer is deeply invested in their new toy. Seems like they were almost gunning for it to be "Randy: The Series" after a point judging by her wearing the armor and going solo for a while.

And then suddenly her armor dies, she's a subplot character and then she's killed off-panel, which seems insane given how prominent she was only a year or two beforehand. I had to backtrack and see the timeline, and it looks like yeah... Ron Marz took over, went "WTF? Who is this?" and just ignominiously had her killed off.

Parts of her backstory and appearance kind of remind me of Casca, the main female in Berserk, who is also a brown-skinned, dark-haired woman with a tragic backstory, an uncomfortable relationship with the main hero (a bad-ass barbarian-type master warrior), and ends up getting tortured and raped. But I'm not sure how the exact timelines match up, here.

I wonder if her surname comes from Jacques Cartier, the French explorer who catalogued most of the St. Lawrence area in Canada.
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