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WarLocke posted:I really hope all the freaky vajazzle poo poo with Maeve was Nemesis being in her. Also bear in mind, our only source for "the mantle gradually transforms its bearer into something else" is Bob, and Bob is not omniscient and has in the past been mistaken and proven wrong. Still, this is Jim Butcher, and Molly wanting to boink Harry has only been a thing for ten or so books now... And now she's the Winter Lady and he's her Knight.
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Oct 28, 2016 18:21
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MeLKoR posted:My point was that you can't "excuse" what Mab does "because she has to rule over ruthless creatures" when she does everything she can to make those creatures more ruthless.
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Oct 28, 2016 18:44
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Cythereal posted:Also bear in mind, our only source for "the mantle gradually transforms its bearer into something else" is Bob, and Bob is not omniscient and has in the past been mistaken and proven wrong. I see the next book starting with Harry and Murphy already an item and Molly shows up to give Dresden further sexual angst.
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Oct 28, 2016 19:02
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Having both Molly and Harry being part of the winter may give winter a potential edge over summer. Molly with the mantle and her natural ability with emotional magic sounds like a real monster.
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Oct 28, 2016 19:41
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Calidus posted:Having both Molly and Harry being part of the winter may give winter a potential edge over summer. Molly with the mantle and her natural ability with emotional magic sounds like a real monster. Yeah, I like to think the real reason Nic bailed at the end of Skin Game is because on top of Light Saber Sword of Faith he sensed the absolute poo poo-wrecking power of a pissed off Winter Lady that has plenty of motive to utterly destroy him coming in, since she showed up right after Nic beat a hasty retreat. I kind of wish there had at least been a kind of additional "oh poo poo" of her arriving and putting a hurt on Nic before he shadow-bailed.
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Oct 28, 2016 20:05
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Cythereal posted:Also bear in mind, our only source for "the mantle gradually transforms its bearer into something else" is Bob, and Bob is not omniscient and has in the past been mistaken and proven wrong. The way that Fix and Lily change is also something of a tell, but... not really. A lot of what Fix becomes can be attributed to him maturing into the person he chose to be. Same with Lily. Their Fae sides influence them, but the extent of that influence might be Harry projecting. I also don't really believe Butters' explanation about Harry's strength. Fix also got a number of purely physical boons from his mantle, and he's been at it much longer than Harry. There is no reason why the same power that grants him ability and knowledge of ice magic, numbness to pain, etc, couldn't just be a form of Fae power. It might even be as simple as a subtler, more restrictive version of the same magic shape-shifters use. One of my favorite things in Cold Days was when Harry got to flex his ice magic muscle to save everyone, and he ended up looking like a corpse dug out of the snow. I enjoyed that bit of Winter manifesting a lot more than the creepy-hump instincts.
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Oct 28, 2016 20:51
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MadDogMike posted:As for Harry and naming magic, there's about a billion clues it's his big talent and WHY he is so dangerous to Outsiders. Not counting all the instances he tags someone or something with a name and changes it somehow, we've got his casual usage of his full name throughout the supposedly "in-universe" books and the bit about "conjure by it at your own risk" all the way back at the end of Storm Front. Most blatant of course is when he breaks the power of the Outsider in Cold Days by first remembering who he is (most obviously when he states his own name in the climactic battle, but even in the bar he shakes it off by focusing on who he sees himself to be) and then demanding it give him its own name. It's thematic as hell (names, true names in particular, have always been associated with magic), and it makes perfect sense that the guy meant to hold off the nameless hordes beyond the edge of reality is the one who can make them no longer nameless. I really don't think this is some special power of harry's so much as it is that harry is brazen enough to throw around names willy nilly having names for things makes him more comfortable so he names and nicknames everything he comes across, anyone could do it but most wouldn't because it can really gently caress things up.
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Oct 28, 2016 23:39
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Elfgames posted:I really don't think this is some special power of harry's so much as it is that harry is brazen enough to throw around names willy nilly having names for things makes him more comfortable so he names and nicknames everything he comes across, anyone could do it but most wouldn't because it can really gently caress things up. I agree, but I also think there is some cause and effect involved here. The more random nicknames Harry gives and the more "poeple" response to them the stronger the names he gives become.
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Oct 29, 2016 00:13
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Cythereal posted:Also bear in mind, our only source for "the mantle gradually transforms its bearer into something else" is Bob, and Bob is not omniscient and has in the past been mistaken and proven wrong. I admit the real scary bit with Molly and Harry is they make a lot of comparisons between Harry and Merlin, and in legend Merlin kinda got in trouble with an apprentice thanks to sexual issues... (more on Merlin's part than hers, admittedly). As for the mantles, they're an open question; I think I'd actually prefer it if being the Winter Knight and Lady is something Harry and Molly have to juggle for the rest of their lives rather than something they can sneak themselves out of, so it may be the mantle is just a constant temptation that doesn't have to win. Weighed against that though is Odin's talk about setting aside mantles, and I expect something bad has to happen to Winter for there to be an apocalyptic event with Outsiders in the future, which could cut Harry off that way. Elfgames posted:I really don't think this is some special power of harry's so much as it is that harry is brazen enough to throw around names willy nilly having names for things makes him more comfortable so he names and nicknames everything he comes across, anyone could do it but most wouldn't because it can really gently caress things up. Kind of a chicken and egg thing; does he have the ability because of his personality or is his personality part and parcel of the ability? I don't buy it's JUST Harry being reckless though, too many people have made mention of something going on with him for that to all be nothing at all. Wouldn't surprise me though if he gets away with more because of that ability, and that's why others don't do it so much. NerdyMcNerdNerd posted:I also don't really believe Butters' explanation about Harry's strength. Fix also got a number of purely physical boons from his mantle, and he's been at it much longer than Harry. There is no reason why the same power that grants him ability and knowledge of ice magic, numbness to pain, etc, couldn't just be a form of Fae power. It might even be as simple as a subtler, more restrictive version of the same magic shape-shifters use I expect there has to be some level of healing above baseline wizard from it for him not to trash himself totally (which could be controlled by Mab like Butters suspects), but it does make thematic sense that Winter doesn't make him stronger so much as make him able to endure more. Can't really trust that Fix is the same given we know so little about the Summer Knight, and in any event Summer is more associated with growth and life than Winter is so an actual boost could be a Summer-only thing. Hell, we don't really know Fix IS Harry's full equal physically or more/less, their one confrontation was more about cleverness than brute strength on strength. quote:One of my favorite things in Cold Days was when Harry got to flex his ice magic muscle to save everyone, and he ended up looking like a corpse dug out of the snow. I enjoyed that bit of Winter manifesting a lot more than the creepy-hump instincts. To be fair, Skin Game shows it manifesting as pure on territorial rage when he sees Binder, so it's not always a stupid sex thing. I do like that Harry has to fight off the mantle's influence with cold logic; makes one wonder if the ruthless pragmatism most of Winter's leadership has is more a method to keep control of their power rather than an effect of being Winter0.
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Oct 29, 2016 00:53
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MadDogMike posted:it does make thematic sense that Winter doesn't make him stronger so much as make him able to endure more. Can't really trust that Fix is the same given we know so little about the Summer Knight, and in any event Summer is more associated with growth and life than Winter is so an actual boost could be a Summer-only thing. Harry also does working sets with 400 kilos. This blows away pretty much every weightlifting record in the world, and that's as his daily workout. And he's a tall lanky runner, not the Mountain That Rides. While removing the limiters might let somebody shift 400kg once because their kid is trapped under it or something, it's not going to let that person do working sets at 400kg.
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Oct 29, 2016 01:36
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Khizan posted:Harry also does working sets with 400 kilos. This blows away pretty much every weightlifting record in the world, and that's as his daily workout. And he's a tall lanky runner, not the Mountain That Rides. While removing the limiters might let somebody shift 400kg once because their kid is trapped under it or something, it's not going to let that person do working sets at 400kg. Yeah. Butter's theory doesn't really hold up with what we've directly observed.
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Oct 29, 2016 02:18
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navyjack posted:Yeah. Butter's theory doesn't really hold up with what we've directly observed. I suspect he's right, but incomplete - that it's probably both removing the limiters and also some genuine super-strength.
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Oct 29, 2016 04:10
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MadDogMike posted:I expect there has to be some level of healing above baseline wizard from it for him not to trash himself totally (which could be controlled by Mab like Butters suspects), but it does make thematic sense that Winter doesn't make him stronger so much as make him able to endure more. Well, at one point we see Fix take on multiple ogres in melee combat and come out on top. In Cold Days, we see him jumping like he's in a kung fu movie. If I had to wager a guess, I'd say that the Winter Knight has more brute force, and the Summer Knight more agility, but they're both in the realm of super human by a large margin. The last Summer Knight lived to be sixty-ish, and wasn't a wizard. That's part of why I don't buy their bodies tearing themselves apart. Summer is more 'positive' than Winter, but it has also been compared to cancer and kudzu. Maybe Fix is getting hurt and we just don't know. Slate was pissed off and in pain all the time, but I kind of wonder how much of that came from him fighting Winter, and Maeve twisting the spiritual knife. We only really see him losing it when he gets pissed and starts arguing with her. I sincerely hope the next book goes into the Knight stuff a little bit deeper. quote:To be fair, Skin Game shows it manifesting as pure on territorial rage when he sees Binder, so it's not always a stupid sex thing. Yeah, but the creepiness isn't really... fun? It took me out of the book. It just made me think back to parts of the novels I'd rather forget, so I'd have preferred he focused on the other traits to sell the Winter mindset.
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Oct 29, 2016 04:52
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Or, Mab was just loving with Harry and changed the labels on the weights and he is really lifting 100.
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Oct 29, 2016 04:52
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MadDogMike posted:Kind of a chicken and egg thing; does he have the ability because of his personality or is his personality part and parcel of the ability? I don't buy it's JUST Harry being reckless though, too many people have made mention of something going on with him for that to all be nothing at all. Wouldn't surprise me though if he gets away with more because of that ability, and that's why others don't do it so much. I think I agree with this. Given the importance of true names in Butcher's mythology (which as someone else pointed out is kind of part and parcel for a lot of fantasy involving magic) I can't see it as just something anyone can do. Could be that is just has more oomph because of Harry's magical strength but I think there is something deeper here that Butcher is building up to that is innate to Harry.
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Oct 29, 2016 12:33
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wheatpuppy posted:Or, Mab was just loving with Harry and changed the labels on the weights and he is really lifting 100. This would be hilarious.
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Oct 29, 2016 17:37
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And finished my re-read of the series with Skin Game, my first time reading it after knowing the twist which adds some interesting subtext to everything. Fun story, bit of another break from the high intensity stuff, but I like the depiction of Hades and boy howdy does Harry have an awkward conversation with Michael in the future. Also, I'm not sure Murphy knows about Harry having a child with a fallen angel. That's going to be another awkward conversation, along with Molly now being the Winter Lady and Harry in theory being bound to her will. Uriel, of course, remains one of my favorite characters in the series.
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Oct 29, 2016 17:42
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Cythereal posted:And finished my re-read of the series with Skin Game, my first time reading it after knowing the twist which adds some interesting subtext to everything. Fun story, bit of another break from the high intensity stuff, but I like the depiction of Hades and boy howdy does Harry have an awkward conversation with Michael in the future. There was a scene where Murphy rolled on the floor laughing at Harry when he told her he was pregnant.
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Oct 29, 2016 17:51
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Just started reading The Laundry Files series by Charles Stross. I am really enjoying them, tore through the first 3 and on the 4th.
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Oct 30, 2016 04:37
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A. Beaverhausen posted:This would be hilarious. It would also be very... Mab. Cythereal posted:Molly mentions in Skin Game that Maeve's been neglecting her duties for centuries, and so Molly's been running all over the place working on Maeve's backlog. There's also no telling how long Maeve was infected by Nemesis, which could be part of it. I was about to say that we have a general idea of when Maeve was infected, but I thought about it again. We know that Lea was infected because of the knife and we assume she spread it to Maeve, but could it be the other way around? Maybe Maeve and her outsider buddies orchestrated it. That could be how Mab found out Maeve was infected. Lea told her. Why would Nemesis step down to get the Winter Lady when it already had Mab's #2 girl in its control already? Maeve was probably pretty easy to snare because she was already trying to buck the system and attain a close approximation of free will by ignoring her duty. She'd probably be the easier get. And in Cold Days she proved she can play chess on Mab's level, even if she couldn't beat her. Setting up Lea's infection was probably her first big power play, and letting her work go undone was a subtle way of undermining Winter without actually rebelling and being an obvious mole. It was just Maeve being Maeve until she made a big move and Mab took a closer look at her.
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Oct 30, 2016 13:11
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vulturesrow posted:I think I agree with this. Given the importance of true names in Butcher's mythology (which as someone else pointed out is kind of part and parcel for a lot of fantasy involving magic) I can't see it as just something anyone can do. Could be that is just has more oomph because of Harry's magical strength but I think there is something deeper here that Butcher is building up to that is innate to Harry. I'm not seeing that at all, harry even says that humans change true names like every few years because your true name changes with how you view yourself. It's a normal thing. harry just gives these things a new way to view themselves because he doesn't give a poo poo about traditions and rules and poo poo and that influences them. he changed lash not by some magical quality but by becoming intimate with her and forming a relationship and that's the same thing uriel was afraid of, he has a position to maintain, he cant be thought of and worse yet think of himself as uri who's just one of the guys especially since the el is very important to who he is. It's like saying hary's special because he can love and butcher has stressed love as being very important.
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Nov 1, 2016 09:54
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Y'all should read Cold Case. It sheds light on a lot of this. Also, Dresden didn't have a child with a fallen angel. He had a child with the shadow that resided in his mind. There's a subtle but important difference there.
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Nov 1, 2016 18:10
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Rygar201 posted:Y'all should read Cold Case. It sheds light on a lot of this. I haven't read the dresden books in years, but how did he manage to bang a clone of a ghost of a demon that existed only in his mind, not to mention getting her pregnant? Or was this, like, a  mystical spawning?
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Nov 1, 2016 19:15
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Drifter posted:I haven't read the dresden books in years, but how did he manage to bang a clone of a ghost of a demon that existed only in his mind, not to mention getting her pregnant? Or was this, like, a
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Nov 1, 2016 19:19
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Yeah human/spirit procreation is lot less tangible and more subjective, fittingly enough.
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Nov 1, 2016 19:26
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Drifter posted:I haven't read the dresden books in years, but how did he manage to bang a clone of a ghost of a demon that existed only in his mind, not to mention getting her pregnant? Or was this, like, a Dresden's subconscious loving Lasciel's shadow is referenced a couple times. Once in a really creepy way by the subconscious himself and again by Lash when she says something like "Your subconscious is much friendlier than you are" when he turns her down during one of the times that she offers to mentally masturbate him. There's also the bit where Dresden's Id tells him that when Lash sacrificed herself to save him in the Raith Deeps that it was the act of Love that resulted in the creation of the Parasite/Bonnie. Oh, and Dresden was the one that got pregnant, not Lash.
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Nov 1, 2016 19:29
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And finished Side Jobs. Pretty good anthology of short stories, some better than others - The Warrior and Aftermath are the two highlights in my opinion, the former being a character study on Michael Carpenter and a look at the smaller but no less potent ways Dresden and friends do good.quote:Uriel: Ah, you mean warrior in the literal sense. That is good stuff.  Now hurry up and finish Peace Talks, Butcher.
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Nov 1, 2016 21:12
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Cythereal posted:And finished Side Jobs. Pretty good anthology of short stories, some better than others - The Warrior and Aftermath are the two highlights in my opinion, the former being a character study on Michael Carpenter and a look at the smaller but no less potent ways Dresden and friends do good. Isn't that the one where Harry submits an invoice to God? I always liked that story.
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Nov 2, 2016 00:25
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Khizan posted:Harry also does working sets with 400 kilos. This blows away pretty much every weightlifting record in the world, and that's as his daily workout. And he's a tall lanky runner, not the Mountain That Rides. While removing the limiters might let somebody shift 400kg once because their kid is trapped under it or something, it's not going to let that person do working sets at 400kg. To nitpick some, it depends on the lift, and standard real world vanilla mortals have managed 500kg bench, 524 kg deadlift, and 571.5 kg squat. It doesn't take away from the point that Harry is definitely magically strong because he really does not have the muscles to move that kind of weight, but he's actually still within the realm of the limits of the human body. Though it is in and of itself totally fantastic and incredible that what feels like a supernatural amount of material to be able to move is actually well within the human potential. People are awesome!
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Nov 2, 2016 00:36
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Some tiny percentage of people are awesome.
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Nov 2, 2016 00:40
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Rygar201 posted:Y'all should read Cold Case. It sheds light on a lot of this. Yeah, sheds a LOT of light on the whole Winter mantle thing; the lust issue in particular has a disturbingly coldly logical reason to it (appropriately enough). Definitely seems to be twisting Molly a lot more than Dresden though. Cythereal posted:And finished Side Jobs. Pretty good anthology of short stories, some better than others - The Warrior and Aftermath are the two highlights in my opinion, the former being a character study on Michael Carpenter and a look at the smaller but no less potent ways Dresden and friends do good. I found it kind of interesting he based it on similar events that happened with him according to the author intro to that story. As for Aftermath, I think my favorite Dresden short stories have been ones where he's not the main character, it's interesting to see how the world changes when the protagonist viewpoint does.
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Nov 2, 2016 00:50
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flosofl posted:Isn't that the one where Harry submits an invoice to God? I always liked that story. Yep. It's mainly just Michael, Harry, and a one-off antagonist whose reasons and goals are very understandable. I adore the Carpenters in general. Michael is at the top of my list for positive portrayals of Christianity in popular media that's not explicitly aimed at the Christian market. He's not without his flaws (and Uriel notes a big one in this short story), but all his powers and special attributes flow from one simple premise: he's a Good Man.
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Nov 2, 2016 01:27
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You should read even hand if you can find a copy of it.
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Nov 2, 2016 03:30
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The bad thing about the short stories is I have to buy a bunch of other poo poo I dont care to read. Not one single story in the collections that Dresden one offs go in end up worth buying all the garbage in the rest of said collections.
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Nov 2, 2016 04:17
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I thought that Even Hand was mediocre at best, honestly. Harry and Murphy and the werewolves and basically everybody in the series have this running inner monologue of "rar rar terrible criminal scum rabble rabble" every time they deal with Marcone, but Marcone is nothing but helpful to them and he's never really ever painted in a bad light at all. He's bailed Harry out of trouble multiple times. He stayed to fight Outsider fueled superzombies just to help Harry save lives. He's funding the Chicago war effort against the Fomor. He's been a great ally, and yet every time they meet Dresden is doing this "One day, Marcone!" crap. In Even Hand is that Marcone basically carries on a similar "One day, Dresden!" monologue inside his head, again for no good drat reason at all. It's jarring because Butcher writes Marcone as a good guy but has all his characters keep telling us that he's a bad guy and it never matches up.
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Nov 2, 2016 04:35
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biracial bear for uncut posted:The bad thing about the short stories is I have to buy a bunch of other poo poo I dont care to read. Just wait for Jim's next collection. It's fairly likely to come out next year as a consolation for not getting Peace Talks.
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Nov 2, 2016 04:44
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Normally I pick up the anthologies by borrowing from the library but they don't have Shadowed Souls yet and I want to read about Molly as Winter Lady now...
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Nov 2, 2016 04:51
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fordan posted:Normally I pick up the anthologies by borrowing from the library but they don't have Shadowed Souls yet and I want to read about Molly as Winter Lady now... Don't forget about Butters on his first mission.
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Nov 2, 2016 09:58
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So wait, is The Hanging Tree out in the UK? Is there an extra chapter in a Waterstones edition like last time?
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Nov 2, 2016 15:14
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:So wait, is The Hanging Tree out in the UK? Technically not out til tomorrow but there's been a signing tour running since the weekend.
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