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Plorkyeran posted:I don't think I've ever read the end of a book series longer than a trilogy which gave me a stronger feeling than "eh I guess it's over", but I'm also not sure how many complete series I've actually read. Robin Hobb finished her like twenty-book Realm of the Elderlings series and it was awesome. Well worth it.
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Oct 8, 2023 09:24
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Should reread and read that someday only read like 6 books.
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Oct 8, 2023 09:34
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Nitrousoxide posted:A Practical Guide to Evil: Vol 3 I remember Tyrant chapters always being a ton of fun to read.
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Oct 8, 2023 13:51
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LLSix posted:I remember Tyrant chapters always being a ton of fun to read. For all the Heiress talks about being an old school villainess, she just doesn't have the panache. The Tyrant very much does. (And, really, Cat is much better at pulling crazy stuff).
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Oct 8, 2023 13:54
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I really love the blurbs about the previous dread emperors at the start of chapters. Stand-outs are Traitorous (of course) and the story of the man-eating tapirs that's been evolving one sentence at a time.
Nitrousoxide fucked around with this message at 14:28 on Oct 8, 2023 |
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Oct 8, 2023 14:25
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Plorkyeran posted:MoL's ending was pretty bad. The actual climax of the story was getting out of the time loop, and everything after that was superfluous. I feel like the issues with MoL's ending were more a gradual process throughout its latter half or so. I don't think it retroactively soured anything (other than the Red Robe reveal being a bit lame), but more just lost some of what made its earlier parts good (namely the more deliberate pacing and heavy focus on characters).
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Oct 8, 2023 15:07
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OddObserver posted:For all the Heiress talks about being an old school villainess, she just doesn't have the panache. The Tyrant very much does. (And, really, Cat is much better at pulling crazy stuff). The analogy I would use: Evil is (somewhat literally) a religion, and Akua is like someone raised in a devoutly religious family who follows the dogma due to tradition/family. Meanwhile, Tyrant is a born-again type who decided to join the religion on his own and has the sort of fervent belief often associated with that.
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Oct 8, 2023 15:11
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The Game at Carousel just had quite a bit of a lore drop. Five chapters posted at the same, major changes, Act One (out of five, apparently) over.
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Oct 8, 2023 15:48
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Since others have commented on it, I just wanted to pipe in that I love the slice of life stuff. I actually think there's a name for the literary principle that you have to keep the action moving, that if your main character decides to take a vacation or start a shop or whatever something has to happen to provide tension and force a big goal upon them, and I've never liked it. So while I appreciate that by most standards the whole indefinite length and slow pace of many webserials is a flaw, I personally am glad for it. If anything I'd like to see more of it; I wanted Mother of Learning to go on a bit longer with post-loop Zorian settling in to the world and learning to be an awesome archmage, and so on in other stories. SupSup Patreon: So I'm really enjoying that SupSup isn't afraid to do the relaxed living stuff. I like all the new friends Alden is making, and them setting up a cool dorm room, and the little details about life on Anesidora. The skill stuff is also fun and now I'm super looking forward to more Luna Plim, but I didn't mind the stuff that's Alden starting to relax either. Bremen fucked around with this message at 20:48 on Oct 8, 2023 |
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Oct 8, 2023 19:57
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Bremen posted:Since others have commented on it, I just wanted to pipe in that I love the slice of life stuff. I actually think there's a name for the literary principle that you have to keep the action moving, that if your main character decides to take a vacation or start a shop or whatever something has to happen to provide tension and force a big goal upon them, and I've never liked it. So while I appreciate that by most standards the whole indefinite length and slow pace of many webserials is a flaw, I personally am glad for it. If anything I'd like to see more of it; I wanted Mother of Learning to go on a bit longer with post-loop Zorian settling in to the world and learning to be an awesome archmage, and so on in other stories. I agree. I think the slow, start of a new arc stuff is great. Also we are getting a lot of world building and drama set up in the background. The demon summoning is happening soon. Alden has figured out two big tricks with his power in the week since entrance exams. All the stuff with Boe is very suggestive of deeper secrets of avowed and authority. I dunno. The pacing has felt OK to me. The main character wants to be taking it slower, but it's clear that the world is still spinning.
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Oct 8, 2023 21:33
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Ytlaya posted:I feel like the issues with MoL's ending were more a gradual process throughout its latter half or so. I don't think it retroactively soured anything (other than the Red Robe reveal being a bit lame), but more just lost some of what made its earlier parts good (namely the more deliberate pacing and heavy focus on characters). Yeah, it absolutely didn't ruin the story and I still think the long middle stretch of MoL between when Zorian stopped being an obnoxious PoV and when all of the mysteries were resolved are excellent. I just think that the story basically resolved everything and was ready to wrap up well before the plot ended, and you could replace a bunch of the final chapters with a short summary of the events without really losing much. Ideally there would have been interesting character beats related to Zorian readjusting to life outside the loop, but I didn't feel like those really hit.
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Oct 8, 2023 22:02
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Plorkyeran posted:MoL's ending was pretty bad. The actual climax of the story was getting out of the time loop, and everything after that was superfluous. The eddings various books about magic blue stones all have formulaic but workmanlike prose and mostly stick their landings. They are a product of their time, and the actual authors were not great people, but happy days now that they are dead it’s ok to rec them as a studyable thing in how to write the hero’s journey if people want to learn it.
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Oct 9, 2023 00:10
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Wittgen posted:I agree. I think the slow, start of a new arc stuff is great. Also we are getting a lot of world building and drama set up in the background. The demon summoning is happening soon. Alden has figured out two big tricks with his power in the week since entrance exams. All the stuff with Boe is very suggestive of deeper secrets of avowed and authority. Yeah, the current arc in SupSup Patreon might have been pretty dull if it was just slice of life stuff. But it's clearly still setting up hooks for future events. Boe's big secret, the demon summoning, Stuart's affixation, Alden's confrontation with the boaters, and the ticking time bomb of his leave ending. Edit: RR SupSup going on a week hiatus  I imagine that this is because (SupSup Patreon) Sleyca wants to pump out the Boe chapters at a much faster pace to avoid the pushback that they got from the Patreon crew. And maybe interspace some other POV's in there to avoid the hero school crew story lines screeching to a halt for a month like they did for Patreon. Nitrousoxide fucked around with this message at 04:47 on Oct 9, 2023 |
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Oct 9, 2023 00:28
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Bremen posted:Since others have commented on it, I just wanted to pipe in that I love the slice of life stuff. I actually think there's a name for the literary principle that you have to keep the action moving, that if your main character decides to take a vacation or start a shop or whatever something has to happen to provide tension and force a big goal upon them, and I've never liked it. So while I appreciate that by most standards the whole indefinite length and slow pace of many webserials is a flaw, I personally am glad for it. If anything I'd like to see more of it; I wanted Mother of Learning to go on a bit longer with post-loop Zorian settling in to the world and learning to be an awesome archmage, and so on in other stories. I feel like the flip-side of the "it's been dull/slow lately" stuff is that I can't imagine any alternative that wouldn't feel weird/rushed. The only alternatives I can think of are abandoning the "Alden goes to school in Anesidora" plot point entirely (which would be difficult to make plausible) and "time-skip through a bunch of stuff" (which would also be bad). One thing I'm curious about is when the next affixation will come. We know that gaps between future affixations will be less than the gap before his second one (which was less than a year - I think like 9 months or something? not sure), and it's already been several months since the second one. It seems like it's gotta happen at some point during his first school year. I guess it also depends on how fast his authority is growing. On one hand, he doesn't have the "chaos effect" hastening it, but on the other hand we've been told that "awareness of authority" leads to exponential growth. Also, regarding the "glossary" of names, I get the impression that this is just because Sleyca is just overly worried that people won't be able to keep track of the characters and is throwing that in "just in case." But it hasn't exactly been difficult to do so. I'm also a little baffled by the "SS is perfectly calculated to appeal to the web serial audience" take - to the extent that that's true, I really don't get the impression it's anything remotely deliberate. The first 20+ chapters in particular are incredibly slow. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 06:36 on Oct 9, 2023 |
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Oct 9, 2023 06:32
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Ytlaya posted:I feel like the flip-side of the "it's been dull/slow lately" stuff is that I can't imagine any alternative that wouldn't feel weird/rushed. The only alternatives I can think of are abandoning the "Alden goes to school in Anesidora" plot point entirely (which would be difficult to make plausible) and "time-skip through a bunch of stuff" (which would also be bad). I doubt it'll be for a while. He's not using it a ton at the moment
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Oct 9, 2023 07:17
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super supportive is weak because nothing that is going on right now (or that has been going on since getting back to Earth) matters on any level compared to everything before then. this has the unfortunate effect that every new character thats introduced feels lesser compared to every character from before - everything happening right now in the story just has so much less narrative weight and so all of the characters lack substance as well.
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Oct 10, 2023 02:29
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theres also something to be said about how alden has been less affected by things than he probably should have been if you wanted to make a more slice of life-y arc after a traumatizing arc feel better and maintain more of the narrative weight of the prior arc so that the new characters could inherit some degree of that but idk im not a writer
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Oct 10, 2023 02:41
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Man, A Practical Guide to Evil Vol 4 has been much better than Vol 3 so far. Some absolutely wonderful vignettes. Surprisingly, my absolute favorite so far as of 1/3 of the way through the book is ghost Akua having to pretend to be Cat quote:“Glory in strife,” the beggar screamed out in Lunara. Love her whole chapter.
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Oct 10, 2023 02:52
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shades of blue posted:super supportive is weak because nothing that is going on right now (or that has been going on since getting back to Earth) matters on any level compared to everything before then. this has the unfortunate effect that every new character thats introduced feels lesser compared to every character from before - everything happening right now in the story just has so much less narrative weight and so all of the characters lack substance as well. shades of blue posted:theres also something to be said about how alden has been less affected by things than he probably should have been if you wanted to make a more slice of life-y arc after a traumatizing arc feel better and maintain more of the narrative weight of the prior arc so that the new characters could inherit some degree of that but idk im not a writer Counterpoint: It's fine. I like where the story has gone, and enjoy the new characters. It's a perfectly decent slice of life coming of age arc. (SupSup 80 RR spoilers) For instance, I really liked the range of reactions all the new characters had to getting into the fancy school. It was interesting to see Alden's traumatic disassociation contrasted with everyone else's glee. I particularly like the moment when Alden got a bit put-out and surprised by Maricel going bubbly. Haystack fucked around with this message at 03:54 on Oct 10, 2023 |
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Oct 10, 2023 03:37
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Wait, wait, I'm confused after the past couple days of discourse, am I allowed to like Super Supportive or not? It sounds like it's either high quality and uses narrative tools well or sucks rear end and and stupid and boring
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Oct 10, 2023 03:39
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John Lee posted:Wait, wait, I'm confused after the past couple days of discourse, am I allowed to like Super Supportive or not? It sounds like it's either high quality and uses narrative tools well or sucks rear end and and stupid and boring I think it's trying to be something very different than a conventional novel/series of novels, and if that works for you SupSup is a really high quality webserial, and if it doesn't you'll probably love it right up until chapter 64 and then probably think it went to poo poo.
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Oct 10, 2023 03:46
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Nitrousoxide posted:Man, A Practical Guide to Evil Vol 4 has been much better than Vol 3 so far. Yeah, Akua is a hoot and a half. A lot of existing characters have great moments in Vol 4. And I really like all the forces of Good that get brought into the story; it puts Cat in a new light to have her interacting with older heroes and Good characters, rather than the foils and cartoon characters she sees earlier. (Not that there’s anything wrong with foils and cartoon characters.)
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Oct 10, 2023 04:54
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SupSup isn't even like, notably clumsy. Beyond some unexpected stiffness in certain conversations (where I suspect the author got too excited about lore drops and forgot to dress them up...) , it's got a better batting average than most webserials not penned by ErraticErrata I have been more dissapointed by Twinned Destinies. There were some surprisingly decent bits of writing in Speedrunning the Multiverse, the author's previous work, so I wanted to see what it would look like with some breathing room. The author intended it be a more sedate work, but it's not really reflected in the text. Really, the pacing is identical to the early stages of the previous serial. Considering said previous work was explicitly a story about a millenia-old god speedrunning apotheosis (again), who ended up breaking all the rules and being so lucky it actively made the story boring, this comparison is ... not good news! It's indistinguishable from a parody of progression fantasies, simply put. I think the author has the chops to craft something worthwhile, but maybe not yet. And likely not with a 5x a week update schedule. in short, it's all punch and no wind-up. anyways, makes for an interesting comparison with Super Supportive edit: and while I'm complaining wow is the Tianlan subplot in BoC a wet fart. and maybe it would be better if Thresholder guy would just write lore bibles since everything else in his work is an excuse to set them up. I do like the fun bits of those two serials otherwise, quite a bit! ok opinions over Ramie fucked around with this message at 05:26 on Oct 10, 2023 |
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Oct 10, 2023 05:10
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Yeah I stopped reading Super Supportive because this poo poo didn't seem terribly interesting. But it'll probably be fine when I just binge it later.
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Oct 10, 2023 05:22
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Super Supportive has the problem of the author having established themselves as being able to write tense, gripping narrative that leaves you salivating (or subscribing) for the next chapter, which has since undermined everything that has come afterwards. I’m not subscribed because I want to see Alden fumble his way through superhero high school. I’m subscribed because his adventures on Moon Thegund had me on the edge of my seat. I’m hitting this same problem with The Daily Grind. The story is at its best when James is in danger and, to a somewhat lesser extent, when the overarching plot is moving forward. The explorations on what love means in a world full of nonhuman life are interesting, but when I get the new chapter notification I am hoping much less for Arrush to finally learn how to be hugged without flinching and much more that someone’s about to die horribly due to [Malus - Skin Surface Area - -0.25 m^2].
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Oct 10, 2023 06:21
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Ramie posted:
I'm disappointed that apparently Rue's family are all idiots and don't question that she's eating a ton of raw meat and dressing like a weirdo.
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Oct 10, 2023 06:41
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So the new Thresholder arc/world started and this time the theme is nomadic mecha people (people who use mechs, not people who are mechs) on a hostile planet which seems pretty cool. I appreciated the previous world's take on cultivation. Managed to feel somewhat non-standard while still being reasonably true to the bones of Xianxia.
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Oct 10, 2023 07:05
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Cicero posted:So the new Thresholder arc/world started and this time the theme is nomadic mecha people (people who use mechs, not people who are mechs) on a hostile planet which seems pretty cool. I appreciated the previous world's take on cultivation. Managed to feel somewhat non-standard while still being reasonably true to the bones of Xianxia. Yeah, I like the concept of a planet with a narrow habitable zone that you have to follow. It seems kinda familiar but I'm not sure from where.
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Oct 10, 2023 07:31
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Tagichatn posted:Yeah, I like the concept of a planet with a narrow habitable zone that you have to follow. It seems kinda familiar but I'm not sure from where. You later find out that (somewhat more significant world building spoiler) there's a satellite that basically shoots a giant warming ray around the planet, which is what keeps the ice back there.
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Oct 10, 2023 07:38
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Sleyca wrote a huge comment on patreon addressing the slice of life focus. She really doesn't like it when people call it a mistake.
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Oct 10, 2023 07:40
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I've been enjoying Twinned Destinies' pacing I also don't care much about power levels and am more interested in Ruyi's growth as a person and if she can manage to form normal personal relationships. I really like how she has grown so much from a spoiled (and crippled) noble who pushes the theoretical bounds of alchemy for validation into someone who hates the class divide and focuses on mass producing health potions as cheap as possible for the lower city. Yet she still has her character faults as obviously seen in her relationship with Sen. My biggest complaint with the story is Tagichatn posted:I'm disappointed that apparently Rue's family are all idiots and don't question that she's eating a ton of raw meat and dressing like a weirdo.
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Oct 10, 2023 07:43
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There is nothing wrong with Super Supportive's current slow pace, but it was definitely weird for the story to change pace abruptly and stay with a new slower speed for a long period of time. Like if TWI became a fast paced story with power leveling in short chapters, you would understand if people complained, right?
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Oct 10, 2023 08:42
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That actually sounds exactly like something TWI would do for a little while. edit: well, except for having short chapters; I think Pirate is addicted to long ones
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Oct 10, 2023 09:08
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Cicero posted:That actually sounds exactly like something TWI would do for a little while.
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Oct 10, 2023 11:17
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I quite like the structure of Super Supportive, but it might help to conceptualize it as a series of books. Moon Thegund is the climax of book 1 and there was a quite a lot of slower paced buildup to it. I appreciate the story having time to breathe and reset, re-establish the setting and stakes and let the character process what they went through, rather than quickly jumping into the next major conflict and narrative. It seems like Super Supportive is going to avoid the need to always quickly go bigger that I think a lot of written superhero fiction suffers from. I think it's interesting that people complain about a changing pace when it slows down, but not when it picks up.
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Oct 10, 2023 13:43
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The return to Earth was probably the end of Volume 1, both in word count and narratively. Right now we are in the initial stages of Book 2 of SupSup, so it's completely normal for it to be a slower paced setup. You'd have to be completely blind to not see some of the major events being setup for later in book 2 here.
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Oct 10, 2023 14:04
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I fully agree that SS is at the beginning of book 2 and so of course it's slower. (Also it's still a great story.) I think there was one bit of genuinely awkward pacing (SS85 or so: It's Boe yo) but I would say even that ended in a place where it's clearly good for the story overall. Sleyca actually addressed how people complain about when pace drops vs pace picks up. People who prefer the slower stuff do mention it in Patreon pledge cancellations, but they're not vocal in comments like the action junkies are.
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Oct 10, 2023 14:29
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Wittgen posted:I fully agree that SS is at the beginning of book 2 and so of course it's slower. (Also it's still a great story.) I think there was one bit of genuinely awkward pacing (SS85 or so: It's Boe yo) but I would say even that ended in a place where it's clearly good for the story overall. People also complain when there's all action all the time or all slice of life all the time. It's literally impossible to please everybody.
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Oct 10, 2023 14:57
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Peachfart posted:There is nothing wrong with Super Supportive's current slow pace, but it was definitely weird for the story to change pace abruptly and stay with a new slower speed for a long period of time. Like if TWI became a fast paced story with power leveling in short chapters, you would understand if people complained, right? But SS *was* a slow slice-of-life for a long time before the more tense/exciting stuff. I think the actual issue is that many/most people started reading it when the tense/high-stakes part was on-going. So they were able to binge through everything leading up to the higher-stakes part, but now they're stuck with the slower stuff on a normal release schedule. nrook posted:Yeah, Akua is a hoot and a half. I like Pilgrim a lot as a character and as a sort of "foil" to Cat (in some ways, though less so in others). In the end, I think Pilgrim is probably the character most similar to Cat herself, unless you maybe count another obvious character near the very end of the story. Kinda curious how Nitrous will respond to an upcoming arc (that is probably the weakest IMO, though works well in hind-sight). I'm also a little surprised at not liking Book 3, since I thought the whole conflict with Akua was really good.
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Oct 10, 2023 15:32
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Re: Book 3 of A Practical Guide to Evil. I rather liked the final confrontation with Akua in her lair, but I felt that the whole fey invasion was not especially interesting and it more or less served as a really extended speed bump on the way to Akua. I mean I get that Cat's power set and personality have been heavily impacted by her Duchess title since then, but I just frankly could never find the fey a very compelling or intriguing faction and antagonist in Vol 3.
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Oct 10, 2023 17:17
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