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Oh neat this thread has risen from the grave again, what wonderfully awful new sights are there to see now?Cornwind Evil posted:Sorry, I am not secretly best girl bringing an update. 
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Mar 13, 2023 15:05
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silvergoose posted:Yeah I loved that book too, then started book 7, hated the new characters for being impossibly dull, and never read any more. Oh my God SAME. I was so excited to see what was going on with Richard, Kahlan, and Nicci and then all of a sudden we have a book where Richard and Kahlan literally don't appear until like...the last 50 pages or so, then I had to wait another 2 years for Naked Empire and that book loving sucked and I was like...what the gently caress is going on here?
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Mar 13, 2023 16:03
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secretly best girl posted:It's one of the most memorable scenes in these novels. Hell, "I'll make my art my way" is one of the biggest normie hooks an objectivist viewpoint can drop, it's why so many of them harp on it (FotF, Fountainhead, etc). The problem is once we get into the Old World rebellion arc, he blew his load too fast with the statue, and now we have the murder stadiums coming up. Art seems like it'd play right into the I'm special mindset too - not just art but the most incredible artwork anyone's ever seen.
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Mar 13, 2023 20:03
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Comrade Blyatlov posted:Art seems like it'd play right into the I'm special mindset too - not just art but the most incredible artwork anyone's ever seen. My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. For y'all that were fans, I'm asking why? I'm not being facetious. I mean, I read the piss out of Dragonlance as a kid, because there were DRAGONS, holy poo poo look at that cool DRAGON! That's my entire reason for reading those.
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Mar 14, 2023 16:51
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I've no real idea anymore!! I just know that, as a teen, I really liked that book! Then hated the next one! Seriously though, actually knowing why I like something is a skill I absolutely did not obtain until adulthood.
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Mar 14, 2023 16:58
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DicktheCat posted:My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. Honestly, what probably helped me is the fact that I'm kinda dumb. Like, it takes awhile for my brain to catch up to any sort of symbolism or allegory, so for me initially, it was just a passable fantasy book with some interesting concepts. At least until a few books in when he was REALLY obvious about the libertarian poo poo and I was finally starting to notice, and Best Girl spelling it out in her read-throughs and the last horse that was my brain finally passing the finish line.
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Mar 14, 2023 17:05
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DicktheCat posted:My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. "Wizards! Wizards are cool! The first rule must by association also be cool! I will read about this Wizards First Rule! ... What's all this S&M bullshit?" The thought process, and reaction, of a younger Malachite_Dragon.
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Mar 14, 2023 17:21
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The groomers are coming from inside the libertarian party
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Mar 14, 2023 17:28
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DicktheCat posted:For y'all that were fans, I'm asking why? I think I've mentioned these were regular gifts from an uncle, but when I was younger I was a voracious reader with no quality control. My father had a massive collection of genre fiction that probably led to the mess I turned into taste-wise, with my reading early Forgotten Realms novels, Shogun, and old Destroyer pulps around 5-6 at a rate of one every day or two I think it was AP courses and having to speed write critical essays on literature that finally made me slow down and go "waiiiiiiiiit" more often. Also I will never not love bringing up the time Elminster got snorted like cocaine by his distant granddaughter.
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Mar 14, 2023 18:39
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DicktheCat posted:My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. Because Richard Rahl is a power fantasy aimed squarely at awkward, socially inept, introverted, intelligent, loners with non-mainstream hobbies and interests that most people look down on. Maybe, just maybe, if Richard's art can wake people up, so can my fanfic/hentai furry art/OC CHARACTER DO NOT STEAL/whatever.
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Mar 14, 2023 18:52
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secretly best girl posted:…but when I was younger I was a voracious reader with no quality control. This is me. Dragonlance, Forgotten Realms (I still have a soft spot for Pool of Radiance), the Belgariad/Malloreon, basically anything fantasy I could get hands on.* The title of the first book here drew me in, by the fourth book I was questioning myself. By Naked Empire I abandoned the series until morbid curiosity got me to read the last books in the original series. I was kind of sorry I did by the end. *Exception: the Wheel of Time series. I tried twice to get into that when younger and failed. It’s only in the last year that I’ve managed to make progress, up to book 8 now.
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Mar 14, 2023 18:54
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TheCenturion posted:Because Richard Rahl is a power fantasy aimed squarely at awkward, socially inept, introverted, intelligent, loners with non-mainstream hobbies and interests that most people look down on. Don't forget him having an insanely hot girlfriend who is super powerful too
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Mar 14, 2023 19:09
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Comrade Blyatlov posted:Don't forget him having an insanely hot girlfriend who is super powerful too Well, super powerful until she needs to be kidnapped again.
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Mar 14, 2023 19:10
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Wizards First Rule was my first adult fantasy book, before that I was mostly reading stuff like Eregon. Young me felt super cool reading about all this adult stuff and my parents were just happy to see me read so they kept getting me the books. Like so many others in this thread young me was dumb and didn’t pick up any of the ideology stuff until Faith of the Fallen where it became impossible to miss.
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Mar 14, 2023 20:22
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Comrade Blyatlov posted:Don't forget him having an insanely hot girlfriend who is super powerful too Having multiple women insanely in love with him, throwing themselves at him, literally destined to be with him, and *he* gets to be the one to say 'no, thank you.'
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Mar 14, 2023 20:53
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It's better to read Wheel of Time, the protagonists is in a relationship with three women, who are more or less happy to share him. And it's a thousand times less problematic than it's contemporary SoT. In fact, is was quite progressive for it's time!
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Mar 14, 2023 21:03
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I did both, as they came out every year or two, and yeah quite obviously wot is better. Funniest poo poo was goodkind naming something the stone of tears while maintaining nothing was at all inspired by wheel of time
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Mar 14, 2023 21:06
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Rand is also a million times less killy than Richard, and when he wastes a whole bunch of unarmed civilians it's rightly presented as a horrifying act
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Mar 14, 2023 21:06
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TheCenturion posted:Having multiple women insanely in love with him, throwing themselves at him, literally destined to be with him, and *he* gets to be the one to say 'no, thank you.' The first Volcel in fiction?
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Mar 14, 2023 21:25
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DicktheCat posted:My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. It would've taken years of dedicated training, if wielding a chisel wasn't like wielding a sword according to Terry. "His" skill was inherited when he picked up the sword of truth iirc.
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Mar 14, 2023 22:19
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Richard BADkind. A Dick of the Badkind
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Mar 14, 2023 23:28
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Comrade Blyatlov posted:Rand is also a million times less killy than Richard, and when he wastes a whole bunch of unarmed civilians it's rightly presented as a horrifying act Plus Rand is capable of loving up. Which he does a LOT. And then he has to deal with the fallout of his fuckups. Meanwhile, Dickroll is Rick Sanchez levels of "Always right about everything forever," but without even the token 15 seconds of comeuppance that Rick would get once every other month. Even when Richard does something royally hosed and everyone is telling him he royally hosed something, the plot Rube Goldbergs itself to where not only was he right, but whatever he did was exactly the only possible way to resolve the issue successfully and any women who were mean to him about it get sent to the agonizingly slow and painful murder pits.
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Mar 15, 2023 02:00
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DicktheCat posted:My favorite part is that he's able to make the statues mostly because he's special, and that the evil commies are banned from making "beautiful" things, so people freak out. As if irl communists weren't all about giant, majestic monuments, and making good art of any kind doesn't take years of dedicated learning. Don't forget: 1. Those are Christian Commies, and as we know, Christians never made good art. 2. Sculpting is cutting, and the Sword of Truth tells him anything he needs to know about cutting
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Mar 15, 2023 05:29
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DicktheCat posted:For y'all that were fans, I'm asking why? I benefited from only reading Book 1, and it was given/recommended to me by my school 'weekend overseer' (went to private school, weekends were 'freer'), he was probably in his 20's, I was 14 or so, and as it turns out, I was on the spectrum then and now... And even THEN, certain things, I am fairly sure, poked at my subconscious as OFF. The extensive Mord-Sith scene, the whole 'beat and attempt to rape the female main character then she gets a power up and brainwashes the pedophile secondary villain and makes him cut off and eat his own testicles' bit...though oddly, I was fine with the 'kick the seven year old in the jaw' bit, even now: I see it as an extreme case of 'gently caress around, find out'. Of course, if Richard was a COMPETENTLY written heroic character, he would have later realized that even with the extreme extenuating circumstances that allowed even a MILD bit of justification on what happened/what he did, he had still done a terrible thing and tried to make amends, maybe sent a wizard around to heal her severe injuries (I think the wizards have healing powers? I remember during that terrible would be rape scene the female main gets her arm broken and the wizard fixes it). I never read any of the other books, who knows what I would or would not have picked up on. I see stuff now like 'it was not a chicken, it was evil manifest' and nonsense like 'the Temple of the Winds only opens if someone has been betrayed completely, for SOME REASON, so they set up a stupid bait and switch scenario where Richard and the female main are sleeping with each other, but both think it's someone else, and the female main starts acting enthused because she's operating under false assumptions and oh my god this is one step away from that 'Whizzard' comic.
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Mar 15, 2023 07:35
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Whizzard’s Number One Rule
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Mar 15, 2023 11:42
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Spotted a bad book at a local used book store. Lithuania hasn't been spared the Good Kind:
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Mar 15, 2023 12:30
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Which is the one where someone deliberately gets magic syphilis from a sex worker so he can give it to his wife so she can give it to her lovers? Or did I dream that?
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Mar 15, 2023 13:44
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Lamuella posted:Which is the one where someone deliberately gets magic syphilis from a sex worker so he can give it to his wife so she can give it to her lovers? Or did I dream that? Blood of the Fold, I think? The one with 'this totally isn't Bill and Hillary Clinton,' mind control via chopped off nipple, purposefully weakening national defense by letting women serve, and I think that's even the one with chickens that aren't chickens?
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Mar 15, 2023 14:40
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TheCenturion posted:Blood of the Fold, I think? The one with 'this totally isn't Bill and Hillary Clinton,' mind control via chopped off nipple, purposefully weakening national defense by letting women serve, and I think that's even the one with chickens that aren't chickens? Pretty sure it's also the one where Kahlan gets beaten into Loss.jpg
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Mar 15, 2023 14:50
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The not-Clintons were in Soul of the Fire, Blood of the Fold was the book before Temple of the Winds. Basically when Richard escaped the Palace of Prophets and started taking over D'Hara.
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Mar 15, 2023 15:06
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The main bulletpoint, Lamuella, is that yes, a character gave himself magical super-syphilis in order to get revenge on his lover and the people she was cheating on him with (The Not-Clintons)
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Mar 15, 2023 16:01
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it's just wonderful how much love for the world radiates from the very pages of these books.
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Mar 15, 2023 16:30
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I'll still never get over the whole 'its regretable that we will have to fight your own people to free them' followed by immediately gleefully beheading a anitwar protester. Its telling that despite how awful these books are they get especialy spiteful when you get to the parts where the author tries to own his real life political enemies. I've never understood the dislike for Pillars of creation, by that point in my audiobook binge i was really, really ready to not hear a word of dialogue from Rick Rahl and a book largely about hunting and killing him was a lot of fun until the ending. Could have been a great end to the series imo
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Mar 15, 2023 18:05
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I'm pretty sure I've said it before in this thread, but I think a fair bit of it is us mourning (too strong a word, but go with it) what could have been. It had some interesting concepts and themes that could have been really fun to discuss if they hadn't been completely loving ignored, like the idea of ecosystems built around magic suddenly no longer having magic to sustain things like dragons. That, and I'll admit, some of the war crime magic he came up with was interesting to me, like the "use wind to blow a bunch of crushed glass at them", because it was subtle but devastating, instead of big flashy anime magic attacks that I'm used to.
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Mar 15, 2023 18:47
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Goodkind dying is an appropriate end because if he was a real übermensch he wouldn't have succumbed to a fake news disease. Tfw you think you're dick roll but meet a banal end like imperial order red shirt guy.
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Mar 15, 2023 18:49
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Mr Phillby posted:I'll still never get over the whole 'its regretable that we will have to fight your own people to free them' followed by immediately gleefully beheading a anitwar protester. Its telling that despite how awful these books are they get especialy spiteful when you get to the parts where the author tries to own his real life political enemies. The thing I found the funniest is "Ok, stop worshipping this bad guy or I'll kill you! Worshipping someone is bad! Now worship me or I'll kill you."
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Mar 15, 2023 21:07
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I'm still on that "releasing slaves is bad and they'll just enslave you" from
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Mar 15, 2023 21:13
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JcDent posted:I'm still on that "releasing slaves is bad and they'll just enslave you" from  when you've made a dynasty of oppression, you probably have every reason to think they'll do the same to you the first chance you give them.
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Mar 15, 2023 21:37
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If I'm 100% honest, I can see why Goodkind made it as far as he did because there are some real "oh whoa this is new" elements to his work for quite a while. People mentioned the guerilla wizard wars above with the glass, but the sheer escalation of how magical warfare in this world went with things like the Chimes, or the bell that disintegrated armies, or making people who literally de-magic the world by existing? Those are the kind of heights you don't see a lot of tales go to when they talk about THE HEIGHTS OF MAGIC WE'VE FALLEN FROM. Dudes in this world did open war crimes and some folks like Zedd are incredibly regretful for having taken part in it, and others like Jagang are going "and how do we top that?". One of the Belgariad or related novels had a book-long detour because as everyone pursued the villain, he went "I need to buy time and I do not care how we do it" and he sets a plague off in their path, knowing the wizards will be able to keep themselves safe, but that quarantine is going to make travel hell. I don't want every magical story to be grimdark and nightmarish escalation, but in a story that plays in that realm, so few really go harder than "we made fireballs, then lightning, then chain lightning... god help us all, we're monsters". Balefire from Wheel of Time is still one of the most amazing magical weapons in fantasy fiction just because... how do you top it. How does anything top it?! How often do the heroes and villains alike all go "oh gently caress, this is it, this is the line"? Update tonight, I'm at work and can't post the full thing from my phone.
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Mar 15, 2023 22:09
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secretly best girl posted:How often do the heroes and villains alike all go "oh gently caress, this is it, this is the line"? That was something I did also really like about Balefire. 99% of the time, if a villain is all "Hey, let's promise not to use this." it's either a lie or some sort of ploy, but with Balefire? Naw, that poo poo legit terrified everyone so badly that they wanted it to never be a thing again. Except Rand, the main protagonist of the series, who is all "Haha, Balefire goes brrrrr" for quite some time until it finally sinks in that maybe he's hurting the Wheel by constantly spamming the spell that burns people out of it entirely. And to give Goodkind some credit with the magical warfare thing, like I said before about the glass, but even the fact that when Zedd was explaining what to expect, it was something like "If you don't see anything happening, then both sides are doing our jobs. We're going to be so busy casting Counterspell at each other than we're not going to be able to do anything else unless there's a drastic shift in the balance."
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Mar 16, 2023 00:11
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