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Argas posted:Kumoko is a slow burn but I felt like it ultimately does the dumb RPG mechanic stuff well. It does it comparatively well because the RPG mechanic is an actual plot device and the main character is unusual (i.e. not a boy/man who is a self-insert wish fulfillment vessel), but I think the main character's interaction with the RPG system is still pretty bad (and I also don't really like her much as a character, even though she's preferable to your average protagonist in similar WNs). I just don't really get the enjoyment out of someone "breaking a (fake) system" and becoming really powerful because of it. The only reason I could deal with reading Kumoko in the first place is that there are other PoV characters who receive focus in contexts that don't involve the main protagonist; without that I definitely wouldn't be able to deal with it. I think the optimal way to do this sort of thing is similar to Forge of Destiny, where the main character is given advantages that make them strong, but in a way that isn't that unusual within the setting and allows for other characters with similar advantages. You can have a power fantasy without discrediting the entire setting and system. I actually enjoy some element of "wish fulfillment" (in the sense of the protagonist being strong and doing fun/interesting things), but it loses all its appeal if it's done in a way that removes tension and hurts the characterization of other characters and the broader setting.
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Jun 22, 2020 21:51
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Yeah, I'd say that the web serial thread is probably posted in a bit more frequently. I'll definitely pick up the ebook Forge of Destiny. I'm due for a re-read and never read the Royal Road version. I hope it does well, because those stories have always been exactly what I wish most other "progression" (for lack of a better description of the "following a protagonist as they become stronger and do fighting in a fantasy world" genre) web novels were like.
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Dec 6, 2020 08:57
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I really like the particular interpretation of cultivation in Forge/Threads of Destiny. The idea is essentially someone ascending to be the personal manifestation of a particular "concept" that represents who they are on a core level, and they gradually transition from just "people casting structured magic" to actually directly overwriting their own bodies and ultimately outside reality within their domain. It's a good way to have "numbers growth" in a way that directly ties into characterization; you can look at a high level cultivator and their abilities tell you a lot about their personality/goals/world-view. It's probably the most appealing "power system" I've seen.
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Feb 22, 2021 21:09
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nrook posted:I finally caught up with Forge/Threads on Royal Road, which I think means I'm about a year behind the newest material. I think the reason why the "aimless" aspect isn't that bad is that the author manages to make the various characters and their interactions feel organic (and also major events happen later that really focus the plot more, so I think that the author may have been thinking along the same lines during the earlier parts of ToD). It's the sort of thing that is unconventional and usually wouldn't work well, but the protagonist just sort of naturally grows apart from people or meets new people (like the large number of people Ling Qi has been meeting recently due to making connections with other major Emerald Seas families as part of her role as Cai's vassal). I think the reason it works is that the story sells the idea that all these other characters have their own circumstances. Like there's obviously this whole backstory for the various named characters Ling Qi hasn't grown close to, and said characters have obviously had their own development "behind the scenes." Biggest example of this is probably the Golden Fields folks, but there's also obviously been a lot of stuff going on for characters like Li Suyin (who Ling Qi has only seen relatively sporadically since entering the Inner Sect) and the relationship between Ji Rong and Sun Liling. In general it seems like the author constantly has a relatively coherent idea of all the side characters' ongoing stories and doesn't change them solely for the convenience of Ling Qi's narrative. It's probably the only thing I've ever read that actually makes a "relatively unstructured account following someone's life in a fantasy world" premise actually work. Regarding Ling Qi specifically, she's absolutely really lucky, but the same is essentially true for almost all other cultivators who are at the top for their age group; Ling Qi's luck essentially just helps put her on par with the various ducal scions (who are all given things by their families that are at least as good as the boons Ling Qi acquires), and we've gotten glimpses into other characters who experience similar luck (namely Ji Rong; I'm not sure if this has shown up in RR yet, but (minor spoiler that isn't really plot-relevant and may have already shown up for you) he ends up getting some sort of heavenly dragon as a spirit companion, which is basically the same sort of good fortune Ling Qi has). So the end result is that she feels very lucky, but not unrealistically so - there's a clear precedent for similar characters, both among her peers and in the broader setting.
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Feb 27, 2021 00:17
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Yinlock posted:i just read the description and it has the exact tone of one of those right wing novels about some ex-marine named JAW TROOPMAN who has to protect his FAMILY AND VALUES from a sinister conspiracy Gonna change my name IRL to Jaw Troopman.
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Mar 19, 2021 09:35
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HerpicleOmnicron5 posted:Ling Qi is great. One of the best character traits of hers is that she actually takes time out from cultivation to socialise and not just disappear from her friends' lives for too long. This wasn't always the case, though; it became a big issue that she was sort of cold/distant from people as a sort of overreaction to social complexity and cultivators trying to manipulate one another, and there was some significant development with her growing beyond that and becoming willing to earnestly interact with others outside of her small closer social circle. And even then, she still ends up growing apart from various people (or having them leave for circumstances outside of their control, like Xiulan). On a strictly moral level, Su Ling is probably the most morally-good of all of prominent characters. She's the only one who seems to naturally care about stuff outside of cultivation - even Ling Qi has to sort of force herself to do so. (spoilers only because I have no idea where the RR version ends)
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Mar 20, 2021 23:19
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I read the most recent Cradle book and it was pretty good. It's nice having Jai Chen/Jai Long involved again. I hope Lindon and Jai Long can get along; Lindon needs a male friend close to his age. It was interesting but realistic for Lindon's re-union with his home to be so bad, though I think that the awkwardness between him and his immediate family is mostly on him and that they'll get along fine once he's willing to open up with them (particularly with his mom and sister, who both seem pretty excited about the outside world). It's funny how apparently the Kazan Clan are literally the only clan/school in Sacred Valley that isn't awful. It was interesting seeing Elder Whisper at the end of the book, since throughout the book I was constantly thinking "what's up with Elder Whisper." I'm wondering if there will be a minor time skip at the beginning of the next book. It seems like Eithan has some ideas about starting their own clan/school and it's possible that a lot of the Sacred Valley artists are early enough in their cultivation that it's possible they haven't irreversibly hosed their advancement yet (since I think Orthos mentioned "redoing" Kelsa's Iron body). I feel bad for Meira. Her life is just complete misery.
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Apr 18, 2021 05:04
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Artificer posted:There's always Threads/Forge of Destiny, eh? Street urchin protag finds herself increasingly embroiled in machinations and decides to make a stand. Colorful cast of characters. Very fun. Speaking of Forge/Threads of Destiny, really random question - what does Bao Qian look like? I feel like I missed/forget when he was initially introduced and I'm not sure how to picture him. His character sort of embodies part of what I like about this series; the protagonist will just "organically" meet new people who may or may not become a bigger part of her life. Normally this is the sort of thing you wouldn't really want to do in a normal-length narrative, but it works very well for this sort of "following a person's life" long serial.
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Sep 12, 2021 06:06
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Tuiri posted:https://forums.sufficientvelocity.c...7#post-12930707 Is where the very helpful Forge discord pointed me towards as his first appearance. Ah, thanks. So basically he's pretty tall/swole while dressed with a bunch of jewels (I had picked up on the latter, but for some reason was picturing him was looking somewhat fat).. lol at Ling Qi taking note of his thick biceps. Stexils posted:id say a bigger problem is that ling qi has way too many abilites to keep track of. most of the fights she just uses her flute + shadow movement + wood regen but she has an excessively large number of other skills Probably the only thing I don't like in Forge/Threads of Destiny is the path the protagonist went down in terms of combat abilities. I choose to ignore the specifics about her abilities beyond what is described in the text. Forge/Threads of Destiny does a good job of keeping that stuff separate from the story, if you want it to be (particularly in Threads, where he's moved away from actually showing Ling Qi's training and instead focuses on actual story arcs).
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Sep 13, 2021 06:52
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Stexils posted:yeah the abundance of skill/training descriptions is not great but its not that bad compared to other webnovels. one i dropped early introduced 5 or 6 seperate power systems one after the other for the MC to be good at. i have no idea why they didnt just combine them all. some people just really want to write korean mmo worlds. I think that the Forge/Threads of Destiny guy avoids the common issue of being inconsistent in the powers they give the characters (usually letting the protagonist cheat in some way and just being a way to numerically show how strong they are, whereas everyone is actually "playing the same game" so to speak in FoD). It also helps that the stats don't technically exist in the story/setting itself and are just abstractions of what's going on (whereas in many stories like this the stats are literal parts of the setting in question). Because of this, they can be ignored by the reader (since they only factor into reader choices and behind-the-scenes calculations).
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Sep 13, 2021 21:37
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Its Rinaldo posted:Forge of Destiny is having a Idol Management B plot for the main character corpse child spirit sister and I’m here for this One interesting thing I realized about FoD, though I don't know if it's intentional, is that IIRC one attribute of the archetype selected for Ling Qi (when the audience was selecting the character background at the very beginning) was having a special talent, which ended up being something like hearing spirits. So it kind of makes sense that probably the single most unusual thing about Ling Qi (compared with other cultivators) is her stronger-than-normal relationship with spirits. I think this was explicitly brought up at one point semi-recently by Bao Qian, who said that, for most cultivators (presumably with the exception of the ones who literally have spirits in their family trees, like Meizhen's snake or Han Jian's tiger), their relationship with spirits are more akin to having a good friend and working partner. So Ling Qi has a somewhat "normal" relationship with Sixiang (though still probably more deeply personal than with most other cultivators), but her relationship with Hanyi and Zhengui is very unusual.
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Sep 26, 2021 01:38
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Katreus posted:Re: Fates Parallel - The thing that I remember the most about this story was that the author basically had to figure out how to undo his own plot point when the MC swore herself to that foreign noble because of the amount of screaming and bad reviews from rr readers who wanted their independent, OP main character. Too bad; that noble seemed interesting, and there are few stories with a subordinate protagonist. I was pleasantly surprised when the readers had Ling Qi choose to go with Cai instead of tutoring under Jiao (which, to be fair, would have also been cool, but I think less interesting because she would have become less involved with the politics of the setting).
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Oct 6, 2021 07:21
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SerSpook posted:gu tai 4 lyfe Yeah this was actually my favorite option, lol. Would have been great. Also meant we wouldn't have lost Ling Qi's coolest friend.
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Oct 6, 2021 23:09
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Zore posted:Honestly Bloodline ruled and my only regret is that we didn't get more of Lindon interacting with the people he grew up with. Besides it was nice to see all of Sacred Valley get its comeuppance after Unsouled and the Adama flashbacks. Hey, not all of Sacred Valley. Apparently the Kazan (or whatever the rock people were called) were cool! Literally the only faction that isn't terrible apparently. edit: I think there was also one of the "elite" schools that, while not exactly good, was at least pragmatic enough to not repeatedly try to backstab the powerful outside cultivators. The leaf one IIRC
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Aug 21, 2022 20:02
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Reading the final Cradle, and one thing I like about Reigan Shen is how he's actually properly cautious/paranoid and acts in ways that make sense from his perspective, even if we as the readers might know otherwise. Like his whole concern about Eithan returning and loving him up if he kills his students - we know it's not an actual threat, but from his perspective it makes sense. He's also smart enough to realize how bullshit Lindon is and expect the very worst from the stuff he does (like early on when he think it's actually possible for all of Lindons friends to suddenly pop out as Monarchs lol). It's an interesting situation where the Monarchs are basically facing their own uphill challenge. I also generally like how this book is proceeding so far. Lindon is becoming ridiculous, but in a way that at least carries actual problems for him. Also the scene where Ziel kills the Weeping Dragon owned.
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Jun 20, 2023 05:35
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I finished the final Cradle. I liked it a lot overall. I think it was about as good as a single book finishing off the series could have been. Highlights IMO: - the aforementioned Ziel part - Malice getting killed and the specific way the story dealt with that. I really liked how Malice was a legitimately sympathetic figure, but there simply wasn't any alternative to killing her. The part where she and Mercy laugh about how evil she sounds (right before the situation was forced into a fight) was pretty sad. - Lindon and Eithan reunion was very heart-warming. IMO Eithan is the highlight of the entire series and generally a very good character. - The way the Daruman fight was resolved, with Eithan choosing to extend trust to Makiel, which in turn made Makiel do the same.
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Jun 22, 2023 04:11
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lol at "OH NOTHING" - Magical Realism
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Aug 28, 2023 23:52
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Darth Walrus posted:I mean, 'gigantic towering brute with resting murderface who's also an adorable himbo' also describes Ichiban Kasuga, and I don't think there's anyone out there who dislikes Ichi. Ichiban doesn't have a resting murderface, though. He's directly described as being charismatic and I can't remember "people being intimidated/afraid based off his appearance" being a thing.
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Jan 29, 2024 20:43
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