[Cain]

Rake VS Osseric



Dun dun DUN

[Nequam]

Cain;313201 said:

Because, (Not that there is a lack of excitement anywhere in his books right now or anything) but it does add some more flavor when you have these Tyrannical bastards that outwit and out fight the good guys every now and then. There has been no evil constant in the series and the playing field is always shifting. I need one singular entity to come to the forefront and me saying, "Wow, this guy is freakin badass" And as Apt said, yeah they are gonna come at you like spider-monkeys when you use your power for your own evil purposes.
But with how many supremely powerful beings there are walking about in our favorite world im suprised none are like. "Screw these spiderwebs we weave im just going to cut right through them."

More flavor? I'd say more boring. More typical, and just un-cool. Things aren't simple enough to have any evil person prancing about. Nobody is truly evil, even people such as Hitler, Stalin, and Mao (as mentioned before) were not evil. They beleived they were doing what was best. And they did (well not really Hitler) bring some good things to their countries.
If there was a super powerful mega-evil guy walking around foiling everyone elses plans this series wouldn't stick out. It wouldn't be what I love, it would be, like I said, boring.
However, there are a lot of people who do bad things. There are a lot of very powerful people who I would call badass. I don't see why you would ever want a constant super-villian to ruin the series.

Cain;313267 said:

Rhulad is actually fairly weak in both power and swordsmanship skill.

WHAT!?!
Did you not read the book? Rhulad was one of the best fighters in the series so far. Not inherently, but through his thousands of deaths he became incredibly powerful, and incredibly skilled. I don't see where this conclusion came from.

..Though I do think Shadowthrone is kinda more intersting than the Crippled God.

[Cain]

Nequam;313329 said:

WHAT!?!
Did you not read the book? Rhulad was one of the best fighters in the series so far. Not inherently, but through his thousands of deaths he became incredibly powerful, and incredibly skilled. I don't see where this conclusion came from.

..Though I do think Shadowthrone is kinda more intersting than the Crippled God.

Hes killed everytime someone fights him : P They might as well of had Kettle step up and bat him down if she was there.

[Nequam]

No, he certainly isn't. Where did that come from? He often died when first becoming emporer I'm sure. But it is failry evident that he killed many people without dying.

Plus ins't being able to come back from the dead, allowing you kill anyone, no matter hwo much stonger they are. (of course how he died was a neat little trick that I applaud Karsa of executing.)

[DCS]

I couldn't disagree more... There have been a number of great villains that stand out in my mind, specifically because they do not fit the evil overlord trope and make such lists. I think the Crippled God has been a great villain, getting everybody riled up from behind the scenes and I very much think we'll get to see him come into the foreground on an unchained terror before the end. Kallor has had a few moments and will have more soon. Shadowthrone, whether you think he's a villain or not is a phenomenal character. Karsa, Laseen, Raest, Pannion, have all been portrayed well and the best part about any of them is that are NOT villains all the time to everyone. Even the petty villains like Feather Witch or Mallick Rel and Korbolo Dom have depth that make them memorable if not classic. That's gritty, realistic writing and why I love this series so much. There is no such thing as one personification of evil that everybody hates...I can't stand one dimensional characters like that and am so glad SE has stayed away from them.

[Cain]

Well, the way I saw it Kallor was simply biding his time for something and so we haven't seen him bust out any true power yet. He might soon hatch all his evil maniacal plans and bust out a 6 foot long sword! Perhaps he will be my Sephiroth. Who will be my Sephiroth? : (

Or on the other hand, like all the other "gritty" "realistic" quasi-bad guys you like in the story Kallor will sacrifice himself for some greater good and we will have a change of heart. -SIGH-

[DCS]

Guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one, because I sincerely hope nobody becomes your Sephiroth ;-)~ I've never met anyone in my life who is totally one dimensional and that's why I'll continue to call SE's work gritty and realistic, from a character stand point, until he proves me wrong by introducing flat villains that these powerful, selfish, egotistical and ambitious Ascendants all agree to hate...right before they get together and swat said flat villains into the ground.

[Aptorian]

Lets not completely derail this thread... but, calling Sephiroth one dimensional, wow. You didn't play the game did you?

[Ain't_It_Just_]

I thought having no main enemy was the point of SE's type o' writing?

The closest we get to PURE EVIL types is Korbolo Dom, Hanradi Khalag (when he wanted to annhilate the 14th, that is), Scabandari, etc. Even Kallor, who killed WJ, I don't really think he's evil. I hate him, yeah, but i don't think he's evil.

The same sort of thing works for good guys; QB and Kalam are evil and not very nice, but they're good men and honorable. I prefer it that way.

What annoys me about the Pantheon it is ALWAYS "something for something" with them. Yeah, it's their nature, but what happened to Common Decency? The nicest god (stupid stupid stupid) so far is probably Mael, imo. Followed by K'rul. Ofc, it's probably because they haven't killed any of our favourite characters or something.

[Shayed]

Ain said:

The closest we get to PURE EVIL types is Korbolo Dom, Hanradi Khalag (when he wanted to annhilate the 14th, that is), Scabandari, etc. Even Kallor, who killed WJ, I don't really think he's evil. I hate him, yeah, but i don't think he's evil.

Kallor NOT evil?! Before he was cursed he incinerated an entire continent and its people just because he didn't want to relinquish it to the Elder Gods.

Speaking of Kallor, what is he exactly? He said he was already there when the Imass were but 'children' so he can't be human, can he?

[Aptorian]

I believe the quote stems from GotM, so either it's just an error or Kallor just likes to boast.

He's a human being so he wasn't around when the Imass were children.

[tiam]

Id say that although as you say we have very little 'pure evil' bad guys we also have very few 'pure good' good guys. The Kalam QB pairing thoughout the series is a level of goodness but ones a diabolical genious and ones an assasin. Thats one the better parts of the series the moral ambiguity.

Raest was a complete bastard and was bullied by both the Imass and Jaghut. If anyone breaks the status quo they are usually set upon by the others who dont want to rock the boat due o the power of convergence. For sheer dominion over their subjects possibly the Shal Morzin 3 might qualify

Apt- actually its a passage at the beginning of GOTM (where the poems usually are) but is also repeated in MOI.

[Dancer+]

Kallor is 121,000-122,000 years old from memory. Where that fits into the timeline, you work it out

[Ain't_It_Just_]

Shayed;313720 said:

Kallor NOT evil?! Before he was cursed he incinerated an entire continent and its people just because he didn't want to relinquish it to the Elder Gods.

Speaking of Kallor, what is he exactly? He said he was already there when the Imass were but 'children' so he can't be human, can he?

No, no no no no. When someone does that, you call them a dick. Or a complete prick.

[Pig Iron]

Mael is sort of decent, which only proves the point since he seems disgusted with the whole god thing and tries to stay out of it. Of course creating a power vacuum exploited by his priests and worshippers, some of which are the most evil in the series.

Or the Tlan Imass, cool guys all around but who sacrificed everything human (Imass) in themselves to genocide a race of gentle hermit giants. Eh gentle giants who sometimes go powermad, or even if they don't at other times create ice ages cause they feel like it.

And so on and so forth.

[Dancer+]

The Imass were so misguided. Only a few Jaghut were tyrants, none of the rest had any interest in tyranny whatsoever. The other Jaghut were just as disgusted as the Imass, and helped to kill some of the Tyrants. Instead the Imass decide to commit themselves to an eternal vow to totally wipe out a race. How unlikely? How stupid? How misguided?

Kilava had sense at least.

[Aptorian]

Dancer. If you had a type of creature in our world, that could potentially destroy a continent. Enslave nations. destroy the environment and violently alter the climate... what would you do? It had only happened once or twice before but every single one of these rare beings could one day enslave you or wipe out your civilization.

I don't think the Imass were a terrible people. Just zealous in their strive to wipe out tyranny. It wasn't the Jaghut themselves they wanted to stop it was the subjugation of one race by another they denied.

Remember how Onrack remarks that if Trulls people became an expantionist tyranny, or something like that, the T'lan Imass would have found a worthy cause in the Edur. That's why they are destroying themselves in a war they can't win on Assail. They are compelled.

[Dancer+]

Aptorian;313838 said:

Dancer. If you had a type of creature in our world, that could potentially destroy a continent. Enslave nations. destroy the environment and violently alter the climate... what would you do?

Obviously declare war, and stir the hornet's nest. Forcing the race to potentially destroy continents and alter climates to escape from my zealotness.

Don't get me wrong, I like the T'lan Imass. And I hate tyranny to the same extent but they went about their war in too much of an absolute way. They destroyed their souls, an honourable sacrifice but I feel not all of them were willing to make that sacrifice. Many of them were unrightly dragged into this mess, and paid 300,000 years of suffering for this cause. It's saddening, which is the main reason why I grieve.

If they denied tyranny, they need not have eliminated all Jaghut; their vow went too far. They should have been more restrained and co-existed with other Jaghuts to eliminate the tyrants. And by that motion, conduct the war with secrecy much more in mind. Honourable intentions, right idea but too far (why every single Jaghut, unrealistic and unfair aim - how would they expect to ever be free, complete genocide is almost impossible...). Would you agree?

[Aptorian]

Yeah but I'm not an Imass. They are pretty intense creatures. I don't remember any Imass, except Kilava, refusing or regretting the ritual. They feel the pain of the loss of their mortal selves, but most of them seem to believe in their philosophy of total war.

I also think that if I was a general of, say the united states armed forces, I'd try to destroy them even if they swor to stay peacefull. They're just too dangerous.

[tiam]

What must be remembered is the fact that all Jaghuts were killed not because the Imass beleived they were a threat, like Apt says, of destroying continents. If so then the Imass would have to destroy the Tiste races and also every tther ridiculously powerful being aswell including the Imass who im sure were all agreed to quite easily polish off a continnt if they really wanted. They were all killed so they couldnt produce more offspring to give rise to more tyrantts. As for any Imass not regretting or refusing the ritual Tool himself refused it as did a couple of others. Its explained in MOI that many did not want the ritual and that it was simply the majority that did making it a fairly democratic decision.

Dancer- Also although the Imass have clearly lost sight of there aims i think the only comparable scenario would be that if Christians found out tht God was say a dolphin. i know that sounds completely ridiculous but imagine another creature of intelligence comparable to humans claiming godhood. Raests POV in GOTM makes him out to be a complete bastard as his godhood was simply for his amusement.