[Sick@Simpliciter]

Hi all,

I'm a new recruit of the forum and I'm currenty on my first read through (right now I'm on chapter 2 of DoD)...

When I read the final sequence of Dassem in TtH I couldn't quite understand the motifs of his actions... after reading the forum (in topics that weren't meant to be spoilers) I grasped that he wanted to get revenge on Hood and that actually getting revenge on Hood was the main drive of his life!

now I can't remember where during the series I should have come acquainted with this notion... I didn't read tRotCG so maybe that's where this piece of info was contained?

I'm usually a careful reader (even if with SE sometimes that's not enough) but I must have totally missed this big point of the story, resulting in a very frustrating reading of the Dassem actions in Darujhistan!

Anyway now that I know the motifs, I still don't understand the evolution of Dassem's story arch in TtH... I seemed to remember that he shipwrecks on Genabackis and then he's rescued/helpes by the Shadow duo and after that he decides to point north... how does it know that Hood would manifest himself in Darujhistan? Was it by chance or maybe by ST design?

I hope you could help me with all this Dassem mess that I've created in my mind!

[Malbolge]

Dassem has been after Hood since the last Chaining of the Crippled God, where Hood (somehow) used Dassem's daughter, or did something to her, that ended with her being dead/left in Tremorlor (Fiddler et al find her body there in Deadhouse Gates), and Dassem renouncing his position (as Champion/Knight of Hood/High House Death) and swearing vengeance upon Hood. Or, at least, that's the most common interpretation of what happened.

It's one of the things that is teased out through the books, rather than being explicitly stated. Also, there is a lot of possibility for interpretation of the situation, which should possibly be avoided currently, if you're just finishing TtH, for fear of spoilers from the later books. I know that there is some elaboration in ICE's first 2 books (NoK and RotCG) about Dassem's past, as well as some in tCG.

Edit: As to Shadowthrone/Dancer's designs... again, open to interpretation, and also elaborated further in the last two books. But, for now, just think about what ST/Dancer pointing Dassem towards Darujhistan ultimately achieved, and how that relates to events to come, and ST/Dancer's designs.

This post has been edited by Malbolge: 29 August 2012 - 01:40 PM

[Abyss]

It's mostly laid out in MoI in the discussion between Envy and Krul.
NoK has some additional details.

[Sick@Simpliciter]

Re-read the conversation in MOI... indeed that helps understand Dassem character better in retrospective...

thanks for the help