[Aptorian]

EDIT: Oh dear this got long.

There will be spoilers for The First Law trilogy and Best Served Cold in this thread.

SPOILERS

Let me just preface this discussion by stating that there is of course such a thing as taste and preferences. The fact that I dislike or disagree with Abercrombies choice in story design is as much a flaw in my perception of what a good story as it may be a failing on Abercrombies part. God knows, it’s a mad world where Transformers is not lauded as one of the best movies of the past decade.

I was thinking of making this thread when I finished The First Law trilogy last week. I hesitated because I honestly had nothing good to say about Abercrombies stories at that point. I made a few posts in the Reading at the Moment thread about my disappointment and was ready to dismiss Abercrombie all together. Then I finished the final book “Last argument of Kings” and I was positively surprised. It was a great ending. It couldn’t fix all the inbuilt faults in the story and there was some clumsy shit in there, but overall it was a great climax and wrap up of the three books. Most importantly it had one of the best “last few pages” to see the reader off. It made me want to immediately read more from Abercrombie, which in and of itself was a herculean effort on the part of the writer, considering my disgust with the way the series is designed.

I just finished reading his fourth book “Best Served Cold” which is, I think, one the best stories I have read in the fantasy genre (all though I don’t even want to call it fantasy, but more about that in a second). It’s a big and romantic tale of vengeance and betrayal, love and war. I think this could be one of those books I could point to in ten or twenty years from now and call a classic. The only real problem I have with the book is that the stupid magical boogeymen from The First Law sneak into the book and ruin what could otherwise had been a perfectly designed cast of good and bad guys that can play off each other in a believable fashion. We went from, yes, this sounds logical to... but if they are superhuman then why bother with Kings or Queens?

And now we come to my big issue with this world that Abercrombie has built. The other lack of logic and the extremely unimaginative structure that lies behind the history of this place.

But before I get into the meat of the things I need to make a small rant about one of my least favorite fantasy trends. This is yet another book in a long string of books I would call “minimalist fantasy”, I don’t know if there is an actual genre named for this trope. Like the Song of Ice and Fire and many other modern fantasy books, there is very little of the fantastic in these books. There is next to no magic in this world, except for some cryptic individuals who keep their cards very close to their chests and some second rate orcs, this might as well be a story that took place in our Europe somewhere between 1200-1600, for all the similarities there is between this world and our own. I hate this kind of fantasy universe. They are boring and strike me as being more unimaginative than realistic. I swear both the fantasy writers and their readers have a chip on their shoulder. They so desperately want to be taken serious by the broader literary world and do what ever they can to look adult and deep and dark and gritty and in the process lose everything that makes fantasy fun. Let’s be honest here, fantasy and sci-fi is the greatest form of escapism we have. Sure, fantasy can also be used to make observations about our society by twisting our societal issues, hopes and fears, into something abstract that can be observed from a different angle but really, fantasy is escapism. It’s supposed to be an adventure. A trip into a different world. To a new land. With strange skies, foreign lands, odd civilizations and unknown properties. Anything is supposed to be possible. Behind the next hill could be a dragon or a giant. Under the sea could be a kingdom of slithering terrors.

And yet most of these modern works refuse to stray further from the world we know than that there is some guys who know mystical shit and once upon a time there
may or may not have been some gods. I don’t see the point of even writing stuff like this. Why not just forgo all pretenses and just place the story in Europe and call it alternative history story. What ifs. I mean, we give the likes of the Sword of Truth a lot of shit but at the least some crazy shit happens in these books. Magical beasts roam the countryside, sorceresses ensorcel (I swear google doesn’t even know how to spell that word) whole kingdoms, evil mages blow holes through armies, etc.

Anyway, that’s neither here nor there. It’s not a fault to want to write minimalist fantasy. How ever when that taste in the genre actually seeps into the worldbuilding and from there into the story, it becomes extremely frustrating.

So lets get to it. I think the First Law trilogy is absolutely shit. Even ignoring the extremely dissatisfying and predictable storylines that end both the first and second book, the actual worldbuilding behind the stories are terrible. It got so bad in the second book that I would have stopped reading if I didn’t have a masochistic need to finish a story no matter how annoyed I get.

THE POINT OF NO RETURN
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
HERE IS WHERE I GET INTO BIG SPOILERS FOR THE BOOKS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

I might get a bit ranty here. Bear with me.

Once upon a time Euz, a demon, walks the earth, banishes all the demons and creates the divide between Earth and hell. He has three or four sons… I think it was and for some reason decides to only give gifts to two or three of them and the last one gets nothing. That was pretty mean. Anyway, afterwards the other brothers are greedy assholes and refuse to share with each other or the one who got nothing.
This leads me to my first issue with this story. Why the fuck are everyone such immeasurably dickish to one another? Is the stars aligned in such a way that upon this earth everyone is a c**t at least 50% of the time? Seriously here. I love when an author builds in flaws in the characters but from the very beginning of the universe, not a single character in the entire series seems capable of thinking two steps forwards or using diplomacy instead of fucking other people over.

But okay. What ever. Be that way. Dicks.

However Bayaz, the guy the entire series revolves around, is himself a giant asshole. Like holy crap. Even before we start to get suspicious in the first book. Even when the full breadth of his assholery is truly revealed, I was impressed with how big of a dick this guy is. It’s not just that he is figuratively a walking avatar of the snake in Eden, that he destroys everything he comes near if he can use it. It’s the way that he doesn’t seem to have a single drop of empathy left. His arrogance is so humongous that it leads to him coming off not just as a dick but also, a bumbling bufon. For the apparent depth of his knowledge, for all the planning he and his associates have done, he comes off as surprisingly ignorant at times. I can already hear the counter argument now "But Apt that is just a flaw of being a thousand years old, you grow tired of mortal minds" but this is bullshit. We see that Bayaz is capable of being deceitful. Of manipulating. So I dare say, he ought to be a heck of a lot better at this business than he comes off as. I mean, already in the first book I had him pecked as being a bad guy. This is a flaw in character design.

Which is where the wheels of this books carriage came off when I was reading and my disbelief ruined the enjoyment of the books.

There is a giant flaw somewhere in the structure Abercrombie builds the stories around. Either there are things about Bayaz and the “banks” that he hasn’t properly explained or there are giant holes in the logic behind the actions of the wizards and their pawns.
I’m just going to start listing all my concerns with the world building here.

My first question would be this: What is Bayaz? Is he a human being? If he is a human being how is he so long lived? We know that the Eaters sustain their health and power through consuming human flesh (which by the way is really fucking weird, surely there is more to it than that right? Otherwise there ought to be splinter sects all across the continent with superhuman cannibals) But how does Bayaz sustain himself? How he gets the magic is never properly explained. It seems to be like touching saidar in the WOT but if this is the case why does an apprentice need to study books? And why aren’t there any natural mages that pop up in the wild. And why aren’t the Eaters using magic like Bayaz does or can? From his talks with that desert mage it sounds like originally wizards didn’t have to draw from the other side? Then where did it come from? Why is the magic leaving the world. Why is this not affecting the Eaters? Why doesn’t this affect the demons?
How does Bayaz know so much and so little? At times it seems as though the wizards are precognicent or have a degree of omnipotence. This is the only way it makes sense that they are able to arrive at certain points or know where or how certainly people will be or behave. It is possible that Bayaz and his companions are telepaths like the Eaters, though it is never demonstrated, how ever this still doesn’t explain some of the stuff they pull off like tracking down Ferro in the desert. All the planning or psychohistoric understanding and analysis (to borrow an Asimov idea) would not explain all that Bayaz does in the three books. And yet, at other times, Bayaz come off completely ignorant. The most important one of these times being the hunt for and failure to find the Seed (which by the way is one of the worst story quests ever).

It is in these moments where Bayaz shows weakness and confusion, that the narrative that Abercrombie builds and finally unveils the complexity of in the last book, unravels. The Kaiser Soze moment does not really impress me when I have just read 2000 pages of Bayaz bumbling across a countryside. It is not believable that Bayaz and only one or two other wizards control an entire continent if they have really grown this weak. So either there is actually hundreds of wizards, or they are precognicent. It’s one of the two.

The real issue I have with the entire series, and I am in danger of repeating the discussion in the “Codex alera” thread here, is the Eaters vs Bayaz and co. The threat of the Eaters is so ridiculously imbalanced that Bayaz and the Union should never have even an inkling of a chance. There are, or where, at least 100 Eaters sent to the Union to help bring Bayaz to justice. I have to assume that there are probably hundreds more of their kind scattered across the history of this world that we have yet to know about, like Irisi and Shenkt from Best Served Cold.

Why on earth would you ever bother with installing mortal kings in kingdoms, or sending tens of thousands of soldiers to fight your wars, if you were but one of hundreds of immortal killing machines? The structure that Bayaz has built up makes sense, if all it was about was controlling mankind and leading them in directions he likes, but against an empire of superhumans it makes no sense. One single Eater could walk into any single castle, any courtroom, any military tent and kill any human they wish. Why fight the Union with an army, when they could just make a surgical strike and kill every Lord and officer in a day or two. With no leadership the Union would fold like a house of cards.

Furthermore, from what we saw in this series, Bayaz himself, is no longer the equal of but one Eater. Not unless he got some kind of upgrade in Ardua when he did what ever it was he did with that nuclear tornado. He is weak, frail, tired, slow and dumb. Just one of the Eaters could punch him into pudding before he even had time to think of touching the other side.

There was so many times during the story that all these inconsistencies clash and made me angry. Why do they all just go along with everything Bayaz says and does? Why don’t they ask the right questions? Why doesn’t Bayaz notice how incredibly jarring the difference of the behavior in his apprentice is? Why didn’t anybody just chop off Fenris the Feared’s arm and leg off and then split him down the middle? If Bayaz wanted Jezal to be the king why didn’t he give him some actual training? If the Union is Bayaz tool against the empire then why does he allow incompetence and greed to rule the Union? Why didn't Bayaz and co. give warning that the Gurkish were comming so that the Union could prepare its defenses?

The answer to most of these things are of course, failures in human thinking, weakness in human behavior, colossal arrogance, which I would say is a theme that all these books revolve around. But it’s, in my opinion not good enough. The pieces do not fit. The logic is flawed. I realize that this was the first works of a new author and undertaking such a project might have been a bit too much but it bothers me that there was never any editor or proof reader that called him on these glaring inconsistencies in the overarching narrative. There is nothing wrong with the pieces that he designs. His writing is in my opinion quite good and only improves from book to book. But the full picture that the reader is left with is a mess.

Oh and the story itself was atrocious but meh… that problem sort of pales in comparison to how disturbingly brittle I find the worldbuilding.

This post has been edited by Maybe Apt: 14 January 2014 - 11:01 PM

[Abyss]

TLDR



Oh ok, fine, i semi-read. Your problem seems to be that JA didn't spell out everything going on between Bayaz, the Eaters and the Bank. You get that there's a history there, but dislike that it's not all or mostly laid out for you.

That's (afaik) the main underlying conflict/sub-plot of the entire series. Expecting more... well, you can draw all the obvious Malazan references.

[Aptorian]

It's not just that there are information holes. It's that things we observe through events and the thoughts of the characters do not add up.

Mayhaps later books fill out some of those holes but that doesn't save The First Law.

[Stormcat]

I love Abercrombie books. I went off with the bloody nine to be a better man, and you have to be realistic about these Things. The end.
*runs off while Apt shakes his fist screaming, "get off my lawn!"*

[Abyss]

Briar King, on 15 January 2014 - 01:22 AM, said:

I have no clue what TLDR stands for

So you're TLTG?

[HoosierDaddy]

I'm going to pretend that stands for Too Legit to Get as it both rhymes and is appropriate and exit this thread on a high note.

[Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai]

i read the bits before the spoiler and can see where you are coming from to a point. I think i may be more easily pleased haha, as my first jaunt into reading was ASOIAF which completely gripped me into the wonderful world of reading. I bought a kindle parperwhite after reading a 100 or so pages of Gardens of the Moon and have now read everything there is to read of the Malazan universe. Now I am reading the First Law Trilogy and to be honest I am enjoying it. It is much simpler in my opinion than the Malazan books and the characters are both fewer by far and not described anywhere near as fully. The main pick up from what you said is the lack of the fantastical, fantasy should be fantastic imo and this, so far just isn't fantastic. Lack of magic is annoying and thus far, no mythical demons, dragons, huge wolves or anything of the sort etc is a shame, if they bring them in then yey. Martin at least had dragons and direwolves and white walkers but that is about it. Malazan has millions of awesome things, soultaken, d'ivers, different weird alien and powerful races like Jaghut, Forkrul, Toblokai, dragons, demons etc etc, this is Fantasy. Fantasy should be huge beasts being killed by huge armies, worlds possibly being destroyed and rescued by the good. These might be cliches but dammit, cliches are those for a reason! I just think fantasy shouldn't pander too much to the closed minded idiots who hear the word dragon then think of geeks and switch the TV off and don't watch Game of Thrones and certainly would not read the books, not even read Tolkien. Big Bang Theory has hopefully improved the genre slightly but not much, it paints the picture of geeks playing D&D and collecting comic books. I am a huge geek, i will be the first to openly admit it, but I am a 6 4 gym goer that cycles, has girlfriends and is not socially inept. Reading some peoples tags on here I see people who are involved in MMA and all sorts, without painting everyone here with a geek brush along with myself I just think the whole thing is misrepresented by the cliche nerd. The whole fantasy genre I think is dumbed down to try to get more readers, and it is a damn shame. Don't get me wrong, I am still enjoying the First Law trilogy but i thought I would add my rant here haha.

[Gothos]

It's quite surprising to me that you spell out the unclear mythology/history and vague machinations and motivations, since you're a malazan fan, as well as the presence of overpowered characters aplenty. Double standards?

Also. Personally I love the "minimalistic fantasy" thing. It makes magic something indeed precious, rare, powerful and arcane. Having a world overflow with magic devalues it, as any other supply/demand + inflation mechanic.

But hey. I'm an Abercrombie fanboy, more or less. Go read Red Country, fantasy western ftw.

[Aptorian]

Abyss, on 14 January 2014 - 11:55 PM, said:

That's (afaik) the main underlying conflict/sub-plot of the entire series. Expecting more... well, you can draw all the obvious Malazan references.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 09:37 AM, said:

It's quite surprising to me that you spell out the unclear mythology/history and vague machinations and motivations, since you're a malazan fan, as well as the presence of overpowered characters aplenty. Double standards?

The thing here is that, I think the Malazan universe is different. Yes, there are epic conflicts and beings so powerful that an entire human army would be helpless before for example a Tyrants might. How ever, there is also checks and balances in place in the Malazan universe. Power draws power. If one power acts, a reaction is certain, now or in a thousand years. There is an understanding here. The gods and ascendants live an endless Cold war held in place the magical equivalent of the threat of nuclear retaliation. So, instead, everything is proxywars and sabotage.

In the Malazan universe even the most powerful god could potentially be taken out by a stray arrow. Claws are there to counter Mages. Mages and soldiers live in a symbiotic relationship. Ascendants are dissuaded from making empires because other ascendants don't accept it, etc.

There is no balance in Abercrombies World. There is nothing stopping the Eaters from just taking over the World. Bayaz and co never demonstrates the sufficient power to be a counter for hundreds of Eaters, of which I assume the Gurkish could always make more.

I could understand it if there were actual philosophical or even metaphysical laws in place, that prevented the powers from directly acting against one another or ruling a kingdom. But there is no such thing. In fact both sides seem to delight in shitting on any kind of basic rules.

Imagine how stable you could make an empire if the Emperor was immortal and near indestructible. So was his council. And his generals. And his assassins. There is nothing in the First Law trilogy that explains why Ghurkul hasn't become The Old Empire reborn (well, besides the more logistical problems of maintaining Communications over such an empire). Maybe that shows up in the later books but as a self contained universe The First Laws power structure makes no sense to me.

This post has been edited by Maybe Apt: 15 January 2014 - 10:46 AM

[Obdigore]

Except a cripple and company captured an Eater.

Some were killed in the attack in the city before Bayaz went super-nuclear-saiyan.

Acting like the eaters are the unstoppable juggernauts that some Ascendants are in Erikson is wrong.

You also have Bayaz fighting them politically and financially as well as being introduced to some others in Best Served Cold who are doing the same.

But the main 'brake' on them is clearly being opened to the other side when/if they ever use their power, assuming eating doesn't channel their power into their specific talents and rob them of the ability to do anything else with their magic. We just don't know. Remember that Khalil has people who go through every slave taken and ever place conquered to find the few with 'the gift' to turn them into eaters. It isn't as if everyone and their mother can eat some long pig and suddenly be faster and stronger. In fact, they made a movie about it you might like. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0129332/

Also, you are really diminishing the power of Money. Money is how capitalist societies turn. Money is how the society that they are in works. The poor die in the streets and the rich live like (figurative and literal) kings. Meanwhile, who equips the soldiers, who builds the weapons, who buys mercenary companies? The man with the purse strings. Bayaz, or his underlings.

The setup isn't Old Doddering Fool vs 100 super-humans, the Setup is Influence vs Direct Might. Bayaz is the shadow general. He stands behind the scenes, pushing pieces here and there, using his money and the influence it buys to get his way. Khalil and the words are the mailed fist, zealous in their belief of the justness of their cause and, apparently, willing to do things they find abhorrent to reach their final goals.

[Gothos]

The difference is that Bayaz doesn't give a shit about "nuclear retaliation" as you put it. See, in the Old Empire where he didn't find the Seed he was furious and hellishly frightened, perhaps for the first time in years he felt the ground shifting under his feet. But he's in the game fully, it's either win or die for him. He's ambitious to a fault as we learn from the past, it's most likely his fault shit went wrong between Kanedias and Juvens. He manipulates the Union just to create a human shield to hide behind when Gurkhul comes knockin'.

As for them Eaters, I was under the impression the Hundred Words is all of the ones created by Mamun and Khalul, with the sole defining purpose of bringing Bayaz down. Such ones as Shenkt seem extremely rare, and he himself unique enough that his personal opposition is enough to keep Gurkhul and Union away. You can conquer a fort with a hundred Eaters, with one even, but you can't hold a continent or keep the peace and money flowing with them. They are dead now, even, but they weren't unkillable before that either, just very tough. We also don't really know what the process of creating an Eater really is.
Why not conquer the world with them? Well, for starters, Khalul seems intent on bringing Bayaz to justice for Juvens' death, everything else is a means to an end. Lands beyond Gurkhul and the Union really seem more of a problem to subdue than gain to further his goals. He would, also, have been successful if not for the Ferro with the Seed and what Bayaz did around it to channel and direct power. Breaking the First Law and all that.

In any case, none of the "big" players give a shit about countries that suffer for their shadow war.

As for power draws power, there's not really much of that to be drawn. Malazan world has dozens of gods, ascendants, powerful wizards, spirits, ancient beings etc to be drawn, in this "minimalistic" fantasy the amount of godlike beings is very limited.

A kingdom where a ruler rules for 200 years would seem strange, and the subjects would react. How would they react I can't predict, but magic is not trusted. A rebelling nation that is being kept hard under heel isn't productive or strong and serves as a pretty bad puppet.


Seems to me you should just play some CK2 and EU4

[Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai]

see too much magic i don't think devalues it, see Quick Ben, Anomander, Beak (to a point) etc etc, there are an abundance of amazing swordsman, mages, dragons/soultaken etc in the Malazan world and it isn't spoilt by it, all sides have the super hard guys and therefore it is all balanced IMO. But again, I am really enjoying Abercrombies world and story telling technique, it is nice getting to know West, Logan and now the rest of his rag tag bunch, so I don't think his books suffer for the less magic and mythology, i am looking forward to more of the books for sure. And more of other fantasy in general, there should be a list somewhere of awesome fantasy that the Malazan community agrees with (on a whole) that is well worth reading, being a novice such as I am, i have to happen upon threads talking about good books and rely on Amazon to tell me what people have bought as well as my books haha, i r super noob!

[Gothos]

There's nothing we agree on as a whole. Tough break.

Not even that Robert Jordan sucks anymore (since he's now enjoying the boost Sanderson gave his image by finishing his work).

We might all agree Terry Goodkind is a terrible writer and person, though.

[Obdigore]

Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai, on 16 January 2014 - 07:50 AM, said:

see too much magic i don't think devalues it, see Quick Ben, Anomander, Beak (to a point) etc etc, there are an abundance of amazing swordsman, mages, dragons/soultaken etc in the Malazan world and it isn't spoilt by it, all sides have the super hard guys and therefore it is all balanced IMO. But again, I am really enjoying Abercrombies world and story telling technique, it is nice getting to know West, Logan and now the rest of his rag tag bunch, so I don't think his books suffer for the less magic and mythology, i am looking forward to more of the books for sure. And more of other fantasy in general, there should be a list somewhere of awesome fantasy that the Malazan community agrees with (on a whole) that is well worth reading, being a novice such as I am, i have to happen upon threads talking about good books and rely on Amazon to tell me what people have bought as well as my books haha, i r super noob!

Just read everything I tell you to and ignore everything Apt says. Also, the angrier Illy gets the more he likes something; just FYI.

This post has been edited by Possibly Brent Weeks: 16 January 2014 - 10:15 AM

[Aptorian]

Possibly Brent Weeks, on 15 January 2014 - 11:02 AM, said:

Except a cripple and company captured an Eater.

I will give you that one, all though I might argue that this was a young, dumb and not very strong eater.

Strength alone is of course not a sure route to Victory.

Possibly Brent Weeks, on 15 January 2014 - 11:02 AM, said:

Some were killed in the attack in the city before Bayaz went super-nuclear-saiyan.

Acting like the eaters are the unstoppable juggernauts that some Ascendants are in Erikson is wrong.

I would argue that the Eaters, at least the stronger ones we have seen, are actually much closer to "unstoppable juggernauts" than the Malazan ascendants. A malazan ascendant has much more destructive potential via that whole efficacy thing, but they seldom display the sheer murderous violence and resistance to damage that the Eaters do. Everyone, except Raest, appears to be a glass cannon in the Malazan Universe. In the case of the Eaters they don’t seem to have much in the way of firepower but they make up for that in speed, strength and durability.

Possibly Brent Weeks, on 15 January 2014 - 11:02 AM, said:

You also have Bayaz fighting them politically and financially as well as being introduced to some others in Best Served Cold who are doing the same.

But the main 'brake' on them is clearly being opened to the other side when/if they ever use their power, assuming eating doesn't channel their power into their specific talents and rob them of the ability to do anything else with their magic. We just don't know. Remember that Khalil has people who go through every slave taken and ever place conquered to find the few with 'the gift' to turn them into eaters. It isn't as if everyone and their mother can eat some long pig and suddenly be faster and stronger. In fact, they made a movie about it you might like. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0129332/

Good point about them needing to fight the right ones to become eaters, but in an empire of millions I would still assume that there was plenty of fodder for your flesh eating killing machine production.

It’s funny I just saw a trailer for Ravenous the other day. A surprisingly strong cast for a film I’d never heard about before now.

Possibly Brent Weeks, on 15 January 2014 - 11:02 AM, said:

Also, you are really diminishing the power of Money. Money is how capitalist societies turn. Money is how the society that they are in works. The poor die in the streets and the rich live like (figurative and literal) kings. Meanwhile, who equips the soldiers, who builds the weapons, who buys mercenary companies? The man with the purse strings. Bayaz, or his underlings.

The setup isn't Old Doddering Fool vs 100 super-humans, the Setup is Influence vs Direct Might. Bayaz is the shadow general. He stands behind the scenes, pushing pieces here and there, using his money and the influence it buys to get his way. Khalil and the words are the mailed fist, zealous in their belief of the justness of their cause and, apparently, willing to do things they find abhorrent to reach their final goals.

Oh I agree that Bayaz tactic is ingenious. He no longer has the power or numbers to directly face down Khalul (or what ever that guys name was) so using money as a tool is brilliant. I really liked how Abercrombie uses that as plot point.

How ever money, ownership and debt only matters so long as we all agree to play by those rules. The Gurkish don’t have to give a shit about about any notion of debts.

Bayaz plays dirty but if you have an empire of millions with tons of slaves and people who worship you religiously you can play a lot dirtier. Capitalist society is dependent upon the flow of money. A monotheistic puppet empire filled with zealots can just throw peasants at you until they drown you in the bodies. Think of how hard it was for the Union to finance 20,000 soldiers.

Just take a look at how fucking scared of little North Korea we all are and then think of how scary the big Soviet Union used to be. And they had to pretend to be working for the people.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

He's ambitious to a fault as we learn from the past, it's most likely his fault shit went wrong between Kanedias and Juvens. He manipulates the Union just to create a human shield to hide behind when Gurkhul comes knockin'.

From his admissions when talking to Ferro in the third book it is clear that everything that went bad was his fault. He stole from Kanedias, fucked his daughter, turned Juvens against Kanedias, killed Juvens and then Kanedias and has been manipulating and lying to everyone ever since. Generally speaking, if it wasn’t for the fact that the Eaters are assholes, I would characterize the Gurkish as the good guys in these books.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

As for them Eaters, I was under the impression the Hundred Words is all of the ones created by Mamun and Khalul, with the sole defining purpose of bringing Bayaz down. Such ones as Shenkt seem extremely rare, and he himself unique enough that his personal opposition is enough to keep Gurkhul and Union away.

You have a point about Shenkt. Even as I wrote the OP I was speculating about Shenkt. Is he special? We know he may have been one of Bayaz students, if not at least an associate of his. Hell he may actually be one of the guys that was trained by Juvens.
How ever we see several of the The Hundred Words displaying the same speed and strength as Shenkt in the third book. We just don’t see them displaying the same amount of skill or experience. Which might be chalked down to Shenkt being older and smarter or them being more arrogant or it could just be how Abercrombie wrote them.
You can’t tell me that the Eaters we see in the Palace, if they were using stealth and subtlety instead of just walking into a fight, wouldn’t be able to clear out whole castles of soldiers.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

You can conquer a fort with a hundred Eaters, with one even, but you can't hold a continent or keep the peace and money flowing with them. They are dead now, even, but they weren't unkillable before that either, just very tough. We also don't really know what the process of creating an Eater really is.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

A kingdom where a ruler rules for 200 years would seem strange, and the subjects would react. How would they react I can't predict, but magic is not trusted. A rebelling nation that is being kept hard under heel isn't productive or strong and serves as a pretty bad puppet.

I don’t agree at all. The strongest glue that can hold an empire together is the belief that the ones that rule are in fact better than the subjects. That they are divine. That they are immortal. That they are unbeatable or at least nigh indestructible. A never changing constant. Most importantly that they are better than you and meant to rule.

Think of how pervasive and seductive the Christian fate has been throughout Europe. People are willing to wage wars, toil in the fields and feed the Church for nothing but stories of Gods and angels and saints and prophets. Imagine if those gods and saints were actually real. Imagine if Jesus Christ was actually the Pope in Rome. Performing miracles. Never aging. Eating a bit of human flesh but only the most worthy, what an honor to be eaten by the Son of God!

Anyone who mistrusts the Prophet is obviously unholy and should be stoned or driven out of their lands.

And again, as for offensive purposes, just sneak into any Bastion at night and murder everyone and walk out again. Easy as cake and utterly devastating to any form of opposition.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

The difference is that Bayaz doesn't give a shit about "nuclear retaliation" as you put it.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

As for power draws power, there's not really much of that to be drawn. Malazan world has dozens of gods, ascendants, powerful wizards, spirits, ancient beings etc to be drawn, in this "minimalistic" fantasy the amount of godlike beings is very limited.

You have misconstrued my meaning. The fact that there is no punishment for breaking the rules is exactly what should mean that the Eaters ought to spread across the lands and take over everything.
There is literally no other empire or pantheon to oppose them. Bayaz is merely a nuisance. How hard could it really be to track down his mountain retreat, sneak in at night and cut his throat?
After that, who is to stop them?
In the Malazan universe you have Azath, Claws, T’lan Imass, Talons, Shi’gal Assassins, Avowed, Forkrul Assail, D’ivers and many other insane things that could pop out of the woodwork at any moment.
What is there in the Abercrombian universe? There’s the demons of course but they are not really any kind of balance.

Gothos, on 15 January 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

Seems to me you should just play some CK2 and EU4

I am afraid to start playing those games. Like when I play Civilization I suspect I would take it really fucking personal when the surrounding countries tried to bully me. I still have a grudge against Joan of Arc ten years after I played Civ 3.

Possibly Brent Weeks, on 16 January 2014 - 10:15 AM, said:

Also, the angrier Illy gets the more he likes something; just FYI.

It’s my impression that Illy gets angry when he likes things, and when he dislikes things, and when he doesn’t care, and when it’s a Tuesday or any other day of the week… generally I would be worried if Illy wasn’t at least a little angry at any given point of the day.

[Illuyankas]

Maybe Apt, on 16 January 2014 - 07:51 PM, said:

It’s my impression that Illy gets angry when he likes things, and when he dislikes things, and when he doesn’t care, and when it’s a Tuesday or any other day of the week… generally I would be worried if Illy wasn’t at least a little angry at any given point of the day.

THE FUCK YOU SAY






Also I got the impression from the trilogy (might be incorrect, been a while since I read it) that Bayaz was good enough at deceiving them to make it too risky for a direct confrontation, and that's besides the possibility of scaling up each side's amount of eaters to the point where we start running out of people.

[Aptorian]

Hmm. Now you are raising an interesting question. You say "each sides eaters" which is a notion I hadn't considered. Through most of the books we hear Bayaz being strictly against breaking the second law and being disgusted with the Eaters. On the other hand we know that Yuru Sulfur is an eater. And Shenkt worked for or with Bayaz. We know that Bayaz has few if any limits so I guess it would be concievable that he could begin to make his own eaters.

Question is. If he so desperately craves power. Why not become an eater himself? I Wonder what the downsides are.

[Illuyankas]

Well, if I could hazard a guess - and I'm just throwing this out there, you understand - I'd say, possibly eating people? The addiction causing a lack of absolute control over his immortal life, having to redo progress on his societal master plan if he gets spotted, etc.

Of course,

Spoiler

who's to say he isn't one?

[Aptorian]

Illuyankas, on 17 January 2014 - 03:40 AM, said:

Well, if I could hazard a guess - and I'm just throwing this out there, you understand - I'd say, possibly eating people? The addiction causing a lack of absolute control over his immortal life, having to redo progress on his societal master plan if he gets spotted, etc.

Of course,

Spoiler

who's to say he isn't one?

I think the guy is a massive hypocrite who believes everything he does is right. How ever I also think tht the fact that Khalul is an Eater is something he uses to justify to himself why he's doing all the shit he's doing.

[Morgoth]

Quote

How ever money, ownership and debt only matters so long as we all agree to play by those rules. The Gurkish don’t have to give a shit about about any notion of debts.

I'd like for you to provide for a historical example of this being true. The Gurkish are not steppe raiders. They, like the union, would need to raise armies, pay for the soldiers, weapons, armour, provisions, ships, carts and everything else required for the massive undertaking of a full scale war. If they stopped paying their debts suddenly they'd be unable to continue the war effort and it would collapse.

Even the crusades and the jihads of the medieval period were dependent on a steady flow of cash.