[Dolorous Menhir]

polishgenius;157758 said:

Kellanved? Tays? Dessimbelackis?

Iirc it was humans that brought down the CG.

There's no indication that human spellcasters have to be any less powerful than those of other races.

That said, I don't think the Seguleh connection fits for Assail either.

When did any of those people fight Bonecasters (that we've seen)?

The only person we've seen fight a Bonecaster was Icarium, and, well, he won.

[polishgenius]

I wasn't implying that they've fought Bonecasters specifically, just that they've shown levels of power to match anything we've seen from a bonecaster and I imagine would have something to say.

Morgoth;157786 said:

erm.. three bonecasters scared Hood away from confrontation.. Do you think a pre-ascended Kellanved, or tays could have done that?

Well, Tays talked down D'rek.

And Kellanved, though admittedly through being a sneaky bastard getting on their throne rather than power, commanded more than one Bonecaster in his time.

I'm not arguing that they definitely would beat an average Bonecaster but it'd be equally fallacious at this point to say they couldn't.

[GingerBreadMan]

The point isn't so much that there are no human "mages/magi/whatever" that can match Bonecasters, just that they are very rare.

If I remember correctly there were 9 Bonecasters in the Logros Clan(sp?)..so if that is an average number then there was something like 20 Bonecasters on Assail between the two clans there...

I don't think we have ever any group that could slaughter 20 Bonecasters...20 Bonecasters defended by 52,000 Imass warriors...

What is even more shocking, is that they cannot extricate themselves from Assail...

What can prevent them from "dusting" away as a means of retreating? From Lanas Tog words it really sounds like they have realized their error and are attempting to retreat but something is stopping them...

The Seguleh we know happen to hate magic, which means they are vulnerable to it...

What I find very interesting, is that Lanas Tog had two swords in her back...If they were fighting some sort of unstoppable warriors I assume she would have died once she got stuck... Instead it appears like she got ambushed and managed to kill whoever put those swords into her...

Perhaps the Tyrants are a group of physcotic men/women who each rule their own "country", and they use those countries to wage war as a way of playing "chess" with each other.

They turned war into a game...and then the Imass came because they saw Tyrants forcing people to wage war for no reason and thus attracted the attention of the Tyrants who decided they had found a new "player" in their game?

Almost sounds like something Kallor would do..except he probably couldn't beat the Imass this soundly..

[Cause]

well the darjhistan thing speaks of tyrants who had cabals of sorcerors and a bodyguard of seguleh. We also learnt that the cabal was more than it seemed. The naems they bore were variations of ones thousands of years old. Iether barak and mammot etc were inheritors of a title or were thousand old sorcerors with unknown powers.

Lets also not forget what the tyrants themselves might be able to do.

[Battalion]

These guys must have access to some form of magic because their weapons (the ones stuck in the Imass) stopped her from dusting down and she couldn't remove them.

[GingerBreadMan]

Cause;157871 said:

well the darjhistan thing speaks of tyrants who had cabals of sorcerors and a bodyguard of seguleh. We also learnt that the cabal was more than it seemed. The naems they bore were variations of ones thousands of years old. Iether barak and mammot etc were inheritors of a title or were thousand old sorcerors with unknown powers.

Lets also not forget what the tyrants themselves might be able to do.

I don't really see the Tyrants doing anything themselves.

But they probably are very powerful, not sure if they are overpowering in the form of a Jaghut Tyrants but probably a lot smarter and more insane in the form of ST.

[Cause]

why insane?

[GingerBreadMan]

Well they view a war with the Imass as a game...

They seem to view war itself as a game...

I assume they have suffered casualties, but again who cares because it is a game..

[tiam]

Abyss;154829 said:

It arises in TB - possibly when Apsalar tells Paran there are TWO continents lethal to ascendants - 7C is one and the implication (not stated) is that Assail is the other.

More clearly, when Cotillion is yelling at Ibra and Monok about no more aid from the TI forthcoming to protect the Throne, he says something like 'You decomposing morons are being chewed up and shat out on Assail and the Tyrants there consider it a game, like snakes and ladders only with swords and big honking rocks and stuff!'.

Okay, he may not have used the term 'honking'.

- Abyss, guilty of imperfect recall.

I thought Assail also but Lether seems like a good candidate too

[Abyss]

Possible, but why would Apsalar known about Lether, while given the Crimson Guard's disaster on Assail (MT, pre-GotM), and subsequent conflict with the Malazan Empire, i would expect Cotillion knew something of it and via his memories, Apsalar.

- Abyss, is not reopening the MT-pre-dates-GotM/no-it-doesn't debate.

[paladin]

perhaps there is a jade presence there that is unshielded by otataral? could be kryptonite for imass?

[stone monkey]

I think you may all have missed a point here. The world would appear to be a much more dangerous place than it was when the Imass first did their Ritual (iirc Tool may have even said as much in HoC - I think it was something along the lines of: "Back in the day I was unstoppable, now one of these Seguleh jokers can whup my ass! How times have changed?" Obviously I'm paraphrasing a bit...)

It would also appear (to me at least) that humans are just better at Ascending than most of the other species. The Imass are dangerous, but a bunch of Ascendants with armies of fanatics (I'm guessing here...) at their beck and call would, I think, be even more dangerous.

I would suspect that some form of natural selection would operate on a continent where there are multiple Tyrants - only the meanest, most powerful and most dangerous would survive.

My guess as to what's happened to the Imass on Assail is that the Tyrants were quite busily and happily fighting amongst themselves when some rather overconfident Imass showed up and decided to teach them who was boss (They have a habit of doing this). When this didn't work they escalated, and more and more Imass were drawn into a conflict they didn't realise they couldn't actually win.

I also suspect that the Imass probably got themselves chopped up in the crossfire between Tyrants using the vastly overpowered weapons they've developed for use against each another.

As to what the Crimson Guard were doing there...Your guess is as good as mine.

[tiam]

Abyss;161282 said:

Possible, but why would Apsalar known about Lether, while given the Crimson Guard's disaster on Assail (MT, pre-GotM), and subsequent conflict with the Malazan Empire, i would expect Cotillion knew something of it and via his memories, Apsalar.

- Abyss, is not reopening the MT-pre-dates-GotM/no-it-doesn't debate.

Im not denying its likely Assail but it seems that apsalar may have known about Lether through Cotillion. If they tried to map the Azath im fairly certain they found another continent that was a bit out of the way. Also him being a god when he possessed her makes me think hes learned a few things. Hed sense things on Lether and ST was likely active against the Edur invasion of the throne since day 1 making Lther a perfectly reasonable choice.


on Assail- The only thing weve seen take on the Imass (really take them on not seguleh champion beating Imass champion) is the KCCM, Iccy,FA and the jaghut. Now its not iccy, unlikely to be jaghut (tyrants might not be jaghut but army might be jhag? not impossible) possibly FA given the name and possibly KCCM/NR who seem to be active although how the last 2 are under the command of humans i dont know. Doubt its seguleh unless in the hundreds of thousands. Personally i beleive a massive human army under an elite group of men. it would be nice to have the undead killing machines beaten by men

[Aptorian]

stone monkey;162138 said:

I think you may all have missed a point here. The world would appear to be a much more dangerous place than it was when the Imass first did their Ritual (iirc Tool may have even said as much in HoC - I think it was something along the lines of: "Back in the day I was unstoppable, now one of these Seguleh jokers can whup my ass! How times have changed?" Obviously I'm paraphrasing a bit...)

Besides swordskill, name one skill or science that the mortal races now surpass the elder races and ascendants in?

It's not that the world has become more dangerous, rather its become a less dangerous and more controlled environment. Why has it become safer because the Elder races are pretty much gone. An army of T'lan Imass slaughtered the city of Aren, and could likewise destroy the Malazan armies. Their weapons cut through metal and magic like a knife through butter.

The elder races are dead or dying, but their hardly worried about the mortal empires.

stone monkey;162138 said:

It would also appear (to me at least) that humans are just better at Ascending than most of the other species. The Imass are dangerous, but a bunch of Ascendants with armies of fanatics (I'm guessing here...) at their beck and call would, I think, be even more dangerous.

I believe it was Paran who theorised that the number of ascendants in a civilization is equal to the size of the population. The bigger the civilization gets the more ascendants might appear, this isn't necisarilly a good thing since the more ascendants are walking around the more trouble seems to show up... probably culminating in the destruction of the civilization. Since there's so many humans more ascendants should exist.

But it's not like that is a problem for the T'lan Imass, they eat up ascendants and gods and craps out the bloody bits.

stone monkey;162138 said:

My guess as to what's happened to the Imass on Assail is that the Tyrants were quite busily and happily fighting amongst themselves when some rather overconfident Imass showed up and decided to teach them who was boss (They have a habit of doing this). When this didn't work they escalated, and more and more Imass were drawn into a conflict they didn't realise they couldn't actually win.

I also suspect that the Imass probably got themselves chopped up in the crossfire between Tyrants using the vastly overpowered weapons they've developed for use against each another.

As to what the Crimson Guard were doing there...Your guess is as good as mine.

The big question is what does the Tyrants on Assail have that The First Empire didnt have. The First Empire's nobility achived something close to immortality, They found out exactly how you ascend and how to make out of yourself a soletaken or D'ivers. The T'lan Imass still came in and wiped up the bloody mess when the whole thing was falling.

What, with the exception of an army of terminator drones, could possibly be on the island that the Imass don't know how to fight?

Maybe the Tyrants are KCCM Patriarchs, and they've created Skynet, just for the fun of it.

Apt, Sarah Conor must die.

[Locke Reaper]

howm about just forgetting about the elder races and thinking along the lines of say a horde of karsa orlong's. Remember what he did to the two degorath in house of chains. now imagine battle crazy gaints running around high on blood oil (assumption of course), no starving ritual bound skeleton is going to stand a chance. add to that a few whacko mages alla hairlock and we have a serious problem for almost anyone!

[Dark Mac]

Aptorian;162377 said:

Besides swordskill, name one skill or science that the mortal races now surpass the elder races and ascendants in?

Letherii swords are the best that have ever existed, and I don't believe any Elder Races have munitions like the Moranth.

[Aptorian]

Letherii steel is the best known steelblades ever made. Seeing as the FA just crumble them up like paper I'm guessing something better was used when the Andii and Edur freed them from their immortal coil. Also is a race better at swordcrafting just because it used steel instead of stone? Letherii steel doesn't brake but neither does a Imass sword. And when you posses enough strength to wield a blade of stone like it was made of plastic, the weight of the weapon isn't a problem.

I new the subject of the moranth munitions would come up... but guess what, the Moranth learnt alchemy from the Edur

[GingerBreadMan]

Maybe I am wrong but here are some advances made since the time of the Elder races-

Magic is more "complex", more finesse is used. Modern mages are not exactly more powerful, they just use their specific abilities with more "knowledge"...kind of hard to describe.

Warfare..Isn't it implied if not outright said that the Malazan empire as well as other armies are using more "modern" tactics and strategies?

Creativity- I know this is an "iffy" thing but it does seem like humans are more creative...with their warfare, magic, etc...

On a side note- What was the deal with Imass and water?

[Aptorian]

The human warrens are of fashioning of K'rul, not human ingenuity. The original question was wether the Mortal races are more poweful/better equipped than the elder races. If you put a bonecaster up against a human higmage, I think most people wouldn't doubt what the result would be.

The Malazan empire is the best the world knows, but to say that the T'lan Imass hasn't faced better human armies before I think would be something of a stretch.

About the water question: Do you mean the fact that theytravel in a muddy form through rivers and on the surface of the sea as dust?

[Battalion]

Aptorian;163137 said:

The human warrens are of fashioning of K'rul, not human ingenuity. The original question was wether the Mortal races are more poweful/better equipped than the elder races. If you put a bonecaster up against a human higmage, I think most people wouldn't doubt what the result would be.

The Malazan empire is the best the world knows, but to say that the T'lan Imass hasn't faced better human armies before I think would be something of a stretch.

About the water question: Do you mean the fact that theytravel in a muddy form through rivers and on the surface of the sea as dust?

Just on that dust scene, where Kallor watches the muddy river running up hill -- best writing in the whole series.