Except that wasn't your original point. You argued that no one in the water tribes could have been considered a civilian - and therefore the fire nation would have been in the right if they had butchered everyone there.

Which is stupid.

Now you further contend that the rules of engagement in our world somehow apply to this show. Here's a newsflash: they don't. Not only is it a different universe altogether, but even if they had the same values as us, you're forgetting something (and I'll bold, italicize and underline it for you):

The fire nation is committing systematic genocide of the entire known world.

Why the hell would they even bother with honoring whatever 'rules of engagement' exist?

Except that the back story is identical to canon, supposedly. All the characters do the same stuff as they do in canon until the story starts. Ergo, we can judge this story by canon standards.

In fact, I believe that we can judge any story by canon. How else would characterization and development be assessed? Without canon, you could make Aang a monster, Katara a manipulative bitch, Zuko god and no one would call you out on it.

Oh. Wait.

Further, if you're going to alter the entire universe - it's no longer fanfiction, but a goddamn original story. If you keep elements of canon in, and introduce new ideas, that's fanfiction (and also what this author has done). Also note that this is not a crossover - and hence only canon rules can apply here (unless new rules are added, then there had better be a good reason for them): there are no mixing of rules.

To continue, new ideas should not be introduced for the purpose of making the bad guys 'misunderstood' and make the good guys look bad. Basically, Snape is a douche and Dumbledore is not a manipulative bastard. In this universe: Zuko is a douche, and the Gaang are not misguided bastards.

Cappadocian, I'm not trying to pick a fight with you personally. But you seem to have a bit of a fandumb with regards to this fic and/or the fire nation. Because, to me, your entire argument has been "you can't say that the story itself sucks because you're looking at it from an outside perspective, because you have to judge the story in itself, and not by any other standards". And, unfortunately, this type of argument usually comes from fans of stories such as Methods of Rationality - where the fic would fail miserably if judged by real-world/canon standards.

In essence, I don't mind this new world that the author created. It's got good ideas, and some measure of originality. What I absolutely hate about this story is the absolute butchering of characterization - from making the Gaang hypocritical vigilantes to the absolution of the entire fucking fire nation. This story reads like Eragorn - Zuko is Eragorn, Iroh is Brom etc. etc. And no one in their right mind would read Eragorn.

TL;DR: the fic had some good ideas that were implemented horribly. Readability is hampered by the destruction of canon personalities, and reads like some one decided to combine Avatar with Zuko fanwank.

2/5

Note: the author's other stories are better, and worth a glance through.

 

While the author makes changes to canon, they are well done in story. The writing is engaging and the characters solid. Its a compelling read that ill be following.

5/5

 

Since when? The last I checked, the only genocide they comitted was wiping out the Air Nomads a century before the series even began. The Southern Water Tribe doesn't count, because they were gradually worn down in legitimate combat action, not systematic, indiscriminate slaughter.

The Northern Water Tribe doesn't count either, considering that Zhao acted alone, and if I remember correctly, only wanted to wipe out the power to bend water, not the people there.

The Earth Kingdom certainly doesn't count, seeing as how the Earth civilians conquered by the Fire Nation have not been murdered, but instead allowed to live as citizens of their conquerors.

Where is this "systematic genocide of the entire world" that you speak of? 'Cause, to me, it looks like you're confusing conquest with genocide, two completely different things.

 

The only time possible genocide really comes into play (besides the killing of the Air Nomads) is at the end of the third season when they decide to burn everything.

Also, you have to keep in mind that the series was targeted at a younger audience, so killing was pretty much omitted. Trying to make strong conclusions based on who was trying to kill whom is difficult.

 

I feel I'm going to enjoy doing this for the time being even if it is a method to appease my narcissus complex.

I would also like to add, that the reason they likely decided to scorch the earth kingdom was because Aang/Koizilla destroyed most of their invasionary forces at the north pole. Otherwise there's really no tactical reason for the destruction of that many resources. Of course in canon the Fire Kingdom was basically in it for the evil.

Once again I feel it's completely self serving but I have already addressed this point so...

In short the Denarian Trilogy was hampered by the complete rewrite of Harry's personality, into an asshole and a mama's boy. It had many ideas with the crossover that never seemed to mesh well with either universe. The main villain's that weren't OC's were changed from complete monster's with no logical motivation into different kinds of complete monster's with no motivation. It's like someone tried to combine Dresden with HP fanwank. Still the writing makes up for it if only slightly.

3/5

Interesting I shall do that, after I watch through streams of avatar:TLA.

 

I disagree so hard.

Yeah, because all but the one or two dozen people in the south were warriors. Wait, no, I don't buy it.

Uh, Zhao sure as hell did not act alone. He called in help, got permission for it (or at least wasn't stopped), and had the entire Nation's backing.

And they didn't show any sign of caring if you could use ater-bending or not, though they did indeed want to wipeout all water benders.

Yes, they are only beaten down and exploited, often to the point of death.

Which is so much better.

Where the Fire Nation is concerned, one has a bad tendency to resemble the other.

No, they were just waiting for Sozen's Comet; this wasn't anything sudden, everyone knew it was coming.

Uh, no it wasn't. They'd been waiting for Sozen's Comet for a long time for that exact reason.

 

Why? Explain where the flaws in the characters are, without resorting to going "CANONCANONCANONCANONCOPTER"

From what I know canon lore wise, the southern water tribe was subject to small amounts of raiding. Add in that it WASN'T JUST that village that sokka lived in, but a multitude of villages spread across the coasts. Their basically Pure Inuit, while the Northern Tribe has come together as a survival strategy. From what I know of canon, again, the benders were either killed or separated out. And the civilians were allowed to remain, with the knowledge that should they raise havoc, havoc would be raised on them. Again, not unlike the Romans.

http://avatar.wikia.com/wiki/Southern_Water_Tribe

Sokka and Katara's tribe may have even been an exiled tribe because they chose to send their warriors out to sea.

Ummm, yeah, whachu talkin bout, I have a feeling that if the fleet had known Zhou planned to kill the moon, Uncle and the Lotus Society would have known in an instant. His fleet, he was the fucking admiral, he was the navy command for that operation and for the entire fleet in the ocean. He probably got approval from Ozai, who is insane.

AGAIN, as shown by canon, the fire nation chose the smart path of not killing everyone, and the earth bender were rounded up on barges. Sooo, unlike the Romans, who would have simply slaughtered them.

Such is the price of imperialism, research Rome more, conditions for the people conquered were harsher than most. But if they were loyal to Rome they go access to technology they had pretty much never seen before. Along with a vast number of immigrants to settle in the lands that were conquered.

Better than complete genocide as you suggested.

WHERE? SHOW US? The benders were put on boats, we get it, Fire Nation were Nazi's in canon, they aren't here. Just like Harry was a stupid kid in canon, but he's not in pretty much everything written by a DLPer.

After Aang and his buddy throw a book at and steal from a VERY powerful knowledge spirit. Otherwise, only the fire nation knew. Which means, that givin the tactical circumstances, they would have had a choice, use the fleet and MASSIVE invasionary they have and invade the north pole, taking them out handily. While simultaneously using the forces they have outside Ba Sing Se, to crush the opposition within the city, once again taking out any bending opposition handily.

It's a bad move tactically and logistically to scorched earth the only major land mass around. You lose the majority of resources you could have gained in food and wood, only to destroy a population they had already had pacified before the avatar started mucking things up. Again this is a major plot hole, why would any sane leader do this? The value in slave labor alone would have made up for any reason to just nuke it.

The only way it makes sense, is if the primary amount of their forces were tied up in holding Ba Sing Se, while the other primary columns were destroyed by Gojira the younger. Thus not leaving enough troops to hold the given land mass when you use normal methods of conquering. And having to resort to a massive population cut.

In fact the air ships they use aren't developed until around 6 months before the comet if I remember the timeline correctly, so they couldn't have had a MASSIVE 100 year plan to kill the earth in one fell blow from the air. Instead it was likely cobbled together out of panic for the losses they had taken and a lack of another viable strategic route.

And another thing, the Gojira incident probably wiped out a significant portion of those who would help form the baby boom generation after the war. So if they didn't do something about earths population, they would merely have to wait 10 years and Earth would be able to overwhelm and overcome them merely by existing.

See when you think about it logically and with the consequences that would have formed in the fringe of Aang's leaving, you can almost start to see a fire nation who is, "GASP, EGADS," HUMAN.

 

Canon is the best way to note bad characterization. Character flaws, on the other hand, are generally regarded as a good thing, to make the character relatable.

Hate to break it to you, but the Romans were hardly the paragon of virtue that you seem to think they are.

Evidence plox? I don't see why sending your soldiers out to fight for your nation makes your tribe exiled.

Because it's so smart and enlightened to enslave people.

Once again, Rome (both S.P.Q.R. and Empire) wasn't very virtuous at all.

But by your argument, the Vietnamese should be grateful for French Imperialism? The Native Americans and Africans should profusely thank Europe for 'civilizing' them?

I mean, they got access to technology they had pretty much never seen before, along with a vast number of immigrants to settle in the lands that were conquered.

Except when Harry becomes more bad ass, his enemies also become more bad ass, leading to a potentially epic story.

Here, the Fire Nation guys are suddenly good, and their enemies (i.e. everyone else) has to become bad to have conflict. Which would be fine and all, but the Fire Nation is, uh, winning the war, and hence just leads to non-tension. Bored now.

It's not a bad move to deprive your enemy of resources. Scorched earth is a viable tactic and is both logistically and strategically sound when you're on the retreat and need to slow down the enemy army.

Also, I'm not sure why you brought scorched earth into this discussion, but if you're referring to to Sozin's Comet, the Fire Nation wasn't going to use it to BURN ZA WARUDO, but using it as a crazy sort of power-up that would let their benders reach god-mode and destroy their opposition in 'one fell blow'.

Lack of airships don't mean lack of plans. A hundred-year plan does seem unlikely, but I'm sure they were planning on using Sozin's Comet as significant power boost to win them the war.

Now you're pulling shit outta your ass and trying to sell it as gold. So in ten years, there'll be a bunch of kids who... will do what exactly? Run around and hit your soldiers with sticks? They won't have bender training, cuz the benders will be engaged in the war, as will the soldiers etc.

Sure they're human. They are also bad. Don't kid yourself. They may have cool looking armour and steam power, but they are also highly imperialistic at best, and bat shit insane at worst.

 

ReverseSide has addressed the bulk of your post, but there was one think I wanted to point out.

Read what you link.

The "small" amount of raiding that you seem to think happened was enough to drive the Southern Water Tribe close to extinction.

 

This was the best thing I've read in a while. Great characters, enjoyable plot, conflict that just won't stop.

Oh wait, I was reviewing this thread.

 

I would give this a thumbs-up if I hadn't used all of mine up. Consider this post a raincheck for one.

 

I meant how she made the characters unrealistic. As in the flaws in characterization. Without referring to "CANONCANONCANONCANONCOPTER"

She's made Katara, insane as someone who's spent the past 10 years after watching her mother die with a near absent father, and pent up emotions from attempting to keep a strong face for her family. Never really talking about her grief or really coming to terms with it at all.

No empire was. That's what I'm saying, he seems to think the abuse is unique to the fire nation.

Not so much exiled as split and excommunicated. Because that village didn't want to take the heat for the warriors out at sea. It's just a theory because the wikipage mentioned the presence of other villages, yet, I haven't seen Katara or Sokka talk about it.

Yes, because it's so smart and enlightened to take children away from their parents. Or so not let women fight. Or to arrange marriages. Or to mind bend people into slaves for revealing there's a war outside the walls. THAT'S THE POINT OF THE FIC, no culture is truly evil and no one is truly good. We'll likely see the fire nation get darker, the fic version is that EVERY nation has declined. We'll also likely see the other nation's getting lighter.

Also to clear up an issue to people reading this thread, Vathara doesn't glorify how the fire nation is now, she glorifies how it was. And how none of this would have ever happened had Kyoshi thought before dissolving a centuries long ruling system. And had Roku had enough knowledge of his own people to repeal that ruling.

As before, so to now.

Not at all, so quit twisting my words, what I'm saying is that there is a price to nearly all forms of invasion, as we are seeing now in the middle east, as we saw in Vietnam, and as we saw in WW2.

They also got access to, better trade, more potential for wealth, more exotic goods, an ingress in skilled laborers. An ACTUAL system of roads and infrastructure in the case of Africa and the Native Americans. Again, open your eyes, I'm not saying it was all good. Just that there WERE benefits.

Focus isn't on the war, I wish I could make a personal attack here, but I won't because it would accomplish nothing. The focus is on the cultures and personalities clashing.

Also tougher enemies? Koh the Face Stealer. A VERY old dragon. The Wan Shin Tong. All of their innumerable servants. None of these were ever faced more than once in the course of Avatar. And all of them were angered by Aang. All of them, if human kind is to survive need to be destroyed.

Only Ryuugi was thinking they were using it to genocide the entire earth kingdom. Thus taking over the world, only doing so would accomplish nothing, they wouldn't be able to farm the land for a good bit. They wouldn't have the trees to build houses, they wouldn't have the citizens to use as slaves on farms. They wouldn't have the air quality to mine, they wouldn't have the livestock to eat. Basically what happened to Hitler in Russia would happen to the fire nation. Russians retreated burning forests and farms, and collapsing mines in some cases. Germans stretched their supply lines too far, so that when the russians actually attacked, they were well fed, while the Germans had been nearly starving for quite a while. This is what allowed Stalin to win the eastern front almost entirely on his own.

Exactly, Ryuugi was the one that put forward scorched earth to genocide everyone but the fire nation.

Exactly.

OK so first you have to know the facts behind a baby boom. Basically when a truce is called, you have the people in bases their to hold the land for a few, and you send what you can't support home for awhile, these people breed like crazy, thier happy, their mostly healthy, and they tend to have kids.

So by killing the fleet you've just killed 100,000 to 500,000 possible breeders of the nation that is supposed to be a very far second in terms of population. Now the earth kingdom has millions of citizens in Ba Sing Se alone, not even counting the lands around the earth kingdom, truce has been declared the land is being held, these people are going to start fucking as well. So who's going to make, or has already made more kids, 1.5 million people or 16, million people? By ten years, the children that had been born would be exiting training by the rebels, while the children that had been born after would just be entering training. Either way in about 2 years after that, the fire nation would start getting over run.

Research what the common Nazi citizen thought of the Holocaust. Also research Millgram's Experiment, and the Stanford Prison experiment.

Then think about what those imply about everyone on Earth. We're all flawed equally, there's no denying that.

See what's happened in the fire nation, is that the body that would normally be filtering out/killing actual psychopaths is now promoting them.

I would type more on these posts, but I went to the state fair today, had a blast, and got my girlfriend to ride a... Ride I guess, for the first time since before her injury.

 

Non, my friend, I wish I could write this well. Or even write the amount Vathara writes.

 

I'm actually enjoying this, strangely, Cappodician. And yet frustrated beyond belief that Cappadocian's arguments point to nothing in particular.

Okay, I'll try this once again. As I and others have pointed out so many times before, canon is not only an acceptable way of looking at a character, it is also the preferred way. Generally speaking, people want, for example, Aang to be the Aang from canon, not a new character thinly disguised as Aang by name alone.

If you choose to accept, as is your prerogative, that the canon characterizations of the characters are half of what makes Avatar, well, Avatar, then admit that Vashara has butchered them for the sake of the author's idea. This creates a dissonance between plot and character, which is jarring when you read the story.

So, please, tell me why I should read about these gross perversions of canon characters.

As for the rest of your post, I had written a lengthy reply... but then I stopped, and asked myself: why?

Cappadocian, where are you going with this? All the tangential discussions are all very good and all, but it doesn't tell anyone why they should ignore the shortcomings of the story. How does anything that you've posted make Vashara's story sound any more appealing? How does it refute claims that it has a good idea but terrible execution? That the most the characters are poor caricatures of themselves?

 

And just how is the Harry in say, The Lie I've Lived, or really any other JBern fic, the Harry he was in canon? I can accept that, if you can accept that it's a double standard to say, "Oh, JBern/Shezza does it to, but we don't judge it for that, because well, he's a friend."

Perfectly acceptable, she changes the characterizations to a more realistic manner, adding in conflict that really should have been there, if Aang and Katara were to ever have a stable relationship.

Because we've seen them in all of 3-5 Chapters, after a VERY stressful time, in a very stressful city. Add in that it's only around 2 characters whom she really changes, because they were the most unrealistic. Sokka is still Sokka. Toph is still Toph. Uncle's still just an old man trying to help his nephew.

By offering counter points to the point's you've all listed.

That and it's probably the best avatar fic out there.

Only two character's have truly been changed, Zuko we had never seen much of beyond "I WILL GET YOU, MY PRETTIES," in the mid season two. Sokka and Toph are to my knowledge mostly the same. Also see the first points above.

So here is what the plot focus's on, it focus's on the conflict balls both of canon, and of the AU variety.

Here's a basic explanation and timeline of them.

Each nation has a very big difference in culture, tactics, raising, society, military structure, definitions of words, etc. This causes a major conflict, Earth would have viewed Fire as weak for lacking the control over it's civilians and clans, Water, Fire and Earth would have viewed Air as weird and insulting because they didn't understand true family. Air would have viewed everyone else as playthings or stupid. Earth would take offense to the nominally Fire Nation pirates raiding their coast. Fire would take offense to Earth bringing up the pirates they had no control over. Fire would take offense to Air anytime a major storm came that they weren't warned about. Air would take offense to water any time they killed an animal. Everyone would take offense to Air because they had territory all over within other people's lands. Water would take offense to people of the Fire not raising their kid's "correctly." It's a clusterfuck and requires complete separation or a messianic figure to bring them to peace. Otherwise it turns to shit so quick you barely have time to blink.

The characters themselves were raised in societies without the messianic figure to explain whats what, not only that but the avatars since before Yasuragi, haven't been doing their jobs. Only really stepping in when things got out of hand. So you have CENTURIES if not millennium's of cultural conflict building up. Until Kyoshi comes and destroys half the clans in fire nation because she didn't have the knowledge of the culture to tell that the wave clans aren't pirates. Then comes the ruling under a single figure, removing the clans independence. Thus allowing a person to gain power over all the associated clans of the fire nation. Then comes a hurricane that they weren't warned about. Then comes Sozin taking action destroying the Air Temples during the comet. Which all could have been avoided if powerful people, A. hadn't been Manipulated by spirits, and B. had been understanding of the actual issues at hand.

Then you've also got a group of spirit servants going around and killing or causing the killing of all the healers. Then a spirit influencing peoples minds to forget there ever were healers.

I could add more, but this is really all I can stand to spoil. It's an interesting read, the characterization is fine for almost everyone but Katara and Aang, whom have been featured in around 6 of 36 chapters, and appear to be cooling off, relaxing and going back to a more canon characterization.

Anyway, it's the fact that the relations are such a clusterfuck that makes it an interesting read.

---------- Post automerged at 07:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:32 PM ----------

I'm going to quote the authors note of the current chapter, because it sums up allot of what I have been saying about the fire nation and the north pole. And provides a better view on the issue that I managed.

 

So then did he have to summon the spirit of the ocean to do so?

Also the ships we see attacked, we see go UNDER polar water, which is deadly to everyone. Polar water can kill in minutes.

Add in that most of the battle actually happens off screen and the main writers of the show said hundreds of ships were destroyed, almost the entire fleet. And you can easily see the reasoning behind assuming most dead.

Having watched the episode recently, I can say the fact's do support most of the ships being destroyed.

Let me give a re-cap,

first clip, about 16 seconds, Koizilla forms, and kills the forces in the city.

Second clip, about 10 second, Koizilla walks towards the bay, destroys the group of about 20 fire nation ships, by capsizing them with a massive wave. We see them go deep under all of water. Signs point toward total destruction.

Third clip, 10 seconds, moons back, we never see the rest of the fleet destroyed, but signs point at it. Camera turns to where the fleet was and you see rubble, Koizilla sets Aang down and goes.

Forth clip, Zhou grabbed and drowned.

Sree, did you even read what the author posted before writing that? Or even really watch the episode?