Nuhuh's Note:

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Aekiel: my only real problems relate to the initial set-up. I find it difficult to believe that any one realm (Hell) could completely conquer all the others. Given what we've been told about power levels, it just shouldn't be possible. There are too many beings of massive power to overcome first. Overcoming any single entity (E.g. Mab, Titania, the Mothers, Ferrovax, etc.) is believable, but all of them? The damage you'd receive from fighting one of them would rather preclude you from being able to defeat the next.

 

Except that the Fallen are massively powerful, and there a a damn sight more than thirty of them, all told. Once given leave to act freely on the world, I wouldn't see it as impossible that they would win. Besides, it wouldn't have been just Hell that acted on the side of the opposition. Some beings would cut deals to regain old power, like Ferrovax, or to reach new heights of it, like the Black Court. It's just that Hell was the biggest faction on the winning side. The rest just comes down to individuals and their power levels.

 

Um, only, that wouldn't matter. The fallen are powerful, yes, but the Thirty in the coins are the strongest after Lucifer, and he beat all of them and trapped them in coins. Lucifer is equal to or slightly greater then a Queen.

Math time!

Denarians > The Fallen. 30 Denarians < Lucifer. Lucifer >= Mab. Mab = Titania. Mab <<<< Mother Winter. Titania <<<< Mother Summer. Mab >= The White Council. Mab >= The Red Court. Mab = Dracula's Daddy. Mab = Ferro. Lucifer < Michael. Lucifer >= the Other Archangels.

And now for some numbers!

A Third of the stars (angels) fell from Heaven. That means two-thirds of the stars (angels) didn't fall. Heaven is therefore twice the size of Hell.

Lucifer is the strongest in Hell, aparently by far. Even assuming he's the strongest of the Archangels (which is bullshit, since Michael beats the crap out of him), Heaven has four guys almost as strong as him.

The Courts have Mab and Titania who are around that level, too, plus the Mothers, who are much stronger then either (and even if they did die, that just means Mab and Titania get upgraded). They also have, and I quote Word of God, 'millions and millions and millions' of soldiers. Each. Plus the other Fae that don't work for them.

Humanity has a population of six billion+ people, plus the WC that has guys that can cause Nuclear level events, and Word of God has stated that Eb is not the strongest on that Council.

Hell, if it tried anything, would be hopelessly outclassed.

But what about the guys who would join up with hell?

They don't matter, because no one would. Everyone with a brain would realize that Heaven alone would stop Hell, even putting aside the billions of people waiting in the wings. Hell already tried to take on Heaven and you know how that ended; with them in Hell.

Ferrovax is stronger then anyone but Lucifer and, by virtue of having a brain, should know that making deals with the Devil is a stupid idea. Especially when he's obviously going to lose and his dudes make a point of breaking their word whenever possible.

The Black Court? They might join up, but who fucking cares? They've been hunted to the point that they barely exist and they only survive by avoiding notice and catching people by surprise. Everyone knows their weaknesses.

But more to the point, they wouldn't side with Hell. Nobody likes Hell. It's Hell. They're evil, they don't obey the laws, they don't keep their word, and now they want to turn the world into hell on Earth?

That's the type of thing that's going to get everyone, and I do mean everyone, on the same side. And it's not Hell's.

 

Denarians are the strongest after Lucifer? I don't remember that from books. Not saying that is not truth, I just recall that they are powerful and banished from Hell, nothing about them being so powerful compared to the rest of the Fallen.

Also we can hardly tell how powerful is Lucifer, because we've never seen anything confirming his power level. For all we know he can be more powerful than Michael and was defeat because of God's help.

And for correction: Mab <<<< Mother Winter. Titania <<<< Mother Summer.

Anyway, even if we assume that the future apocalypse will be mainly a battle between Heaven and Hell, I wonder what side various gods will be on.

 

Word of God.

We know he's an Archangel, though, so either way.

Sorry, my bad; I used the wrong sign.

It wouldn't matter; most of them have lost their strength.

 

So it wasn't in books? That's why I have a mixed feelings about WoG. On the one hand it gives us more insight into the world from books, which is useful when we have only one first-person narrator. On the other how should I know everything that was said about a subject in multiple interviews/posts on forum/other? Either it's in books or we should be able to speculate about it as much as we want.

Was it ever told how it happened (WoG or not)?

 

http://forums.darklordpotter.net/showthread.php?t=15724

Also, God's opinion on Word of God:

http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,4787.msg120033.html#msg120033

In Backup, yes.

 

True enough, but as I said, it's not a matter of just Lucifer and his Fallen hellmates. It's a matter of the Dragons, who are universally pissed at humanity for usurping them as the most powerful force on the planet. It's a matter of the fastest growing vampire court going on a genocidal rampage through most of China and the USA. Overnight.

As a bit of creative license on my part I'm giving the Black Court a distinct advantage by saying that any person killed or turned by a vampire gives the killer a boost in power as well as the vampire in line above him, ad infinitum. On top of that I'm attributing them Bubonic Plague, thus making the Black Court the creation of Nicodemus and Tessa + Dracula. The idea is that if say Mavra was the sire of every single living Black Court vampire (which she's not), she'd gain power from every single kill or turn they make.

If we apply that situation to the 30 Elders of the Black Court that were killed en masse by humanity in the late 1800s, then it took about 100-150 million deaths to create them, as an upper bracket. Last I checked there were one billion people in China alone. It would make the oldest living Black Court vampire into a god. 30 of those fuckers were enough to take on Mab. That was with 150 million deaths.

So yeah, major league fucked there. I plan on there being three of them.

While those are rough power levels they fail to consider the fact that straight up battles never happen in the Dresdenverse. While Ferrovax could probably kill Mab in a face-to-face duel, they'd both be much more likely to cheat and use any advantage they could. So in the Dragon's case I wouldn't see it so much as Ferrovax vs. Mab, but Ferrovax and his cadre of Dragon buddies vs. Mab and Winter.

In short, they would cheat, and cheat like Hell. The Apocalypse is win or lose, there is no second best.

Michael beat the crap out of him once. Lucifer would know better by now not to give Michael that chance again. Also, you seem to be imagining pitched battles with billions of beings lined up ready to fight. I don't. I see it more like a nuclear war than WWI, with humanity literally nuking everything else in sight just to try and slow shit down.

Also, archangel level powers aren't really that rare. We have four archangel levels in the Faerie Courts, my new Black Court Elders would be as powerful, if not more so, Cowl would perform the Darkhallow and become as powerful as Mab.

Millions and millions and millions don't matter shit to Persons of Mass Destruction and the weapons they employ. After all, the Red Court had a fucking large number of vampires, but they still fell to a single spell.

The White Council would have to unite together in its entirety in order to stand a chance against Mab. And they'd need her Name. I can't see them matching up to the united forces of all the Fallen, the Dragons, the resurgent Black Court and every other manner of beasty out there, no matter what.

True enough, but then they didn't have allies. That's the entire point of making alliances, you know. Joining your power to overcome a greater enemy.

You can't write off the enemy simply because they lost once. After all, that worked so well for the Allies, didn't it.

I've already said this once, but my Black Court would literally become godlike in power overnight. A coordinated worldwide strike against every major population centre going. Maybe two days worth of human genocide occurs before the nukes start to fall, by which point their numbers are way, way, way higher than anyone could hope to kill, and their leaders are powerful enough that nukes don't fucking matter any more.

What does good or evil matter to a Dragon? Laws? They're for things that want to be human. If you're powerful enough to look out for yourself, what does it matter if they don't keep their word? Get what you want then tell them to go fuck themselves.

Because everyone is on the side of truth, justice and freedom for all, right? Fucking hell, you actually had some good arguments going before this shit. Arguing power levels is fine and dandy, everyone can weight the scales. Arguing on grounds of morality though? For crying out loud, mankind's closest ally is an amoral sociopath that would throw every single one of her minions, every single ally she could find, and herself at an enemy if she thought it would be best for Winter.

 

And they would team up with Lucifer...why? What do they stand to gain for teaming up with Evil? Anyone with half a brain would realize making a Deal with the Devil is stupid.

The Black Court doesn't have the numbers needed to go on a rampage.

Sadly, Creative License does not excuse idiocy and retardation, with this qualifies as. If the Black Court has a broken power like that, they wouldn't need Hell. They wouldn't have been hunted down like animals. They wouldn't be inches from extinction. But they are.

They would rule the world! But they don't.

They wouldn't need to cower in fear and avoid attracting too much attention. But the do and they must.

(Also, Dracula is too young to have created the Black Court, as are Nick and Tessa. They've been stated tohave been a round a hell of a lot longer then two thousand years.)

Only no. The guys that were killed in the 1800s were not the 30 Elders of the Black Court; it was the Court in it's entirety that was hunted down. And those Elders were the strongest people in the entire Court.

And if they had retarded powers like that and three of them were around, why the fuck do they need Hell? Why are they crushed and weak? Why do they barely qualify as a power?

In which case, I'd bet on the Fae. 100%.

And since Hell is a sack or traitors, liars, and assholes that is going to lose, why would anyone want to side with them and folow them down?

Here's the problem with that:

Why the fuck would anyone do that?

In which case each and every one of those guys has way more power then Hell. So why the fuck are they siding with the guys that are going to stab them in the back?

(Also, your Black Court Elders are stupid beyond words and make no sense whatsoever, so...)

A spell which exploited a weak point that few others have. Which reminds me; if your Black Court is so scary, why doesn't someone just hit them with a Bloodline Curse like the Reds? They have the same weakness. That would solve that problem and a new BC wouldn't be hard to find in this situation.

Bam! There goes that problem.

They don't have too. The Angels will crush the Fallen, full stop. And if they didn't, the Fae would. But that doesn't matter, because the Angels would win. They literally have God on their side.

The Dragons are upset with not being top dogs any more, but if they were so upset about it that they'd side with fucking hell, they'd have done something with their huge amount of Power by now. Ferro seems content to chill, mostly.

Here's the thing and I think you're missing it.

We're talking about fucking hell. They're everybody's enemy. Nobody wants hell to win. Because nobody agrees with Hell's goals.

(Also, it's Hell.)

You can if they're weaker then you in every way and you hopelessly outnumber them since, again, nobody likes Hell.

Oh God, the idiocy of this paragraph...

Okay, I'm going in.

The Black Court doesn't have the power to do shit like that. They cannot attack that many places at once. Their weaknesses are well known worldwide. They would be crushed. They would be crushed like they were in the past, back when Humanity ran around with much, much shittier weapons and they had much more power and much higher numbers. Only worse, because now we have way better weapons and they barely hang onto unlife.

As such, Nukes would never fall.

And your retarded idea for the Black Court that causes nothing in the history of the Dresden Files to make any since is still retarded.

Then why the Hell are they even siding with Hell?

Not everyone is on the 'Good' Team, no.

But pretty much everyone is one the 'Let's not get raped up the ass by Demons forever' Team!

What does anyone benefit from a bunch of monsterous Creatures that enjoy nothing more then the horrible suffering of everything taking over the planet?

What do vampires get out of this? Their only food source being hunted to exinction (or, at least, way smaller numbers then could support a population that size)? A new hellhole for a home in which they can do nothing but slowly starve to death?

What do the Dragons get? A place at the top in a world that's been reduced to a raging hole of suck?

This has nothing to do with morality. Nobody profits from this except Hell! This situation literally sucks for everyone but them. It's like with Outsiders. Everyone would side against them. Why? Because they're gonna tear down the Universe!

The Black Court hates it's situation...but they have six billion happy meals running around and they aren't starving to death in a hell hole!

The Dragons don't like their place in the world...but it's a place that doesn't suck!

Humanity gets hunted down by so many different sources...But they're still at the top and they prosper.

You know what they all have in common?

They benefit a hell of a lot more from not being ruled over by Demons!

Even the people with similar goals would side against Hell, because they wouldn't want Hell to take over!

 

Why do you think the reigning Queens are weaker than the Mothers? Sure, the Mothers are probably more skilled and knowledgeable, but they are almost certainly weaker in raw power.

 

Word of Jim is that the Mothers stronger than the Queens. I'll see if I can find the link I read it at, but I definitely remember him outright stating it on his forums at some point.

 

For fuck's sake. Stop thinking about Hell as if its the be all and end all of evil! It's not. It's a fucking different perspective that some people agree with and others don't. What does fucking evil mean to the Fae? Or ghouls? Or anything apart from humanity? Evil is just a perspective, and pretty much the entirety of the supernatural community preys on humanity, to one degree or another. And some of them are massively powerful too.

Of all the nasty creatures in the Dresdenverse, why are the Fallen held as any different to say, the Faerie Queens? Because Dresden is the hero and his morality is the championed cause. That's why Lucifer and his followers are labelled evil.

To a Black Court vampire humanity is evil. After all, they hunted down and killed the vast majority of their species for doing nothing more than living. Humans have free will and are thus able to go against their nature. Vampires do not, and are thus constrained to act as they have to. What are humans to creatures like the Black Court?

To the Dragons, which used to rule over a portion of the cosmos, not just fucking Earth, what is evil? They're arrogant, universally despise humanity and are well known for being greedy as shit. So I ask you, why wouldn't they want to take that back? If it puts them against the forces of Heaven, so be it.

To the Old Gods are we anything more than a link to the world?

To the Ghouls, which eat humans alive, are we anything more than cattle?

To the Fomor, are we anything more than slaves?

To the trillion beings in the Nevernever that don't answer to Mab or Titania, is free will and humanity in general anything particularly special?

This is the Apocalypse we're talking about here. This isn't a particularly difficult concept to understand. Those who want power go for the evil side. Those that want humanity driven into the dust ally themselves with Hell.

As for my Black Court additions. If you'll check out this thread on the JB forums (third post down), there is some decent evidence for the idea that the Black Court work like a giant pyramid scheme. After all, it's not like Bubonic Plague waxed and waned as the population grew and shrank, right? Spelling mistakes aside, it's a decent theory that has some evidence for and not much against.

 

I don't think Ryuugi Shi is really making a point about evil. Rather. he's just saying that the denizens of Hell are the ultimate traitors and backstabbers who want to fuck everyone and everything up and are almost guaranteed to turn against their own "allies" without a moment's hesitation. And that everyone knows this. As such, no one in their right mind would ally with them. It's not about good and evil, it's about not being able to trust Hell.

That said, I don't think your point about evil being a perspective is true in the Dresden Files. I believe it was all the way back in Storm Front when Harry felt black magic and his inner monologue was something like "I'd always thought that evil didn't really exist, but in that instant I knew that genuine evil existed".

 

Subjective experience doesn't mean much in the grand scheme of things. That said, there is a loose way to group good and evil in the Dresdenverse (according to Jim), and that's by dividing everyone into the group that seeks to help free will, and those that seek to hinder it. That's the very basic division between the 'good' guys and the 'bad' guys. Hell, it's not like morality is in shades of grey in the Dresdenverse or anything either.

As for Hell, how do we know they'll go back on their word? If it benefits Nicodemus to see an alliance through to the end I could easily see it going until the final curtain. This isn't so much about morality or personality or history as it is realpolitik on a cosmic scale.

I'm just finding it strange that you lot seem to think The Apocalypse (that is, the Biblical Apocalypse) wouldn't bring out every power hungry being in the universe and make them pick sides.

 

If it were the genuine Biblical apocalypse, everyone who has ever read the Bible would know which side to pick (hint: it's not Hell).

 

Then again the Bible is more like a propaganda brochure for a "good" guys than an objective history and predicting the future book.

 

It's flatout stated by both Jim and Summer Knight. Jim's quote you can find in the Word of God Thread. In SK, hen Harry approaches the Mother's cabin, he notes the Mother's feel much, much more powerful then Mab.

Sigh.

It has nothing to do with good and evil! Nobody else benefits from this! Hell is full of traiors and monsters and would fuck up earth beyond redemption and nobdy wants that to happen!

No, they're labelled evil because they're evil. God (or at least his Angels) said so.

They're different from the Faerie Queens in major ways. The Queens, at the end of the day, want balance. Hell wants to fuck things up.

Nobody wants to be fucked up.

Good God, Hell is Pro-Outsiders! Put another way, Hell is Pro-End of the Universe!

A food source which they cannot live without? One they'd have to (and thus starve) in this hilariously stupid plan?

If they Universally dispised Humanity and they could do something about it, they would have. They don't and they haven't, but even if they did, why the fuck would they side with Hell?

A link without which they are powerless?

Also, you're bringing the Old Gods into this? They want to destroy the Universe!

Granted, it was stated that Hell wouldn't mind that and actually supports them, but, well, that's why nobody likes Hell!

No, we're a food source that they cannot live without.

Maybe not, but apparently they need slaves.

No, so why the fuck would they get involved?

Why would people that want power go for the losing side?

Fuck, even if Hell wasn't the losing side, why would they go for a side that was pro-End of the Universe?

And while a lot of people might not like Humanity, about every race we've seen so far needs them!

I'm looking at it right now and no it doesn't.

First of all, that's Conjecture and Theory. I.e. Fanon.

Second of all, we know what created the Black Plague! And we know it was a Plague!

Third of all, even if we didn't that post doesn't support what you're saying that it does.

Jim has stated, multiple times, that there is Good and Evil in the Dresden-verse.

Hell wants to destroy Humanity and Earth (i.e. things really important to everyone we've seen). Nobody benefits from that.

Hell wants to destroy the Universe. Nobody benefits from that.

It's not that people can't trust hell (though they fucking can't), it's that nobody beneits from siding with the Devil! If you don't get anything out of it, why side with them?

Also, you must have been drunk while reading the books with Nick and the others in them. They do not work like that. There have been a number of situations in which both Nick and someone else would have benefited. They've made deals and if he'd just kept them, it would have turned out fine for everyone involved.

Nick betrayed them the moment it was good for him because it profitted him.

Oh, here's the problem. You got it wrong. We know everyone will wantto chose a side.

They'll just want to chose the side that isn't after the End of the Fucking Universe!

On the other hand, the Angels literally have God on their side. The big G. The Alpha and Omega.

They win by virtue of having an Omnipotent on their side.

 

I find it somehow ironic (and I really hope I use this word how it should be) that you take God side in your 666th post.

I have also a question - what do we really know about Him in Dresden-verse? He is powerful, probably the most powerful being ever, but how compared to others? Was it ever stated by someone who is not biased on this subject?

Also, getting back to Hell winning the Apocalypse. Instead of looking at it like Hell against the rest, think about it more like all against all (for whatever reason, probably manipulated by the Black Council) and the last standing is the winner. I think that could happen.

 

Hell isn't after destroying the universe, I don't know why you're thinking that since it's never been outright stated in the Dresdenverse. Hell, in my mind, is about ruling the universe. Lucifer's goal is to take over, because he's not suicidal.

As for humanity on Earth, it would be relegated to livestock for all the various human-eaters out there.

I'll reply in depth later, gotta get ready for work now.

This of course relies on the idea that the White God isn't going to involve himself personally. This is one big experiment to Him and he's not going to bias the results of it just so the good guys can win.

 

Not to prolong this stupid pissing contest, but what makes you think that God in the Dresden-verse is the same as Christians IRL think? I'm far from an expert on Dresden canon, but I know "God" is referred to as "the White God" in it, which to me means "one of a multitude of gods." Just because the White God is the most powerful at present doesn't mean He/She/It couldn't be taken down a peg or two, just as the gods like Zeus and Odin were. After all, there was a time that they were on top as well.

All I'm saying is: as powerful as "God" is in the Dresden world, is there evidence that Butcher sees that entity as the be-all, end-all, universe-creating being that Joe Blow Christian does?