Okay. So. I fucking love Interludes and everyone knows it, but something's have to be said.

Malicia pulled one over on Cat; she was Athal from the beginning, the guy the Dead King supposedly gave her as a servant. Malicia's been listening in on their plans from the beginning--hell, most of the time, they were asking her about the plan. It was all a ruse! Cat was bamboozled from the start and it's Malicia who gets what she wants! And you'd think that would make me happy, because it's what I asked for; seeing the threat, seeing the turnaround, seeing what happens. And I would be, but--

We don't actually see any of that. There's no moment of defeat here, no dawning realization of mistakes made or things missed, no point when we actually see Cat come to terms with being beat. It's the lake drop all over again; Cat gets beaten, but only off screen. This was what I wanted, but without any of the actual satisfaction or emotion of it. We spent over a dozen chapters building up to this moment, but we skipped right by the payoff. I can't give points for [Footage Not Found], even if--especially if--it's something I want to see. If Cat can be outdone, outwitted, beaten, let me see it and see how she grows from it.

So the part that was basically served up to me, I can't give more than a 5/10, for being everything I wanted, but not at all the way I wanted, and for the college math clause of not showing your work. It doesn't help that Cat's still kind of walking out of this with a win, just not a moral one, but I'll get to that.

Interlude Part 2: The check-in with Cordelia. By all accounts, this takes place shortly after her extra chapter, because we see what the Augur told her. Turns out, it was jack fucking shit--she has not idea what's going on. She has no idea what the Free Cities are doing, which I can maybe forgive because of the Hierarchy. Less forgivable, she has no idea what anyone else is doing, either. No idea what Black's up to, what Malicia's up to, what Cat's up to. Augur has apparently foreseen absolutely nothing, which is an utter travesty because we just got to see a precog at work in the Skien and he was one of the hardest motherfuckers in the story. How is Cordelia consistently the least informed person in the setting? What the shit is the Augur doing? Why is she even in the story at this point?

No, seriously, why the fuck is she in this story? Why was the chief Good nation given a precog name next to their leader if she never predicts anything? Like, I seriously don't understand why she's here at this point. If Assassin snuck in and murdered her, it would make literally no difference.

Also, Black invaded the largest country on the surface of Calernia with a badly wounded army, cut off his own supply lines, cut off any path of retreat or reinforcements, and is waging war via pillaging and the mass-murder of innocents in classic Evil fashion, and not only have there been no consequences but he's burning through everything in his way with ease. Is literally anyone surprised? No? Good; anyone with a brain knew that was how this would go, which does not mean I forgive it for being stupid or an utter failing on the Crusade and Heroes' part.

Also also, Cat's changed her opinions on the mass-slaughter of millions, it seems; stopping it didn't work out, fuck 'em. Like, not even negotiating against the potential threat, now that Malicia beat her and the fucking Dead King is loose; you can't even say this is her being practical, because you'd figure she could seriously leverage this too her advantage if she had any diplomacy in her body. She has gates through Arcadia, Procer's about to be on fire, forget stopping the Crusade, she could demand Cordelia give her a blank check and foot all of Callow's bills and still get what she wants just for moving people around. But no:

Suck my dick. This is stupid and evil on every level.

Finally, the Dead King walks free and the fucking Bard is back! I missed you. I also missed you two being together. Can we have this spin-off? Can you be our new protagonists? Can this be about the Bard and Dead King's eternal shadow war? Bardie and Deadie's Bizarre Adventure? I'd be down for some posing, even.

Anyway, this part is good, of course. In any other case, it'd make an 8/10, 9/10, etc., Interlude, but it's being dragged down by so much it sadly just keeps this chapter above the bottomline. Liked the histories, loved every single mention to past events, dig their relationship, it's just not enough. And that's sad, because I love these two motherfuckers.

No idea what they're planning, though. Is she letting him run loose into Procer? But if so, why?

Anyway, first part left me lukewarm, second part pissed me off, third part only barely salvages it. And it's a sad day when I say that for an Interlude, because I fucking love the Interludes in this story.

 

Well then.

 

Hahaha. What a great chapter. I loved how rigged it was just to teach Cat a lesson - not sure she learned the lesson the Bone Daddy wanted to teach, but she definitely learned to step more into her apotheosis and what that actually means for her. She's been shying away from being a construct so much, but at least, she started to understand the mist and shapeshifting technique and pulling more Winter.

All in all, a good showing all around. Malicia gained valuable intel and showed off her sneaky side, and Cat saw how her Woe performed in action against other, strong Named (even if some were dead). It was basically a scrim! (With Bone Daddy giving coaching and critique at the end, heh). And she knows now where the Woe need to improve. Felt like the War Games so I wonder how this will play back later on.

Other than that, good for Black tearing through the center provinces and still going. I'm starting to think he'll make it out actually through the South: he's a Named, and there are no Named on the opposite side of the field to really oppose him because they're mostly stuck either in Callow or at the pass. Ooof - sent so much out that they don't have enough for defense. (The problems with spawn camping!)

And Procer gets the Crusade that I'm sure they always wanted. Very epic, very glorious, have fun.

Curious where Cat plans to go next though... Although now she has some time with the Dead King's invasion.

 

now that arc is over I think I can say I'm done with the story until I hear that its actually good again.

 

You know what? Screw all y'all. I loved every minute of this arc. I'm not reading it expecting Shakespeare it's just a fun story in a fun world with occasional moments of badassery.

The one upsetting thing is just how unused Hakram has been. He needs a taste of badassery.

 

Hear hear.

I actually quite liked the resolution. And the Bard continues to be my favourite character to hate. Mostly because I can't figure out her motivation, or her plan, or what the fuck she's trying to accomplish.

I also liked how the Dead King is basically coaching Cat on how to be an eldritch abomination.

It also amuses me that, while Malicia is admitting she needs to revise some plans, she's still not taking Cat as seriously as she should in some respects.

And Hassenbach continues to be a self-righteous cow.

 

Actually, all the Named that were fighting in the North are traveling back through Procer and headed his way. Also, I'm not sure how much of this counts as a 'showing.'

I'm not expecting Shakespeare either, but I think 'If you spend over twenty chapters building up to a specific moment, don't just skip that moment' is less Shakespeare and more Writing 101. Like, everyone else got the whole 'Beginning, Middle, and End' spiel, right? It wasn't just me?

Yes, because she's upset about the pointless slaughter of millions by heartless mass-murders. What a bitch?

 

Wer're not even halfway through the book, did you expect Malicia to just bite it? Cat achieved what she needed, getting Malicia out of Keter. There'll be plenty of time for payoffs later but in my eyes the resoution of the Malicia angle works perfectly for this stage of the book.

 

Um...I'm not sure what you're reply to or what you think my complaints are? If Malicia had died, I'd have rioted; her being alive isn't the issue, it's what I wanted.

Here's the thing, you can say were only half-way through the book, but were also sixty chapters into the book, over twenty--count them, over twenty--of which have been dedicated to Cat seeking the Dead King's aid. We just spent ten-odd chapters on her attempting to kill Malicia, to get her bid for power to overrule her enemies. We had a long, complicated, sometimes non-nonsensical scheme going the whole time, multiple fight scenes, two power ups, and more building up to this--to the point where we see if Cat has succeeded or failed. As a story, that's what all of this has been building up to.

And we don't even get to see it? We don't even get to see Cat's reaction when she does all that and the Dead King refuses her offer, when her plan is revealed to have failed? We only see things after the fact, from the outside, without any real emotion playing into it. What the fuck? No, sorry, just in terms of 'this is a story, right?'--what the fuck. If you spend twenty chapters building up to a specific moment, why wouldn't you show the moment?

Because, see, this isn't an isolated incident; it keeps happening. The Pilgrim defeated Cat's plan, off-screen. Malicia convinced the Winter King to marry the Summer Queen and ally with Cat, off-screen. The Bard killed off the Captain, off-screen. Black keeps doing utterly ridiculous shit out of nowhere, off-screen. And, what's worse, the last five or so arcs have had very little payoff to their build up, particularly with Cat as a character; this is self explanatory, the Crusade ended with a shrug five minutes after Cat woke up, Black handwaved his way through both Akua and the Vales, Malicia resolved Winter off-screen, the Free Cities were dealt with off-screen, on and on.

Goddamn it--I feel like I shouldn't have to say this, but I read the story to read the story.

(Also, not sure what you mean? Malicia's still in Keter, more or less, and if she's leaving it's with everything she wanted.)

 

It's more the hypocrisy than anything, and her unwillingness to recognise her own hypocrisy (which incidentally is one of the things I find most irritating about Cat's character as well). She's more than happy to sacrifice Callow and its people on the alter of the Greater Good to secure peace in Calernia (which from an objective point of view is perfectly defensible), but gets morally outraged when the person she attacked returns the favour. Especially given that Cat simply said she refuses to help her would-be executioner, not that she will be aiding the Dead King.

I definitely see and agree with what you're saying. All the interesting and climactic stuff is happening out of view and is beyond frustrating. The fact that we didn't get to hear the conversation between Cat and the Dead King was particularly egregious (and dumb, let's not forget dumb). Doing it once would be a tease and all fine and good (such as with Captain). The fact that it's become a trend is just bad writing. The pacing is also a little off, and there doesn't seem to be the tension behind everything that existed in the first book (which I think is still the best of them).

It's becoming a long running series of Noodle Incidents and we're finding stuff out in hindsight.

If this had been a chapter later, after we got the conversation with the Dead King, it would be a much stringer resolution. That said, I still liked the insight into the other principal actors.

For some reason I'm still enjoying it though, but it's more because I still find the world and the cast interesting despite the author's recent efforts not being up to par.

I think the thrice weekly update schedule is negatively affecting the plotting and pacing.

 

Keep in mind two things:

1) Cordelia's not actually going to do that at all and has said as much multiple times--Procer can't afford to destroy Callow or Annex it. While saying that they want to save Callow is going more than a bit too far--they're in this because they also don't want another hostile, Evil border--the circumstances blatantly don't allow for anything like sacrificing Callow or it's people for the greater good. She wants Callow to no longer be an Evil nation and wants a safe route through to Praes, it's just that Cat can't provide these in a way that's satisfying--she offered to provide Faerie gates, for example, but that gives Cat the ability to stand Procer's entire army in a desert at will, which is hard to rely on when Cat's betrayed a lot of people she worked with.

2) My complaint about Cat's behavior with Procer is that evil, sure, but more importantly that it's tremendously dumb. Cat has Procer by the balls right here, because if she used the Gates, she could save millions, meaning she can basically demand whatever she wants. She could ask for a place in Procer's group, removal of her heretic status, the withdrawal of the Crusade, and the payment of all her bills and probably get it. What she's doing here does literally nothing but get thousands killed, strengthen the Dead King's position, create pointless enmity, and give the heroes a chance to turn things around--there's no aspect in which it's not stupid. Say what you will about Cordy's plans, but they aren't pointlessly wasteful and stupid.

I definitely still enjoy the world and at least some of the people in it, but how it's being written is getting to be trying.

 

Ryuugi I feel like whatever happens in the story you'll find a reason to be upset and bitch and moan for paragraphs at a time. You're acting as if the next chapter is already out and Cat has glossed over the entire incident. All we saw from her was some disappointment. She's not going to freak out and explain all of the ramifications to the slave that the Dead King gave her that she barely trusted. Freeing Athal and moving on with The Woe is all an outsider will see. Having Athal be Malicia in disguise actually had some real emotion, for me at least. As you said we spent the last ten chapters going through this crazy plan, which kinda succeeded in that she killed the two known puppets, only for it to be pointless. If we hadn't had this interlude it would have been a chapter of the Dead King saying no but good try, and then Cat moping away off to wherever the fuck she's going now. Instead we find out that the plan was doomed from the start and get to see from inside the head of one of the major antagonists. That segment alone makes this interlude worth it, and gives us more info than a traditional chapter. It's also super cool and a nice example of Malicia being the planning queen.

I'll agree that some of the off screen things were a little needless, but most are there to add drama and for the story telling. Bard killing Captain off screen was great storytelling. We got the build-up and false trails and even the beginning of the fight. It was never about the physical battle between Captain and Champion, but the story battle between Bard and Black. They both moved pieces around and tried to set up the other to lose. Black finding out that all of his efforts played into her plan was our payoff. We knew Captain would die then and seeing it wouldn't do much other than give us another fight scene.

The Winter King was already allied with Cat before Malicia stepped in. All she did was set the plan up that would get him and Cat what they wanted out of the deal. Sure we could have had all of that laid out for us but then that spoils the surprise. Would you have rather had a chapter of negotiations instead of finding out about the plan as the story unfolds? Did you get mad at the Usual Suspects for not telling you who Kaizer Soze is off the bat? No, because then that ruins the story. Knowing you though there probably was some bitching about how it wasn't believable.

Black's not the main character and has a list of feats out the ass we've never seen so no reason to start now.

I don't know what you mean by little payoff though. Cat has grown into the Queen of winter and started exploring abilities she never conceived of. She's learned things we haven't seen, that get revealed at cool moments like the artefacts, but is also learning new things that we get to see as she learns, the new mist trick. The Crusades ended with a "shrug" because despite Cat knocking out Juniper smashed the Crusaders. They didn't sit on their thumbs for a few days and read a book. There were some hard fought battles where the Crusaders lost more and more people, not to mention the fucking lake dropped on them. Akua waking up in Cat's body and giving the heroes a beat down certainly didn't help things along either. A combination of losing their supplies, a not insignificant amount of troops, and still having Cat to deal with is why they entered negotiations. All those negotiations did anyway was call a temporary truce and get some hostages in Callow, something we haven't seen the end of. So I'd really like to know where this ends with a shrug comes from.

Black didn't hand wave his way through Akua and the Vales either. For Akua he had a plan that neither saw coming and executed it perfectly. Same could be said about the Vales. You bitched about Augur not telling them every detail of Black's plan but we just had an arc showing that even the most powerful of seers can be fooled. Black knew about the Augurs existence, do you not think he didn't plan around her. What we saw happen at the Vales is one possible way it could have gone. Black probably had a dozen different plans. Even if they knew of every single one sometimes there isn't a hard counter. Like having a lake's worth of water dropped on them or for rapid switching of placement. They knew it was going to be a bitch and really it was an insignificant loss of life for the crusaders. Really they just lost time where they have to dig through a mountain into some nice under protected Callow. As for gallivanting around Procer that's still ongoing and for all we know it could go bad soon.

The Free Cities weren't dealt with off screen either. We saw the last big epic fight, with the Calamities, Bard, and Tyrant all making their moves. It just wasn't the most important part of the campaign. Similar to how Tyrant's ancestor won all the battles but lost at the table. Hierarch coming into existence scrapped everyone's plan, because that's what Tyrant wanted. His getting elected was Tyrant's goal and he won. Of course this is a side story to the main story so we didn't follow along with every point, but I'd call what we got more than an off screen hand wave.

 

Ah, you see, I hadn't even considered that. You're right, that's both wasteful and self-defeating.

And I don't have any serious issue with the actions Cordelia has taken, but her characterisation just always rubs me the wrong way.

Also, (and this is a bit of a stupid question but it's bugging me) without a Name, can Cat really be considered a Villain (with capital v). I mean, it seems like she is, but I'm curious about the metaphysics behind it all.

 

Except you misunderstand again--we would need her to explain anything to Athal if we saw what happened when the Dead King dropped the bomb. That's the issue here; even if we see how Cat reacts tomorrow morning, we weren't in the room where it happens--and I wanna be, I wanna be in the room where it happens. You seem to consider this finding an excuse to bitch, but I can't fathom any story wherein 'skipping the fucking climax' isn't something worth complaining about. We're missing the most emotional moment of this defeat.

Yeah, it sure was great storytelling to have:

Literally require the Bard to sit-down and explain the logistics of it to us because we had no idea what they were and they involved the linguistically quirks of a language we didn't know:

And thereby have the turn around and change happen completely unseen with no visual indication of the villains ever even kind of being in danger until they suddenly got explained to death.

Amazing. Truly amazing.

I would absolutely have liked to see that negotion, because if you recall, Cat was fucked at the time.

Cat had no way to win that confrontation, until Malicia magicked a way off-screen.

Yeah, because it's not like they've had any major effect on the plot lately or anything.

Cat growing into her powers doesn't count as a payoff, because Cat's powers were nebulous and undefined back when she became the Squire for the second time. That she got a Fae Mantle, unleashed it's true power, gained it in full, assumed it, and then became a Queen doesn't make any goddamn difference, because I have no idea what, if anything, this has meaningfully changed and it promised costs and consequences after the first time that I'm still waiting on.

Juniper beating the Crusade when they had eleven goddamn heroes active was utter bullshit and didn't make sense on any front; it was just another example of Good dropping the ball. There is no logical way for them to have held for three hourse of fighting goddamn heroes. Similarly, Akua waking up and going one on nine with the Heroes also made no goddamn sense, their powers just stopped working again.

And then, after all of that happened, Cat woke up, completely unaware of the situation, in the middle of a life or death battle, casually escaped a fight with nine heroes unharmed, made it all the way to the enemy camp, and convinced the general to surrender when the Saint of Swords was right there--and the Saint went along with it, despite repeatedly showing she didn't give a damn what the Princes thought and even threatening to kill them?

???

First of all, Black has a plane in Liesse that no one saw coming, in or out of story, because it literally doesn't makes sense and is based off story shenanigans he pulled out of his ass.

Second of all, are you kidding me--Cat had seventeen goddamn plans going at once and it wasn't enough to deal with the Skein. If anything, why the Augur isn't doing more is a major question after we had an arc of a precog at work, because the Skein was an utter monster. Of all the villains we've seen, an undead shade of him beats everyone except the Dead King and maybe the Warlock.

Third of all, we literally got the Augur's powers explained and nothing Blak did was equipped to deal with them.

Fourth of all, Black literally monologued about the four major points he had to get right for his plan to work.

Fifth of all, even if your argument didn't fall apart immediately, none of that would excuse the Augur having no effect at all.

Are you kidding? That fight ended, the Tyrant seized the reins of the Free Cities, and the Calamities almost literally just went home. One of the most defining upsets in the series and everyone literally just walked off.

 

There has been a lot of edging. I attribute the lack of detail to the additional chapter per week, which I believe has seriously changed the pacing of the story.

I hope that EE sets some new patreon stretch goals to hit—if they made enough to quit their day job, that would be great, and hopefully would result in better quality overall.

 

We already got the fucking Climax. That was what the fight was all about. You really want to be in the room when she heard no? Because that's all it is really. The Dead King telling her no we have a better offer. They had no counter or argument other than killing Malicia so that would have been a pretty sad scene.

It actually was pretty amazing. We saw Black theorize about Bard's plan and all the preparations they went through to stop it, and it was all for naught. Bard explaining how he went wrong lined up all of the pieces, but you even quoted the last one. Captain fighting Champion was a win for Captain. Sabah letting out the beast and letting it do its thing was a recipe for disaster. Sabah was no longer in control at the end of the fight and that is what Champion needed to win the narrative. Looking back it makes sense especially once Bard fills in the details for us.

Cat was fucked at the time, which is why we got the Malicia lessons in the first place. Again this goes back to my Kaiser Soze example. We could have seen the plan that they came up with to end the confrontation, but there's no suspense to that. Instead we know that they were planning in the background for one final moment. Cat's lines in the chapter would have been far less cool if we knew that she was angling for them to get married, it also would have changed our expectations going into the fight. All we knew was that she had an impossible task to unmake the Fae, knowing the solution kills the moment overall.

Sure they have. And you know what you are right. I call all of Black's actions bullshit until we have a full story explaining all of his feats and various legends. Until then everything in the plot he has influenced is basically moot. In fact Erratic having anything happen off screen that will have any effect on the plot is just bad writing and needs to be seen. That way there are no surprises or twists. It's fucking ridiculous that they expect us to just believe that someone can do something to effect plot going on hundreds or thousands of miles away. It's not realistic and totally ruins the story. Along with Black's scenes we will also need everything with the Crusaders, a full book on Akua's history and her plotting, a side story on William and how he became who he was (Because lets be honest that conversation with Bard was total hand waving), every other chapter should be devoted to Malicia's scheming, and of course a congruent story that follows what the Tyrant is doing.

Again you are right. I'm tired of being drip fed the changes that Cat should just instinctively know about her new and unforeseen eldritch powers. There should be a full write up of all the possible abilities she has so we can determine which ones are bullshit. Screw Cat's reluctance about exploring them further to save what's left of her humanity. It's a totally stupid plot point and she should just be diving feet first into the Winter pool as we all would. If only you were the Guide so we could ave this magical resolution, if you even managed to get that far into the story.

Juniper beating the Crusade was an example of her great leadership, and shoddy leadership on the side of the Crusade. You're forgetting that most heroes aren't army killers in and of themselves. The only real powerhouses the Crusaders had were Pilgrim and Saint. Pilgrim was more concerned with advising and healing the younger inexperience heroes when they got hurt. While Saint was busting tough locations and fighting Archer when they needed her away from the action. It's not like the regular heroes were losing to regular legionnaires anyway. From what we saw they dominate the battlefield in little pockets, but they can't be everywhere. They don't all have a solution to fucking Goblin Fire.

There's a phrase I'm fond of. "If you're feeling froggy, then jump." Saint had been threatening the Princes, but when push came to shove she didn't jump. Pilgrim being there helped, but it still didn't happen. That perfectly explains why Saint let her start to negotiate with the Princes, and why she followed along afterwords. She knew her purpose for being there and empty threats aside there are some things even she couldn't do. Cat getting away from the B-League while Archer held off Saint and Pilgrim makes perfect sense though. As does them breaking away to let Archer play with the kiddies while they try and stop Cat from assassinating their General. They just didn't expect her to open negotiations then.

Black did have a plane and he flew it right into their expectations, blowing shit up massively. His plan makes sense when you see it from his perspective. He wanted the story to play out, just without his death. So he puts in a stand in that no one will see coming. That all leads to him throwing off Akua just enough that Cat, with an assist from Thief, can slip the bindings and kill her. Just because no one saw it coming doesn't mean it's bullshit. It just came out of left field.

Skein is far stronger than the Augur though. And what we do know of the Augur is estimates. Even the allies of Cordelia have doubts about the Augur.

That's one thing that wasn't in their reports about Augur, so it's not as if they have every detail about her powers. So unless there's some back channel you have open about the Augur's true abilities then her abilities are still in question. Personally I don't see her being more useful because she can't be. The heavens tell her important stuff but unless she's specifically directed to look for something it can pass her by. And again just because they know about something doesn't mean they'll automatically have a perfect counter.

Off course they left. What the fuck else are they supposed to do? It's like saying the losing team of the Superbowl walked off just because the buzzer ran out. Tyrant backdoored his way to victory, Black lost one of his closest friends, and they had another crisis they needed to deal with. Leaving and regrouping in the face of a major loss is normal. Unless you have another plan they could have used against this newly united Free Cities and freshly named ruler

 

If that was our climax, see what we all said about it being dumb as hell, for reasons not limited to 'It shouldn't be possible for Malicia's goons to betray her because she mindfucks them with Rule.'

More to the point, if all you can think of for the scene where the main character thinks they've won and finds out they wrong is the Dead King showing up to say no, with no emotional reactions or discussions, that sounds like a failing on your part, because that's story fodder. I wouldn't have minded another conversation between them, period.

And we saw literally none of that or what made it possible. Last we saw, Champion was getting wrecked, but apparently we looked away and she Supermaned that hoe.

Except here's the thing--it was Cat's problem. It was the defining problem for Cat in that entire book and the Winter Mantle has been hanging over the entire story sense, and the decisive moment that decided the matter...was done by someone else, without Cat's input, off-screen.

Yay. Almost as fun as Black resolving Akua for her.

Effecting a story is one thing--driving a story is another. More then once, Black has resolved Cat's problems for her. In the saw way that vague, unexplained magic shouldn't solve your problems, vague and distant mentors shouldn't handle your decisive moments.

Yes, because truly, asking to have an idea of what our characters can do from one moment to the next is just silly. Come on, dude, this is a pretty clear-cut case of Sanderson's Law: 'An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.' That there are aspects of her powers that are slowly discovered or mastered would not be a problem--the issue is that, like Masego's magic, her mantle is used to develop solutions to problems on the spot without establishing them beforehand. Winter has undergone four power-ups since Cat first got it, and we don't even know what the limits of the first one were.

Asking to know how the characters resolve their problems is not a dumb request--it's asking for basic storytelling.

No? Not on any front, really.

First of all, pretty much all heroes are army killers, or at least we were repeatedly told such throughout the story. Will, as the Lone Swordsman, was on par with Cat as the Squire 1.0 and he slaughtered his way through normal soldiers. When he walked into Liesse, he was described as having a zone around him where anything died if it entered. Even if these guys were just Will-tier, they'd slaughter their way through an army with that many of them.

Second of all, most of Junniper's plan was to tell people to try not to die for four hours, so...no?

Third, the Pilgrim was directly involved on one side of the battlefield and destroyed all of Callows siege weapons. This made surprisingly little difference and he did nothing else.

Fourth, Saint fought Archer. Archer, shockingly, proceeded to not immediately die, which...how the hell did that happen again? Archer's decently strong in her own right, but the Saint sent her running for her life twice, in between cutting through all of Masego's spells and swinging her sword at nothing and cutting it. Archer had no story running--hell, she was standing in the Saint's way while the Saint was trying to save her comrades lives and while Archer was protecting someone talking about eating her. And your excuse is that Archer kept the Saint busy? Please.

Fifth, the Pilgrim waved his hand and stopped a sun from being dropped on them.

What the hell does Archer look like in the version of the story you read? Hell, what does the Saint look like? Because in the version I read, she's called the Regicide, from the Princes she killed.

???

His plan involved a narrative weight shifting that he supposedly stole from the Bard, except he never say the Bard do it, and it involves Reality spontaneously deciding he doesn't exist, for reasons. What are you talking about?

No? Well, I mean, yes--in the sense that the Skein is a sixty-foot giant rat king. In terms of oracular powers, though, if anything, the Augur has the edge, because the Gods can literally just go 'Yo, actually, here's what's up' if she misses something big enough.

And sense when do Cordelia's allies doubt the Augur? Or the allies that aren't dumb, I mean.

Bwah?

1) That's not an ally--that's one of Cordelia's enemies, the mother of whom she in fact killed with the help of the Augur.

2) It's specifically called out as a rumor.

3) We've actually seen the Augur and Cordelia together, remember, and that was not at all what happened.

Would have been nice to at least see someone react to it.

 

Re: The Augur not leading to crushing victory.

This seems like a pretty good reason why the Augur has currently been a nonentity compared to all the work she was putting in to unify Procer. If Proceran messages are intercepted, then even with her foresight she'd have to constantly be making revisions and updates to deal with the maneuvers that her enemies have made since her last directive.

 

Unless she foresaw that the messages were being intercepted. Which she could totally do, because we've literally seen her tell Cordelia that her messengers are being intercepted before.

 

Just because we didn't get one last conversation doesn't mean it wasn't a good end. Knowing that Malicia was Athal and is still there is enough for us to know it's over. What more could you get from their conversation? As for her goons why would she mindfuck literally every single person around her. We have no idea what her limit is to Rule other than her being able to Speak without actually speaking the words. We don't know the limitations.

We saw quite a bit of it. We saw them planning on dealing with the caravans and their theories on what it could mean. They were looking for a symbol drawn by the caravans or some other variable. Hell they thought they beat that plan when they killed the Priestess, they were just wrong about the real reason. Bard built a narrative, which naturally favor Good, and it fucked Sabah. When Sabah was no longer in control of the fight she lost. The last line is even "Sabah Watched." That she let out the beast and it had control is why she lost.

I'll agree that we don't know how the deal came to be, but Cat damn well had input. Do you think she just let Malicia do everything? The purpose of their talks was for her to learn. The culmination of those talks was Cat getting into place to have the marriage of the century. Unless you want to say that Malicia puppeted every little thing she did.

We've already seen that this story goes against tropes. Should Black let Cat handle her problems? Yea, and in a conventional story she would. This is the Guide verse though and Black only cares about winning. He knows that he is a crutch for her, but he just sees it as more training.

She develops solutions on the spot as part of her character, and because she is reluctant to truly experiment. She knows that the mantle is far stronger than she imagines and goes beyond how she uses it. It takes life threatening situations for her to really try it though. Look at everything Akua did with the mantle in half of a chapter. We don't know what the mantle can do because we have a MC who doesn't want to truly find out. As for Masego's magic he literally just got his second aspect. You call bullshit on a lot of what he's done like he isn't the son and apprentice to one of the most powerful mages on the continent. He pulls shit out of his ass because that's what they need in a situation and he has the knowledge to. We have an idea of what our characters can do situation by situation, but we also know there is more. Just because they do something new doesn't mean it's always an ass pull. Masego got a new aspect and broke a pocket dimension, but it's bullshit because we didn't know he could do it sooner? Fuck that.

And their abilities haven't been exaggerated? It also takes time and energy to mow your way through an army, no matter who you are. Will was stronger than Squire 1.0 because he didn't have a traditional name. He did slaughter his way through soldiers though, and that what other heroes did. There were just a fuck ton more of them and also planning to specifically deal with them. So they may have had a death zone around them but that doesn't matter when their regular allies still die.

Juniper's plan was more than don't die for a bit guys. It was hold out while we try other plans to make them back off. Or did you forget about the canals and walls of Goblin Fire?

He did destroy most of them, but he's not really combat focused name. He's more of a mentor, who just happens to pull bullshit moves. Most of these moves have limits as we've seen though. Why else didn't he resurrect everyone everyday?

Archer kept Saint busy because she's probably one of the strongest members of the Woe. Remember her entrance when she trounced Cat, Hakram, and Masego? Or the years of training she had from fucking Ranger? She wasn't going to win but she's not some green scrub who is little more than cannon fodder. And remember that she did keep Saint busy. Specifically when Cat was escaping out of Akua's brawl by shooting her bullshit mage killer arrows. Saint blocked them but that allowed Cat to get away.

Pilgrim's bullshit move of the day.

Archer is Ranger-lite. Give her a few decades and I'm sure she'd be even closer to her mentor. Saint looks like Ranger but on the side of Good. She is regicide, but she was feeling froggy and I didn't see any jumping. Most likely it was because Pilgrim was there to rein her in.

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???

His plan involved a narrative weight shifting that he supposedly stole from the Bard, except he never say the Bard do it, and it involves Reality spontaneously deciding he doesn't exist, for reasons. What are you talking about?
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Which plan are you talking about? In Leisse his plan was to disrupt Akua's plan to have Cat kill Black and become her minion. He did that quite well by calling in Assassin.

Yes and from what we've heard characters theorize they can't do that too often. She's got breadth but not too much scope.

Yup so don't you think she'd look into Augur as much as possible. Rumors have a hint of the truth to them. What we've seen of them together is Augur provide warnings, sometimes with details, that they then use to plan their actions. She doesn't hand them some guidebook that has it lined out like the ABCs.

Yes we're all quite sad we didn't get a whole chapter about the aftermath of their defeat. We got to see Hierarch for a bit and that's more than enough. Black knew he lost and Cat even noticed that he wasn't quite the same, especially with the death of Sabah. But again Black's not the MC and we don't need every single one of his thoughts.
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You ignore the part that Augur has to look for a problem. Only the biggest ones get a divine handout. She's not an omnipotent God.