Yeah, I don't see what's so great about the drow either.

Especially considering that a lot of war problems Catherine have actually resolved or started ameliorating themselves while she was failing to pick up the Dead King.

I mean, because of the arch-heretic stuff, apparently the Callowan recruiting drive has been revitalized by the power of 'fuck those guys'. The Tenth Crusade is being torn apart from the inside thanks to Black taking an axe to their political divide, to the point of Cordelia being in fights with her chief general/the state religion. The Dead King is about to start rolling down from the north, the League is definitely about to do something.

Despite the failure in Keter, it seems like there's actually been some breathing room bought for Cat to go home and start solidifying her country against sabotage from Malicia, and actually pick up the wreckage of what happened while she was gone instead of sending Thief and Adjutant.

Instead, she's off chasing an ally whose entire culture revolves around the exact same shit she hated in Praes. Like, I think the new paradigm with Akua is funny as fuck, but it's extremely off-putting considering how Books 1-3 were.

There was a big mess talked about how 'oh I can't set up an entire new court of Winter because I'd get slapped by the karmic scales of the other side', but like, that's already fucking happening? And also, as Ryuugi has pointed out repeatedly, the country of Good is already being ravaged by the Evil armies of the Black Knight, so if we were trying to avoid escalation that shit has well past failed.

Everyone in the Army of Callow command staff should be Winter Dukes, Counts and Barons already. Kendall, Talbot or Juniper should have been tossed the other 2 of the 3 Prince/Princess titles Larat isn't using. And Cat should be basically posted at the border in front of Papenheim's army waiting for the Grey Pilgrim to show face anywhere else on the continent (such as the North or in Salia) so she can drop another lake on them with impunity. Hell, why not just open the floodgates right now and turn Red Flower Vales into a fucking lake - I'd like to see his army bilge through that without divine assistance.

Pretty much every other force on the continent has their fists up and is swinging for KOs, and Cat's still got her hands tied out of some nebulous moral reluctance which only seems to matter every other day. I don't know what the fuck is going on, but I don't like it.

 

Yeah, I agree that they're not worth the effort. I just don't think they're necessarily on their way to extinction either. All this time could've been better spent reorganizing Callow and her army, but I guess the author felt it would've been too similar to past books? The Drow literally can't reach anyone relevant except the Dead King without Cat's portals, since the elves and dwarves are in the way, so Cat has to stick around for the disunited remnants of an empire pull itself together.

 

I get the notion that Cat needs somebody to split casualties with. Callow's been ravaged repeatedly over the past few books what with a demon fucking up Marchford, Summer scouring Dormer and Holden, the Crusaders now recently scavenging the northern baronies, and of course Liesse. The southern part of her country is completely fucked and she needs time to recover instead of continuing to turn it into a wasteland of its own (I wonder if this is story-world forcing that upon a country sliding towards evil. Evil countries aren't supposed to be nice places to live). Killing another several thousand people in their prime is not something she needs right now, even if that's still preferable to getting conquered by Procer.

The Drow are a terrible fucking choice for this purpose. They're unreliable, seemingly outdated, and irrelevant. Callow may abide them at first because "fuck Procer", I doubt that lasts. Plus I have no idea what Cat has to offer them.

But moreover, the Dead King is entering the war. He may not be doing so on Cat's terms, but he's invading Procer nonetheless and taking the pressure off Callow that she very much needs. Are the Drow still necessary? The chief concern of the Crusade has changed from "liberating Callow" to "holy shit the Dead King is here". The Free Cities will make their move and threaten her allies in Tenerife. The most brilliant warlords that Praes has born in god knows how long are pillaging the heartlands of her country. Her Grand Alliance of Good will be under siege by a Grand Alliance of Evil, and she cannot fight all of them. Good hasn't won a Crusade since the Second. The Tenth isn't going any better. She needs to close down some hostile fronts, and if she's going to peace out with anybody, she knows that Cat is a real possibility. It's literally the lesser of two evils.

Only reason this still makes the slightest bit of sense is if Cat wants to stay in the war rather than just peaceing out. If the Bard is really the one behind the Conclave there may not be a choice, but based on her pro-Callow goals that's the best thing to do for her country. I guess smacking Malicia is a thing that needs to be done, but she's hardly in a position to do that or suffer the consequences of a victory. I know she wants to get the Liesse Accords, but girl just cut your losses and take care of your damn people. Find another way.

 

Hell, its technically even worse thinking than that because the drow have been contained at this point. If by some chance the drow aren't a bunch of useless critters, there is still the fact that bringing them back into Calernia at large may be the worst decision here. You really want to drop a bunch of slavers into the clusterfuck that is Callow or Procer right now? This just seems like your house is on fire and you have decided to fight the fire with fire. Except that now your fire is still losing so you just want to throw gasoline at it.

 

The idea, as I understand it, behind Cat hesitating to make a new Court, is not about the karmic scales as such, it's about divine intervention. The way Akua described it was like this:

Simply put, if Cat starts pulling out all the stops, there's really no way for Good to match her*. Despite the number of dead mooks, the fact remains that Cat, the Woe, and the forces of Evil have kind of one-sidedly beaten the shit out of the Crusade thus far, so even if you accept that attrition could eventually turn the tide, the only way for Good to win if she hands out powerups is to start cheating and boosting it's own dudes. Issue is, if the Gods Above do that, the Gods Below do as well, and suddenly Creation's at the center of a bidding war, which Cat doesn't want.

Except...I don't really know why? Like, I keep harping on about it, but the fact of the matter is that heroes in this series are punk-ass bustas, and that causes problems when it tries to routinely act like they aren't, such as now. If the heroes seemed at all intimidating, I could maybe see where they're coming from, but Cat, Masego, and a bunch of fucking nobodies defeated over three times their number in soldiers, along with twelve heroes, two of which were supposedly some of the biggest heroes on the continent. Black proceeded to have everything go just as planned in the Vales and is fucking Procer up the ass with nothing to stop him despite engaging in classical villain behavior. Kairos has something big building in the Free Cities and is just waiting to cut lose, and the literal story the Tyrant line was founded on was his ancestor beating up Procer. The Warlock and Masego are preparing to crush Ashur's fleet, Malicia unleashed the Dead King, and the Dead King himself is preparing to deep-dick half the continent with the strongest forces we've ever seen in this story and an extremely conservative minimum of a literal million soldiers counting only the last Crusade he broke over his knee.

Cat keeps acting like the Crusade is a big deal, but the story made a joke out of them, so who the hell cares? Let's say Cat hands out her titles and drops 50 points on her side and the Gods Above react by dropping a 100 points on their team--the Gods Below drop 100 on the Dead King and the situation doesn't really change because the Good guys are still fucked.

Now, could they be intimidating? Sure; if heroes were at all like they keep getting described in the lore, they'd be terrifying. Even if they just consistently remembered how their powers worked, they're be pretty damn bad--like, since Cat's been running around other countries, I think it's worth mentioning that since the Warlock probably left the Vales at least a month ago, if the Augur had noticed literally anything that, the Witch could have moved the mess in the Vales in an afternoon and marched into Callow, in which case half the country would be on fire right now. Or if the Saint hadn't somehow been stonewalled by fucking Archer, she could have slaughtered her way through Cat's forces while she was asleep and left Callow in an actual, horrifically dire situation. Like, if Cat had no army left at all, I could see her concern right now.

But as is? Fuck it, hand out titles; who's gonna stop her? The Heroes? She woke up from a nap surrounded by eight heroes and they still couldn't take her on.

*Well, I guess in theory, the weaknesses of being a Fae could suddenly start to matter in a big enough way to backfire on her, but there's been very little of that as far as we've seen.

 

The Drow all share this pool of power and their culture is based on killing your way to getting as much of it as you can. Killing non-Drow is the only way to add to that power. Cat wants to lead them out of the Everdark so they can kill a bunch of non-Drow for her. Also Neshamah once kicked their ass so hard he left a cultural scar that makes them piss themselves at the thought of him, so good luck keeping them in line once he takes the field. This plan keeps getting worse and worse.

 

Agreed, with emphasis. Let me get into it:

Just to get it out of the way, to start off with, we do a lot of pussy-footing around actually killing the prisoners like Cat insisted on last time, before killing them. I'm more annoyed by the pussy-footing than the killing, if I'm being honest, just because we wasted a lot of words on that, though the fact that Cat can't bring herself to do it with her own blade gets her points off from me. But really, who cares?

After that, we go into the Gloom--which might be a giant Domain, as it turns out, and possibly intended as a way to keep out the dwarves. Turns out that it's not just the surface where the drow make no progress; they can't get anywhere underground, either*. On the other hand, we learn what the drow might have to offer, and it comes with a big old reason not to take it. It turns out that the drow can gather Night, the substance that gives them their powers, from anyone they kill, up to and including undead. In the process of doing so, they can take 'Secrets,' meaning that they can steal the knowledge of whoever they take this way. Kill a master swordsman, become a master swordsman. The worthy take, the worthy rise. Since they can do that to anyone they kill, they'd make for great soldiers if unleashed.

And, you know, a horrible plague. See, several things are becoming clearer and clearer--first, that the drow are assholes who shouldn't be trusted, but secondly, that they're potentially huge, huge threats that are thankfully kept in check by the fact that they border all the hardest motherfuckers on the continent, above and below. As is, with the shithole of a society they're stuck in, they don't develop or learn anything new; they only have their Secrets and they kill each other over the same scraps of knowledge, again and again. It becomes clear then why they consider going on murderous, slaving raids to be a fucking holy duty, to the point that it can cleanse any disgrace; because only by doing so can they currently add to the Night. And these guys can learn some esoteric talents, such as the Secret of Many Lives.

And Cat thinks it's a good idea to let them out? And entire race that not only thinks murder and slavery are sacred but can directly and greatly benefit from it? In a scenario where they aren't kept under lock and key, these guys have the potential to grow up fast, and they're best way to do so is via mass-slaughter, not just of soldiers, but of civilians. You want some useful skills--slaughter the farmers, the book-keepers, the works all around.

This does not seem like a good idea. This sounds a lot like raising up something you're not sure you can put down. If Cat does gain their loyalty, a few months of solid killing away from the Ratlings, Fae, Dead King, and Dwarves has the potential to completely restructure the drow as a species, in a way that could make them seriously, crazily dangerous. What happens when these guys start learning magic from killing mages, for example? Does anyone think it's a good idea to give these guys the knowledge the Praesi have, in any capacity, who are a group Cat's opposing now? The knowledge to potentially summon demons?

Seriously, I mentioned the idea before that since the Warlock probably left the Vales at least a month ago, a word from the Augur to the Witch would have half of Callow on fire right now. Or if the Saint and the heroes had gone hadn't somehow been stonewalled, that they could have slaughtered her way through Cat's forces while she was asleep and left Callow in an actual, horrifically dire situation. And if this was the route we were gonna take, I feel like that should have happened, because if Cat had no army left at all, I could see her being desperate right now. Heck, have Malicia have much more prolific assassinations going on, whatever.

Because as is, I don't understand in what universe it would seem like a good idea to let these chucklefucks out instead of dealing with Callow and giving out titles. Am I missing something? Because as near as I can tell, a drow society that isn't too busy fucking itself until it can't walk and has a way out of being surrounded by the Chain of Hunger, Golden Bloom, Kingdom of the Dead, and Kingdom Under has every reason to be a plague upon the Earth. And she wants these guys to be in her own country!?

Can somebody tell Cat that Pandora's Box is, historically speaking, a tricky bitch to deal with once you open it? And any plan that let's these motherfuckers out of their box needs to come with a good way of putting them back in,because in case you missed it, they hold up murder, treachery, and slavery as something sacred and the slaughter of other people to add to the Night as something holy without equal. Send these guys against the Praesi and Procerans and in short order you're going to be dealing with a vastly bigger threat than what first came out. And again, these guys do not believe in loyalty.

*There's also mention of how the dwarves use 'great machines of steel'--does this imply they don't get red letters from the gnomes? I wonder if it's because they're underground or because they're a continent spanning group; might imply other major nations don't get as fucked up by the Gnomes, if it's the latter.

 

Interesting thought, what the hell happens if they kill a fae? I'm trying to imagine the sheer info dump that would occur if they dog piled Larat.

 

Cat, come on now. You've shrugged off the massacres of a whole bunch of people--hell, you currently have Akua with you. It's a bit late to try and plant your feet on this.

Anyway, allying with the Drow was a terrible idea that's somehow managing, against all odds, to get progressively worse. That expansion phase that Black and Scribe talked about a year ago? Apparently it's straight through the Everdark. Honestly, I'd pack up and leave based on that alone, because the apathy of the dwarves seems like a better deal than the friendship of the Elves, but Cat's still intent on going to meet with the Drow and I feel like I'm missing something.

Seriously, Cat--what are you doing? You have a Mass Effect decision tree before you, and the correct option is clear; 'I should go.'

 

That discussion between Cat and Akua was just wow. Akua was basically right about everything. Cat looks down on her accomplishments way too much and that clouds her judgement. She may not want to listen but hearing it from someone else will at least make her think. Also gave a small bit of justification for why she needs the Drow, though it's looking more and more like that's gonna be a fuck up too.

 

Akua, the living personification of old school villainy and bad ideas, continues to be the most useful person on the team and the one talking the most sense, which continues to also be disorienting. Not much to say beyond that: We're still in the Everdark, for reasons*. Cat didn't turn around and leave after seeing what the dwarves have done and is potentially risking mass destruction in Callow, for reasons. Cat continues to claim to hold to hating and being prepared to kill Akua despite needing her to tie her proverbial shoelaces, for reasons. We get yet another monologue about the woes of Callow, though at least someone pointed out that Callow stopped mattering awhile ago, in and out of story; even I can admit that while Cat's fucked Callow up a bunch, Callow was already fucked up a bunch and any claims of a heroic rescue after what we've seen are laughable, much as that pains me. Cat continues to ignore this, though, for reasons.

*Cat dismisses asking Black, Praes, or the Fae for help when Akua suggests it, because she doesn't want to interfere in the former and the latter are too costly. None of that makes much sense, honestly, because giving Black access to Gates would probably help get rid of a lot of her problems, even assuming Procer can afford to have armies trained on her right now, which they kind of can't. As for the Fae and Praes being really costly, that's absolutely true. But, like, are the drow gonna fight a war for her for free, then? To say nothing of the fact that the drow are currently getting their shit shoved in by a force Cat cannot risk upsetting.

 

Right up until this point I could buy that maybe this somehow wasn't the worst idea ever. But today we find out that

Spoiler

the dwarves aren't here for a little expedition. They're here to wipe out whatever causes the Gloom and take the whole Everdark for themselves.

Which throws me firmly into the gtfo and never come back camp.

 

It's kind of amazing how this bad idea keeps getting worse, yeah. I'm sure Cat's gonna stay for some reason or other, but seriously, I'm struggling hard to think of any reason why she shouldn't have left yesterday. It's been made increasingly clear that these risks aren't worth the reward; even a slight misstep against the dwarves would ruin her whole country both directly and indirectly. It's Mass Effect decision-making time, and there's only one right answer: 'I should go.'

 

Only explanation I can come up with is that the new plan is going to be to help them evacuate elsewhere. But that still seems like the worst of ideas. The dwarves may not care if they just want the space, but do you really want to take the risk they won't follow to finish the job? And even if they don't, the drow are evidently terrifying and the only reason they're not a problem is because their current borders don't let them. Put them in a place where they can gather Night safely and you're going to have serious issues.

 

The dwarves' timing is pretty bad. Cat goes to recruit the drow just as the most terrifying race on the continent comes in to conquer them? Which they certainly could've done for a long-ass time but are just finally getting around to. Now Cat can offer escape via fairy portal, which is pretty damn enticing when extinction is on your doorstep and will certainly bring the Sve to the table. It’s not just the initial pool of dark power Cat found. This whole thing smacks of "divine intervention" to unleash the Drow. Maybe just the Bard’s doing, but that's not so different a thing.

The drow are a shaken up soda can, and the gods just handed it to Cat for her to pop off the lid and spray them all over Calernia. God this is a terrible idea. Cat really should just open up a portal and leg it. Maybe bring Ivah along as a new treacherous dread lieutenant and make Larat jealous.

 

Not much to say this time either, aside from two distinct points:

1) It's becoming increasingly evident that any time Akua speaks, Cat needs to shut up and listen, and I'm not sure how comfortable I am with her being the voice of forethought and reason in the group.

2) Cat views the idea of the entire drow population being up and dumped on Callow's lap as a good thing? Uh, am I missing something? Because that sounds like an utterly terrible idea even compared to all the other terrible ideas she's had recently. Like, the idea of a species of traitorous, slaving, mass-murderers with the potential for exponential growth getting loose of their confinement was bad enough to begin with, back when there was the unrealistic idea that maybe you could somehow put them back, but we've apparently moved on to, no, just fucking let them live in Callow.

???

 

Let's talk about something new. Author said that Book 4 will have 7 story arcs. We're on arc 3. This is gonna be a fat bastard, but Book 5 is supposed to be shorter.

jfc, this arc needs to get to the good part ASAP and the book in general needs to remember that there's this whole continent spanning war going on we should get back to.

 

So seeing the dwarves fight was cool and all, but all it really did was continue the growth of the somehow still growing question of 'Why the hell do you want the drow, Cat?' Because yeah, these guys barely had armor or weapons and had nothing in the way of soldiers, so...?

Anyway, because Cat's still insisting on this dumb fucking plan even after realizing the dwarves were in town, she's now been revealed in front of an army of dwarves while in the company of multiple drow. Normally, I'd say that could lead to tense, interesting moments, but this was such a horrible idea with so many ways to backfire and no clear way to succeed that I feel pretty much nothing. After five chapters in a row of horrible decisions, even the comeuppance feels kind of tiring. Hopefully it means we're moving towards more interesting pastures, though.

 

The author needs an editor to run ideas like this by. The last two arcs have been a trial of poor story decisions to get through. My only thoughts on this is that Cat is trying to pull her own version of Black's stunt with the orcs. God I hope I'm wrong and there is something else driving this stupidity.

 

I want to get off Cat's Wild Ride Idiotic Escapade.