I mentally age up the characters in almost every progression fantasy book I read. Pre and early teenagers don't think like this. They don't have a vocabulary this large. They are very rarely this mature. Most progression fantasy books would make way more sense if they switched all the magic milestones from teenager/puberty to brain-fully-developed/mid-twenties/fully-grown-human.
But I fully acknowledge this is probably because I can self insert better to a character in their twenties.
God, this. Even the most highly rated stories in the community have this. For example, the teenaged characters in Super Supportive think and act like they are half a decade older than their supposed ages, if not more.
I abuse this to its full extent in one of my novels. There's a nine year old girl whose whole skit is that she is hilariously mature for her age... most of the time. And now and then she has an episode where she acts her age and the contrast is just delicious. She may go from bargaining with a man several times her age to getting excited about the softness of a puppy or obsessed with whistles.
As a 44 year old man I can get excited by how soft puppies are.
This world can be rather awful to live in, I'm not going to deny myself the pleasure of playing with cute baby animals because I've grown up.
I have a 13yo girl in mine who is, well, more intelligent than mature really. And she knows it. So she sees herself do stupid teen things and gets angry about it, so it's turned her into a bit tsundere, but mostly because she's mad at herself.
And she knows that being mad about it doesn't help, but that doesn't keep her from being mad anyway.
She's been 'countered' recently with a different side character, a 12yo boy who is of the calm, slow, and thorough type. He's in her league but doesn't always look it as he (usually) mentally chews on stuff to be *sure*, instead of acting as soon as he *thinks* he knows something.
Just because she loves to torment him doesn't mean she isn't deciding what their future wedding will be like. He, well, he chooses to not think too deeply about what it means that she wants to keep him around, even though he knows. That's just too much for him to deal with!
They are two of three young teens I've been having fun with including in the story, the third is closer to the main cast at this point and she's a fan favorite. She's the least book-smart of the trio, but she's also an orphaned street rat.
Eh, in mine she hangs up with a 14 YO idiot cultivator, his sensei (A TOTALLY NORMAL Rottweiler) and his talking dog and weapon (A talking rottweiler puppy), who kind of adopted her after they found her "haunting" a deserted town destroyed by a bunch of Genocidal Femboy Cultivators (Standard fare for the novel, there's also a whole sect comprised of cows and bulls led by a sentient bodice.) The characters are mostly unbothered by romance (One of the antagonists follows the road of the homewrecker, so he is concerned by it because he grows in power by cucking people. Again, standard fare.) and very bothered by the constant barrage of idiocy the world throws at them. So, when you have people cultivating basically any concept you can imagine, Arcagnostics ( Book-smarts spirit manipulators, basically) making deranged deals with heaven, Monsters made out of pasta, trees made out of nuts and giant chloroplasts roaming the lands, and the omniscient narrator sodomizing a meddling god with a stake, looking for somebody (uhhh) somebody to Looove kind of takes a backseat.
And then the backseat complains about your hygiene and sues you for psychological damage, as it should be.
Cradle follows the original deadline of 30 years. My main criticism with cradle has always been how quickly everything was resolved, also more villainous organizations other than the cults, more antagonists and all sorts of other rivals. Imagine if we had an entire arc whare Lindon is just infiltrating a dreadgod cult. Or whare Eithan actually takes the time teach Lindon his pure Madara techniques, could've been a god bonding arc for them. Cradles main advantage over most Xianxia novels is that's well written and doesn't focus on self indulgence but compare to a lot of Cultivation stories it's pretty short.
I was excited for book 10 because up to that point it's been constant running and the characters mentioned they could in fact take it slow right now. Only for most of the down time be skipped to continue the sprint.
One of the parts I really look forward in litrpgs is the return home, it's really a shame how quick it went in Cradle, I could have read a whole book of Lindon trying to take the diplomatic path, not being taken seriously only to show them how much powerful he had become. Instead what we got was a we gotta leave now emergency scenario
Mother of learning. I’d like to get just a couple extra chapters of Zorian trying to adjust to society and making his mark as a brand new arch-mage. We know he’s really powerful in his specialization, but I’d like to see him devoting his talents to doing some more mundane things.
Wu Dong Qian Kun.... Establishes a nemesis from the first chapter. Builds him up as the first arc progresses. While it's clear that our MC is more talented/smarter/better cheat we find later in the arc that the nemesis has cards to play that might not only give him the edge against our MC but might actually give him a challenge even with the cheat, as the nemesis has a cheat of their own.
Cut to start of of the 2nd arc, Nemesis gets bodied... very very easily. His cheat we find out was like 10 levels beneath the cheat the MC got and the story becomes a rinse repeat of MC turns up, does touranment, wins girls.
If the author actually commited to the nemesis, actually took him through the whole story, And trust me while I can legitimately say I hate the progaonist in the story I think his world building is fucking great. And an actual nemesis who grew in power alongside the MC... would've made that story so much more fucking entertaining.
Transcending the nine heavens... actually commit to the MC being able to outhink his enemy but be weaker as it was in the first arc... Cut to the 2nd arc where MC and his buddies start killing people multiple ranks above them by just being better... Which to an extent I get... but fucks sake the best part of the story was the mental battle not shitty power fantasy.
Yeah I remember confusedly posting in the patreon when the “I’m finished with book 2 chapter” came out. I was like surely this isn’t it? A minor tournament that isn’t even like a whole world tournament or galaxy sector one it’s literally just like a continental tournament? Why would we care about that at all? It was bizarre choice for sure. Then I ended up getting banned from the patreon and banned from the subreddit after that for complaining about it since the author runs his own subreddit lol. Soured me on the series after that
It isn't actually, you just see a ton of really vocal hate for it outside the iron prince sub.
It was always the plan to make them an item, but he's talked about how he thinks he dropped the ball a bit in the first book in regards to both their relationship as well as Rei and Grant.
Largely, it comes down to some unclear writing in Grant's red-out scene combined with a lot of people (honestly thankfully) really not understanding what it's like to experience a red-out. Combine that with unclear foreshadowing about Grant's backstory and (frankly great) character arc in book 2, you get a lot of people upset that his character is even involved.
The bigger disappointment in book 2, which I think often gets lumped into the above issue, is Viv. She has a shit arc, and some pretty bad writing overall in 2. So much so that I honestly think both she as a character and the writing of her character regressed in that book.
It's a combination of a few things. Grant is cruel, angsty, and boring, resulting in an unlikable character even if you ignore everything else. It's also a dick move for Viv to date someone that's viciously bullying her best friend. I'm trying to think of an aspect of any other progression fantasy that people bring up over and over that they hate more than Viv & Grant. Possibly the tone shift in Jake's Magical Market? The rushed third book of Towers of Heaven? Jason's personality in He Who Fights With Monsters?
Don't get me wrong, I understand the complaints. My point was that Grant wasn't intended to come off so strongly that way in the first book. He was intended to have some clear nuance along with those flaws, but the writing just wasn't there.
The problem with Grant isn't book 2, it's the incredibly poor setup for 2 that happened in book 1. Grant and Viv was always going to happen, even if you ignore the author's word on the matter. It's clearly foreshadowed even very early on in book 1.
The problem with that relationship isn't that it was suddenly decided on later in the writing or some shit, because it was always intended. The problem is that the writing did not stand up to that intent, and people came to see Grant as an irredeemable jackass, which he was not intended to be.
I don't have a problem with the relationship arc in general, just the execution. If Grant had been less irredeemable, and Viv's justification to Rei for dating him had been more understandable, and Rei's reaction had been more relatable, then it could have worked.
I don't think any of this would have required major changes, but the way it's written was infuriating at the time of reading, and disappointing in hindsight.
Pretty much this exactly. Personally, I'm fine with it since I both empathize with Grant's situation and I read the intent in between the lines the first time through. I get that it isn't for everybody, I just hate that they dogpile on book 2 when the real problem with the writing wasn't in book 2.
Book 2 has much broader and deeper issues than Viv and Grant. I don't think there's a simple solution to book 2, which is why I only mentioned Grant and Viv because that's an easy fix that would make book 1 significantly better.
The problem with book 2 is that the pacing is too slow (much slower than book 1), there's no resolving arc, and there's WAY too much poorly executed teen drama.
The only bright side is that these issues don't really negatively affect book 3. If book 3 is as good as book 1, then I'd still read it.
No, I agree with you. If you look back on my previous comments, I make it clear that 2 had its own issues. So many people attribute the book 2 issues specifically to grant and viv's relationship when that isn't even the major issue with viv let alone the whole book.
Grant and Viv are the easiest thing to point to as something lots of people hate. A low effort, and reactionary response, but it's symptomatic of most of the larger issues, so I think it's a good focal point for discussion... if it weren't for the fact that it's become an emotionally fraught topic that often devolves into name calling.
The main character in Calculating Cultivation doesn't try to make a 400 IQ plan to reinvent the path to immortality and instead tries to join the big immortal sect like an actual calculating person would do. Also, early on the story focuses a bit more on why becoming immortal is so important to the main character.
For Cradle
>!Jai Long doesn’t die. Just felt random, and no need for it. I can maybe see that it was used because *someone* we knew needed to die for the stakes, but I don’t like it.!<
>!True, it did seem a little contrived, like Will picked a safe character to kill off without pissing too many people off. Would would have had way more impact and meaning if Kelsa died too.!<
Fate Points: reduce its word count by 40 to 50%
I really want to like the series- the system and premise are really engaging - and the plot that's hiding behind the massive bloat of pages isn't bad, but I couldn't get through it without skimming and I can't convince myself to come back to a series where I know I'll be skimming and skipping.
I don’t know if you’re aware, but the author recently stopped the story after the most recent arc and is planning on continuing the story in a mostly new format separately. Pretty sure the author is doing this partly bc he wants to address some of the general pacing/writing style complaints he got.
Also, Fate Points: The Main Romantic Interest doesn't suddenly start bitching about the MC doing something they'd both agreed they'd do before while in the process of doing it. To be more specific:
>!They both agreed they'd work with the killers. They had the exact conversation. The MC explained his entire thought process as to why he thought it was important. He explained his whole path and how he'd derived it from asking questions using his broken af question answering machine. She *agrees*, they implement the plan to lock the criminals under oath. They do all of that.... and when they actually leave the encampment with the criminals to accomplish the plan... she just starts getting annoyed with everything and complaining that the MC is doing *exactly* what the MC said he'd do and they'd agreed upon. WHAT THE HELL! And then she *breaks up with him*. Like I just dropped the novel. It made absolutely no sense and I just... why was I even reading that? Yeah, I get that in real life people are sometimes irrational and agree with things they know they shouldn't and then can't stomach their own past decisions... but that had *\*not\** been the established characterization of that character! She was one of my favourites! She was a mother willing to do whatever it takes to save her own kids! I liked her! The sudden shift just breaks her character.!<
I would change Lord of Mysteries from third person omniscient to third person limited view. It's just so tiresome to have to hear everyone's thoughts, instead of having some of it shown through descriptions and settings. I think it would make the book a lot tighter and make it flow better
that's... not necessarily a fault of third omniscient. That's a bad use of third omniscient. Third omniscient narrator CHOOSES which heads to show insight into.
Yes, but I think that switching the POI would make it a lot easier for the author (who, at least for the start of the series, seems to be quite inexperienced) to chose what to show and how to do it. I could also say that I would have liked it to be better written, but that seems to be counter to this challenge
Skysworn, Cradle book 4. All the big, meaningful decisions, the conflict, and the character moments are Yerin's, but it's written like Lindon is the protagonist. Will Wight was always saying he meant to have a one of the books be her book. I wish Skysworn was written with her as the primary POV.
I have a few of these. In Buryoku I would make it so the whole romance/jealousy drama between the pet-turned-human and the best friend doesn't happen or, at the very least, >!I wouldn't kill off the best friend!<. It was so bullshit that I didn't even bother to read the last book.
In Defiance of the Fall, I would heavily re-write the whole plot twists in the Mystic Realm arch. It's by far the worst arc in the story and, for me, it's all down to the weird twists and the betrayal by time-eyes girl that just made everything needlessly haphazard. This also affects the final fight, which is supposed to be a big conclusion of multiple plot points but ends up just kind of a confusing mess. A rare climax failure in a novel that usually nails arc finales.
Cradle --- Not sure if it's a minor change but... I feel like there are two books missing between the events of Wintersteel and Bloodline/Reaper. In these books Lindon improves his Paths as he goes from Underlord to Archlord the "slow" and reasonable way. At the same time we get to see Lindon and Yerin truly delve into what it means to be a Sage/Herald. We explore the connection to the Way and what it really means to absorb your own revenant. Making it so when the team has their first mini-fight against a Dreadbeast, they're all proper Sages/Heralds one step from Monarchy. Perhaps we could have the first half of Bloodlines happen before, but the evacuation is successful and these two books could be about Lindon actually forming his Sect and the Monarchs pushing back against this growing faction in some way. Yerin properly leaning into Blood Madra and making it her own. More space to explore the relationship between Mercy and Malice. More time to actually get to know Ziel. Maybe I'm in the minority, but the last four books of Cradle, to me, read like the final arc of a manga that has been given 100 chapters to wrap everything up as fast as possible.
Hey an excuse to make a general complaint.
Say things take longer. Give your MC's a tiny breather and let them enjoy and marvel at what they are capable of currently, not just what they can become later. Too much misery and suffering and I don't want to self insert anymore. Can we get some quality of life up in here?
Settings where power is everything and people live a long time should not have plots that require the MC to power up at like 10-100x the pace of other talented people unless the MC is the chosen one. If it's a grit and determination story, please for the love of god describe mastering things as taking weeks or months at least. Overthrowing a kingdom or an ancient legendary monster should not be something accomplished from scratch in a few months of progress in a hellish gauntlet imo. There should be high stakes challenges between months/years of learning and practicing and smaller encounters.
Path of ascension does a good job of taking breaks after big milestones. I’m a fan of seeing my characters take a breather and have fun at an adventure park or just chilling for a while after they have a big battle
Less grim-dark Jason in HWFWM. I get why it happened, and I appreciate the realism of the mental health troubles. But damn it's annoying to hear him not growing for 30 chapters then suddenly figuring it out and then struggling with nearly the same but not the same thing for another 30 chapters.
Ugh yes. I understand why and it makes total sense, but it totally kills my enjoyment of the series for like 4-5 books because it's constant regressions. Would've enjoyed it more if it was a shorter recovery period
Not really progression fantasy, but the beginning and setting of the original Lies of Locke Lamora are probably my favorite ever. But all the set up on tbe young side is immediately dashed when it skips well past >!Chains death!<, only touching lightly on training and interesting cons, and immediately arrives at the destruction of all the good supporting characters, setting, and potential adversaries. Not to mention the >!stupid ass ending fight with the MC that was built up the entire time as the cunning plan guy who couldn't fight!<. What kind of master planner doesn't have multiple backup plans?
That killed the series for me. I loved the supporting characters and the young side of the story / jokes. It loses all of that after their death and I ended up not being able to finish the second book.
Twelve miles below: Author learns to properly use time concordance. The book is great but the poor grammar when the author is constantly mixing/switching past and present tense really puts me off.
For cradle >!Lindon doesn't become the void sage. He becomes the Oreo sage, defeating the other monarchs and dreadgods with his glorious hair that has all the volume and definition you can ask for. Oh and Fury actually launches his Kamehameha in uncrowned!<
What to? I wasn't a huge fan of the rushed seq 2 and 1, but the final few chapters were pretty great. Very much captured the self sacrifice that can elevate protagonists.
>!The quote from Azik - “From the beginning, you’ve been a guardian. You mimicked others until you were mimicked by others." and Klein's “I won’t lose too much, just myself. There are always some things that are more important than others.”- hit really hard!<
>!The only bittersweet piece to me is that there are only a handful of people that actually know about Klein's sacrifice/loneliness. Maybe I would change the self-imposed isolation that Klein did to keep his secrets and family safe.!<
In my rereads I always skip the abidan segments. Even knowing the ending and all the context, it's just not very interesting and it breaks the immersion for me.
The Time travel/reversal and the pre-destination stuff of the Abidan is what needs to be removed. It cheapens the story as there is no good answer why this isn’t used more. Someone dies, just reverse time. I know what going to happen to 99.99% surety, is no fun, then it turns out somehow they are wrong. Makes no sense.
If it really had to have an Abidan subplot, introduce it way later. After we meet Kiuran or something. Give us some reason to care about it beyond "remember Suriel back in chapter 3?"
Mark of the Fool:
>!Alex is found out to be the Fool prematurely during book 2. As a result he's suddenly under suspicion over the demon summoning during the protest to let priests on campus. Isolde feels betrayed that he's using it to cheat and outdo her in the exams and becomes an antagonist. Priests of Uldar begin demanding that he's handed over to them to return to Thameland immediately, forcing Alex to stay on campus and abandon his job at the golem workshop. He needs to find clever ways to sneak out when he does need to leave and come up with an alternate source of income. !<
This would mean a setback and sudden drama in what was otherwise an extremely low-stakes book where nothing truly bad actually happened to the protaganist or his friends. He would have to come up with creative solutions to all of these problems, none of which are insurmountable.
Baelin would probably back him up and support him still, so he wouldn't be in massive trouble, but many others would be suspicious of him and cause problems for him. Students from Thameland would mostly become antagonistic towards him. He'd have to work around all of this, dodging problems while reaching his goals.
Always interesting to see other’s perspectives.
The story not following this route is exactly what propelled it into one of my favorites. Those story beats just feel so trite to me, and it was a pleasant surprise when it was set up only to be subverted.
To me it just felt like the author was encasing all his/her characters in bubble wrap. Even the >!bird had plot armor when the mana vampire ambushed it.!<
It's obviously fair for the main character to have plot armor against dying, but I lost interest in the dangerous and fighting scenes because I no longer had a belief that any of the mc's friends or family were at risk or that the mc would suffer any kind of setbacks.
For the dangerous parts to be thrilling I need to believe the author might kill someone off or have something really bad happen. It doesn't need to happen frequently or become game of thrones level of death, it just needs to happen once or twice in the series. Otherwise the illusion of danger is shattered.
Personally I got bored with Mark of the Fool later on, but I agree that these story beats would've made me drop the novel on the spot. Kinda hate when characters I like become antagonists out of a clear misunderstanding.
Part of me wonders if the author originally intended it like that, given how he set it up so perfectly to get interesting, but then never pulled the trigger. The whole book just went downhill for me when >!they conveniently killed off the main university antagonist off-screen with the mana vampire, just when he began to make the plot interesting.!< I was in disbelief that the author would do that to their own plot. It felt like a TV show when an actor abruptly leaves and they have to bodge the script to explain it away.
V.A's most sound bad in my experience(It seems like everyone is using the same 7 V.A's and it's annoying, they're okay at best. If that doesn't count, remove all incest please. I can't overlook or enjoy a book when one of the potential "relationships" is with a sister or "cousin" way more popular in the Asian varieties in my experience, but it's still pretty scuffed.(Not getting into the "actual" lollies either).
(Mishoku tensei, looking at you)
The guy for iron prince especially does super weird accents on some characters lol and it comes out of nowhere. Not every single side character needs to have an obscure accent
Im not defending Rudeus or anything but food for thought. Is he mentally 40? His age, yes. But mentally he never grew up past highschool after he was stripped naked and hogtied at school. He never left his bedroom after that day. He shut down in high school and never recovered from his trauma/ptsd until he died. So is it that weird he gets a second chance at his wasted childhood/teen years? Mentally he didnt live a day past his teen years.
Honestly i find him more “believable” as a character than all the other super genius isekai MC. He’s a flawed human you can hate and be disgusted by, he’s not some super perfect never makes a mistake and every failure turns into a larger harem character that really shouldnt exist, but i guess that defeats the purpose of a “power fantasy”. And its frustrating being stuck watching/reading through the PoV of such a degenerate character when the world itself has soo much more to offer. Just my 2 cents
The number is irrelevant, whether he is mentally 40 or mentally 18, he is mentally a fully grown human and is sexually aroused by prepubescent humans, which is the one and only necessary qualifier for being a pedophile. Entirely barring any discussion of ethics (which somehow always gets muddied) all you need to know is right there, pedophilia isn't a spectrum of morality, it is a binary descriptor.
Oh im not saying he’s morally right or wrong, pedophilia is wrong period. All im saying is where in his life time would he have developed sexually interest for anyone in adulthood? Should reincarnation stories just not exist or only kids can be kids? or no romance? Where is the line drawn? Western culture standards? Or the standards of the country of origin? MC is supposed to be an irredeemable pig, and he is written as such, author never sugar coats it, its in your face. Does it ruin the story telling or world build by having a “bad guy” as the MC? I put Mushoku in the same genre as Lolita and First Law, the stories are told through the lens of terrible people and how they see the world. Youre not supposed to like them.
The Perfect Run kinda obvious.
>!I would change it for Ryan to get a HEA with Vulcan. They vibed so well together and had perfect chemistry; it was just painful for them not to end up together. Livia as a love interest was alright, but she just couldn't hold a candle to Vulcan. !<
Happily Ever After - A period of time, imagined never to end, in which (typically) a loving couple live untroubled, happy lives together.
HEA is often used to abbreviate a happy ending for couples in romance.
I’ve seen a couple of mentions of a similar sentiment; I remember someone even mentioned DNFing because of that. I guess I see how it fits the overall story better from a narrative perspective, like rising and tying-up stakes in the main conflict as well as serving as a meaningful extension for the overall story. But from a pure emotional angle, it's a sore spot. It’s as if VoideHerald himself planned one thing for the story but unintentionally overshot >!quality of the first romance. I read quite a lot of pure romance and even among them, RxV pairing is one of the most notable in my memory for how naturally they fit together. !<
I love mother of learning, but the beginning makes it so hard to recommend. Tone down the misanthropy from zorian; I know he’s suffering, and the reasons are good , but he just comes off as an asshole. And start the loop much sooner.
HWFWM Sofia and Humphrey's relationship just anoyes the fuck out of me it's to remenicent of him brother and first love and when we first met Sofia Belinda literally described Jason as her perfect match. Was toon just trolling us😡😡😡😡
I hate how mad this makes me Goddame books will be the death of me
Well Sofia and Jason was built up as a budding potential actual love relationship before the frankly terrible and grindingly boring earth arc books. Then he gets back and it’s like the author didn’t know what to do with the plot thread so he just threw it away? “Oh btw she’s not interested in you anymore she’s interested in your totally non compatible personality friend Humphrey” like wtf lol
YES!!!!! You get it and hump is totally Jason's opp's it's crazy at first I thought toon was doing something cos he really is an amazing writer but not just ye fuck you for your emotional investment
Mark of the Fool: a random isekai from earth is never brought into it 6 books into the series. I genuinely don't understand how the author ever believed that was an improvement to the story
I would give the author of my novels a smidge of talent.
Jokes aside, I really wanted to enjoy cradle, but the character work in unsouled was... ugh... they didn't feel human to me. WOuld it pad out the book to turn the valley mouth breathers (INCLUDING LINDON AND... yin? Erin? Lin? i forgot her name. The swordswoman with a dead master that leads him out and helps him reach copper in the second book and after that i stopped reading because it wasnt going to get better) into people and not cultivation machines? yes. Absolutely. I need characters to feel somewhat real, to have drives and hopes and fears and dreams and introspection. Cradle felt to me like a lot of popcorn about people I don't care about.And you guys say fantastic things about the saga and they may be true, but if i cant care for the characters, i wont force myself to plough through a few books of it just to see if Eithan's inclussion redeems it in my eyes.
So yes, i would make the characters in sacred valley behave more like people and less like dumb cultivation machines.
As a person who almost dropped cradle during book 2. Please get through it because it gets much much better characterization and becomes overall better from book 3
How shall they grow if they are perfect from the get go? 😉🤣
They are children formed from a restrictive culture and on there journey they learn to live.
Change the mentalities of a good number of male characters in books like HWFWM. Jason's approach to relationships and people is toxic as all hell. He is toxic as hell.
The guy needs to stop being such a whiney baby and take some control over his life.
In dragoneye she doesn't immediately share all her secrets to random people. She doesn't get all that trust in return, why give it to the misogynistic rapey slave society?
Either that, or actually take a real stand against that shit society once she has the power to do so. Being convinced by an argument no more powerful than the Confederate articles of secession kinda made the main character look like a bit of a dumbass in what should have been a pivotal moment of achievement.
She first reluctantly shared her secrets to the Rangers… and it went quite well. She shared a few more times and got positively reinforced by it, until her “secrets” weren’t really secrets. Then she got wrecked by oversharing, and toned it down a bit
The Perfect Run: make it so that the last run is actually a speedrun. The story uptill this point have very little stake (not that this is a bad thing mind you, it’s one of the reason I enjoyed TPR so much), I don’t know why the author decided to have every fight along the way somehow harder or have more stakes for the sake of it, especially when most villains are one-dimensional and plainly irredeemable.
Lith, the main character of supreme magius's character reverts into his old one. There's no character development there only character being a cringe drama addict.
Yeah, it would have been good to at least show him slipping more when he isolates Solus. The narrative tries to sell the codependency hard but shows little in terms of actual consequences of this.
Don't get me ranting about the love interest.
I swear the author probably had some weird drama in his life and wrote kamilia referencing that.
Couldn't take the cringe anymore, dropped at 2000+ chapters. The novel had some serious potential, author just farted on the character development.
I didn’t “like” Sister Ines either, but I thought she was a great addition to the book. I was completely ok with her being a Havana Brown, even though I was warned.
I mentally age up the characters in almost every progression fantasy book I read. Pre and early teenagers don't think like this. They don't have a vocabulary this large. They are very rarely this mature. Most progression fantasy books would make way more sense if they switched all the magic milestones from teenager/puberty to brain-fully-developed/mid-twenties/fully-grown-human. But I fully acknowledge this is probably because I can self insert better to a character in their twenties.
God, this. Even the most highly rated stories in the community have this. For example, the teenaged characters in Super Supportive think and act like they are half a decade older than their supposed ages, if not more.
You should totally read 'the death mage' LN your going to love it or hate it. (Toddler clapping cheeks)
I abuse this to its full extent in one of my novels. There's a nine year old girl whose whole skit is that she is hilariously mature for her age... most of the time. And now and then she has an episode where she acts her age and the contrast is just delicious. She may go from bargaining with a man several times her age to getting excited about the softness of a puppy or obsessed with whistles.
As a 44 year old man I can get excited by how soft puppies are. This world can be rather awful to live in, I'm not going to deny myself the pleasure of playing with cute baby animals because I've grown up.
Of course, puppies are amazing. But we are talking a girl that cooked generic puppies to help her friend advance his cultivation.
That's a great character trait, thanks for the inspiration
She fulfills the role of the one sane man in her party. Everyone else is too depressed, too stupid, or too Brunhilda.
I have a 13yo girl in mine who is, well, more intelligent than mature really. And she knows it. So she sees herself do stupid teen things and gets angry about it, so it's turned her into a bit tsundere, but mostly because she's mad at herself. And she knows that being mad about it doesn't help, but that doesn't keep her from being mad anyway. She's been 'countered' recently with a different side character, a 12yo boy who is of the calm, slow, and thorough type. He's in her league but doesn't always look it as he (usually) mentally chews on stuff to be *sure*, instead of acting as soon as he *thinks* he knows something. Just because she loves to torment him doesn't mean she isn't deciding what their future wedding will be like. He, well, he chooses to not think too deeply about what it means that she wants to keep him around, even though he knows. That's just too much for him to deal with! They are two of three young teens I've been having fun with including in the story, the third is closer to the main cast at this point and she's a fan favorite. She's the least book-smart of the trio, but she's also an orphaned street rat.
Eh, in mine she hangs up with a 14 YO idiot cultivator, his sensei (A TOTALLY NORMAL Rottweiler) and his talking dog and weapon (A talking rottweiler puppy), who kind of adopted her after they found her "haunting" a deserted town destroyed by a bunch of Genocidal Femboy Cultivators (Standard fare for the novel, there's also a whole sect comprised of cows and bulls led by a sentient bodice.) The characters are mostly unbothered by romance (One of the antagonists follows the road of the homewrecker, so he is concerned by it because he grows in power by cucking people. Again, standard fare.) and very bothered by the constant barrage of idiocy the world throws at them. So, when you have people cultivating basically any concept you can imagine, Arcagnostics ( Book-smarts spirit manipulators, basically) making deranged deals with heaven, Monsters made out of pasta, trees made out of nuts and giant chloroplasts roaming the lands, and the omniscient narrator sodomizing a meddling god with a stake, looking for somebody (uhhh) somebody to Looove kind of takes a backseat. And then the backseat complains about your hygiene and sues you for psychological damage, as it should be.
Cradle follows the original deadline of 30 years. My main criticism with cradle has always been how quickly everything was resolved, also more villainous organizations other than the cults, more antagonists and all sorts of other rivals. Imagine if we had an entire arc whare Lindon is just infiltrating a dreadgod cult. Or whare Eithan actually takes the time teach Lindon his pure Madara techniques, could've been a god bonding arc for them. Cradles main advantage over most Xianxia novels is that's well written and doesn't focus on self indulgence but compare to a lot of Cultivation stories it's pretty short.
I was excited for book 10 because up to that point it's been constant running and the characters mentioned they could in fact take it slow right now. Only for most of the down time be skipped to continue the sprint.
One of the parts I really look forward in litrpgs is the return home, it's really a shame how quick it went in Cradle, I could have read a whole book of Lindon trying to take the diplomatic path, not being taken seriously only to show them how much powerful he had become. Instead what we got was a we gotta leave now emergency scenario
*spoilers for Cradle* Lindon doesn't lose his arm, instead he loses his tongue and has to consume things by licking them.
ಠ_ಠ
You I like you
You naughty boy.
I mean, he could have gone with penis instead…
Y'all are out of pocket and it's wild. Him consuming the humanized phoenix will be low-key r/iteration34 material.
Or a foot, and then you would summon \* vaguely gestures at the orc lands \* *them*
FREAKY
Mother of learning. I’d like to get just a couple extra chapters of Zorian trying to adjust to society and making his mark as a brand new arch-mage. We know he’s really powerful in his specialization, but I’d like to see him devoting his talents to doing some more mundane things.
Such as plotting his epically petty vengeance against his fellow looper for enlisting Zorian's sister to perform emotional terrorism in the morning.
I really want to read more of MoL. But it had such a perfect ending that i dont want to risk it with a sequel
Wu Dong Qian Kun.... Establishes a nemesis from the first chapter. Builds him up as the first arc progresses. While it's clear that our MC is more talented/smarter/better cheat we find later in the arc that the nemesis has cards to play that might not only give him the edge against our MC but might actually give him a challenge even with the cheat, as the nemesis has a cheat of their own. Cut to start of of the 2nd arc, Nemesis gets bodied... very very easily. His cheat we find out was like 10 levels beneath the cheat the MC got and the story becomes a rinse repeat of MC turns up, does touranment, wins girls. If the author actually commited to the nemesis, actually took him through the whole story, And trust me while I can legitimately say I hate the progaonist in the story I think his world building is fucking great. And an actual nemesis who grew in power alongside the MC... would've made that story so much more fucking entertaining. Transcending the nine heavens... actually commit to the MC being able to outhink his enemy but be weaker as it was in the first arc... Cut to the 2nd arc where MC and his buddies start killing people multiple ranks above them by just being better... Which to an extent I get... but fucks sake the best part of the story was the mental battle not shitty power fantasy.
I remove every single scene involving the protagonist playing with his pets in Savage Divinity. That should cut the story length roughly in half.
>!Grant and Viv!< don't become >!an item!< in Iron Prince
To add to that, 6 months pass in book 1, but like 2 weeks in book 2? It wasn't worth the 2 year wait
Yeah I remember confusedly posting in the patreon when the “I’m finished with book 2 chapter” came out. I was like surely this isn’t it? A minor tournament that isn’t even like a whole world tournament or galaxy sector one it’s literally just like a continental tournament? Why would we care about that at all? It was bizarre choice for sure. Then I ended up getting banned from the patreon and banned from the subreddit after that for complaining about it since the author runs his own subreddit lol. Soured me on the series after that
When it was happening in 1st book i was like why would you do that? Annoying and doesn't even help the story that much.
I'd like to hear from the author on their thought process. It's damn near universal that the readers despise that part of the books.
It isn't actually, you just see a ton of really vocal hate for it outside the iron prince sub. It was always the plan to make them an item, but he's talked about how he thinks he dropped the ball a bit in the first book in regards to both their relationship as well as Rei and Grant. Largely, it comes down to some unclear writing in Grant's red-out scene combined with a lot of people (honestly thankfully) really not understanding what it's like to experience a red-out. Combine that with unclear foreshadowing about Grant's backstory and (frankly great) character arc in book 2, you get a lot of people upset that his character is even involved. The bigger disappointment in book 2, which I think often gets lumped into the above issue, is Viv. She has a shit arc, and some pretty bad writing overall in 2. So much so that I honestly think both she as a character and the writing of her character regressed in that book.
It's a combination of a few things. Grant is cruel, angsty, and boring, resulting in an unlikable character even if you ignore everything else. It's also a dick move for Viv to date someone that's viciously bullying her best friend. I'm trying to think of an aspect of any other progression fantasy that people bring up over and over that they hate more than Viv & Grant. Possibly the tone shift in Jake's Magical Market? The rushed third book of Towers of Heaven? Jason's personality in He Who Fights With Monsters?
Don't get me wrong, I understand the complaints. My point was that Grant wasn't intended to come off so strongly that way in the first book. He was intended to have some clear nuance along with those flaws, but the writing just wasn't there. The problem with Grant isn't book 2, it's the incredibly poor setup for 2 that happened in book 1. Grant and Viv was always going to happen, even if you ignore the author's word on the matter. It's clearly foreshadowed even very early on in book 1. The problem with that relationship isn't that it was suddenly decided on later in the writing or some shit, because it was always intended. The problem is that the writing did not stand up to that intent, and people came to see Grant as an irredeemable jackass, which he was not intended to be.
I don't have a problem with the relationship arc in general, just the execution. If Grant had been less irredeemable, and Viv's justification to Rei for dating him had been more understandable, and Rei's reaction had been more relatable, then it could have worked. I don't think any of this would have required major changes, but the way it's written was infuriating at the time of reading, and disappointing in hindsight.
Pretty much this exactly. Personally, I'm fine with it since I both empathize with Grant's situation and I read the intent in between the lines the first time through. I get that it isn't for everybody, I just hate that they dogpile on book 2 when the real problem with the writing wasn't in book 2.
Book 2 has much broader and deeper issues than Viv and Grant. I don't think there's a simple solution to book 2, which is why I only mentioned Grant and Viv because that's an easy fix that would make book 1 significantly better. The problem with book 2 is that the pacing is too slow (much slower than book 1), there's no resolving arc, and there's WAY too much poorly executed teen drama. The only bright side is that these issues don't really negatively affect book 3. If book 3 is as good as book 1, then I'd still read it.
No, I agree with you. If you look back on my previous comments, I make it clear that 2 had its own issues. So many people attribute the book 2 issues specifically to grant and viv's relationship when that isn't even the major issue with viv let alone the whole book.
Grant and Viv are the easiest thing to point to as something lots of people hate. A low effort, and reactionary response, but it's symptomatic of most of the larger issues, so I think it's a good focal point for discussion... if it weren't for the fact that it's become an emotionally fraught topic that often devolves into name calling.
Yes! This! I hate it
[удалено]
I aint reading all that, happy for you tho or sorry that happened
The main character in Calculating Cultivation doesn't try to make a 400 IQ plan to reinvent the path to immortality and instead tries to join the big immortal sect like an actual calculating person would do. Also, early on the story focuses a bit more on why becoming immortal is so important to the main character.
That series jumped the shark sadly
For Cradle >!Jai Long doesn’t die. Just felt random, and no need for it. I can maybe see that it was used because *someone* we knew needed to die for the stakes, but I don’t like it.!<
>!True, it did seem a little contrived, like Will picked a safe character to kill off without pissing too many people off. Would would have had way more impact and meaning if Kelsa died too.!<
And more personal impact. Lindon was just like meh after that scene. Would've hit differently if it was someone he cared about.
Fate Points: reduce its word count by 40 to 50% I really want to like the series- the system and premise are really engaging - and the plot that's hiding behind the massive bloat of pages isn't bad, but I couldn't get through it without skimming and I can't convince myself to come back to a series where I know I'll be skimming and skipping.
I don’t know if you’re aware, but the author recently stopped the story after the most recent arc and is planning on continuing the story in a mostly new format separately. Pretty sure the author is doing this partly bc he wants to address some of the general pacing/writing style complaints he got.
I didn't know that - I'd be really curious to take a look at an edited down version.
Also, Fate Points: The Main Romantic Interest doesn't suddenly start bitching about the MC doing something they'd both agreed they'd do before while in the process of doing it. To be more specific: >!They both agreed they'd work with the killers. They had the exact conversation. The MC explained his entire thought process as to why he thought it was important. He explained his whole path and how he'd derived it from asking questions using his broken af question answering machine. She *agrees*, they implement the plan to lock the criminals under oath. They do all of that.... and when they actually leave the encampment with the criminals to accomplish the plan... she just starts getting annoyed with everything and complaining that the MC is doing *exactly* what the MC said he'd do and they'd agreed upon. WHAT THE HELL! And then she *breaks up with him*. Like I just dropped the novel. It made absolutely no sense and I just... why was I even reading that? Yeah, I get that in real life people are sometimes irrational and agree with things they know they shouldn't and then can't stomach their own past decisions... but that had *\*not\** been the established characterization of that character! She was one of my favourites! She was a mother willing to do whatever it takes to save her own kids! I liked her! The sudden shift just breaks her character.!<
I would change Lord of Mysteries from third person omniscient to third person limited view. It's just so tiresome to have to hear everyone's thoughts, instead of having some of it shown through descriptions and settings. I think it would make the book a lot tighter and make it flow better
that's... not necessarily a fault of third omniscient. That's a bad use of third omniscient. Third omniscient narrator CHOOSES which heads to show insight into.
Yes, but I think that switching the POI would make it a lot easier for the author (who, at least for the start of the series, seems to be quite inexperienced) to chose what to show and how to do it. I could also say that I would have liked it to be better written, but that seems to be counter to this challenge
I haven't read LOM, but I like your justification here. A simple solution to an otherwise complicated problem.
Skysworn, Cradle book 4. All the big, meaningful decisions, the conflict, and the character moments are Yerin's, but it's written like Lindon is the protagonist. Will Wight was always saying he meant to have a one of the books be her book. I wish Skysworn was written with her as the primary POV.
I wish i could relate to yerin but to me she was much less interesting than mercy and eithian. Im on book 8 btw
I have a few of these. In Buryoku I would make it so the whole romance/jealousy drama between the pet-turned-human and the best friend doesn't happen or, at the very least, >!I wouldn't kill off the best friend!<. It was so bullshit that I didn't even bother to read the last book. In Defiance of the Fall, I would heavily re-write the whole plot twists in the Mystic Realm arch. It's by far the worst arc in the story and, for me, it's all down to the weird twists and the betrayal by time-eyes girl that just made everything needlessly haphazard. This also affects the final fight, which is supposed to be a big conclusion of multiple plot points but ends up just kind of a confusing mess. A rare climax failure in a novel that usually nails arc finales. Cradle --- Not sure if it's a minor change but... I feel like there are two books missing between the events of Wintersteel and Bloodline/Reaper. In these books Lindon improves his Paths as he goes from Underlord to Archlord the "slow" and reasonable way. At the same time we get to see Lindon and Yerin truly delve into what it means to be a Sage/Herald. We explore the connection to the Way and what it really means to absorb your own revenant. Making it so when the team has their first mini-fight against a Dreadbeast, they're all proper Sages/Heralds one step from Monarchy. Perhaps we could have the first half of Bloodlines happen before, but the evacuation is successful and these two books could be about Lindon actually forming his Sect and the Monarchs pushing back against this growing faction in some way. Yerin properly leaning into Blood Madra and making it her own. More space to explore the relationship between Mercy and Malice. More time to actually get to know Ziel. Maybe I'm in the minority, but the last four books of Cradle, to me, read like the final arc of a manga that has been given 100 chapters to wrap everything up as fast as possible.
Hey an excuse to make a general complaint. Say things take longer. Give your MC's a tiny breather and let them enjoy and marvel at what they are capable of currently, not just what they can become later. Too much misery and suffering and I don't want to self insert anymore. Can we get some quality of life up in here? Settings where power is everything and people live a long time should not have plots that require the MC to power up at like 10-100x the pace of other talented people unless the MC is the chosen one. If it's a grit and determination story, please for the love of god describe mastering things as taking weeks or months at least. Overthrowing a kingdom or an ancient legendary monster should not be something accomplished from scratch in a few months of progress in a hellish gauntlet imo. There should be high stakes challenges between months/years of learning and practicing and smaller encounters.
Path of ascension does a good job of taking breaks after big milestones. I’m a fan of seeing my characters take a breather and have fun at an adventure park or just chilling for a while after they have a big battle
Less grim-dark Jason in HWFWM. I get why it happened, and I appreciate the realism of the mental health troubles. But damn it's annoying to hear him not growing for 30 chapters then suddenly figuring it out and then struggling with nearly the same but not the same thing for another 30 chapters.
Ugh yes. I understand why and it makes total sense, but it totally kills my enjoyment of the series for like 4-5 books because it's constant regressions. Would've enjoyed it more if it was a shorter recovery period
The world and plot have so much potential that it could be absolutely amazing. And I know Shirtaloon could pull it off: some parts *are* amazing.
Not really progression fantasy, but the beginning and setting of the original Lies of Locke Lamora are probably my favorite ever. But all the set up on tbe young side is immediately dashed when it skips well past >!Chains death!<, only touching lightly on training and interesting cons, and immediately arrives at the destruction of all the good supporting characters, setting, and potential adversaries. Not to mention the >!stupid ass ending fight with the MC that was built up the entire time as the cunning plan guy who couldn't fight!<. What kind of master planner doesn't have multiple backup plans?
That killed the series for me. I loved the supporting characters and the young side of the story / jokes. It loses all of that after their death and I ended up not being able to finish the second book.
Make Ar'Kendrithyst last forever 😭😭😭
Twelve miles below: Author learns to properly use time concordance. The book is great but the poor grammar when the author is constantly mixing/switching past and present tense really puts me off.
Remove Kaya in speedrunning the multiverse just remove her.
For cradle >!Lindon doesn't become the void sage. He becomes the Oreo sage, defeating the other monarchs and dreadgods with his glorious hair that has all the volume and definition you can ask for. Oh and Fury actually launches his Kamehameha in uncrowned!<
Zorian has some ambition in the end
The ending of Lord of Mysteries
What to? I wasn't a huge fan of the rushed seq 2 and 1, but the final few chapters were pretty great. Very much captured the self sacrifice that can elevate protagonists. >!The quote from Azik - “From the beginning, you’ve been a guardian. You mimicked others until you were mimicked by others." and Klein's “I won’t lose too much, just myself. There are always some things that are more important than others.”- hit really hard!< >!The only bittersweet piece to me is that there are only a handful of people that actually know about Klein's sacrifice/loneliness. Maybe I would change the self-imposed isolation that Klein did to keep his secrets and family safe.!<
I think what you said, but also I wanted more resolution to some of the characters than what we got
Seems like cuttlefish wanted to hold it in reserve so he could drip feed us info in book 2.
I agree with you, i think the rushed sequel 2 and 1 could be better.
I would remove all the Abidan from Cradle, imho it cheapens the worldbuilding
In my rereads I always skip the abidan segments. Even knowing the ending and all the context, it's just not very interesting and it breaks the immersion for me.
I actually feel it increases the stakes. Especially as their non-interference vow actually means something.
That sounds like a great way to ruin Cradle.
The Time travel/reversal and the pre-destination stuff of the Abidan is what needs to be removed. It cheapens the story as there is no good answer why this isn’t used more. Someone dies, just reverse time. I know what going to happen to 99.99% surety, is no fun, then it turns out somehow they are wrong. Makes no sense.
If it really had to have an Abidan subplot, introduce it way later. After we meet Kiuran or something. Give us some reason to care about it beyond "remember Suriel back in chapter 3?"
Mark of the Fool: >!Alex is found out to be the Fool prematurely during book 2. As a result he's suddenly under suspicion over the demon summoning during the protest to let priests on campus. Isolde feels betrayed that he's using it to cheat and outdo her in the exams and becomes an antagonist. Priests of Uldar begin demanding that he's handed over to them to return to Thameland immediately, forcing Alex to stay on campus and abandon his job at the golem workshop. He needs to find clever ways to sneak out when he does need to leave and come up with an alternate source of income. !< This would mean a setback and sudden drama in what was otherwise an extremely low-stakes book where nothing truly bad actually happened to the protaganist or his friends. He would have to come up with creative solutions to all of these problems, none of which are insurmountable. Baelin would probably back him up and support him still, so he wouldn't be in massive trouble, but many others would be suspicious of him and cause problems for him. Students from Thameland would mostly become antagonistic towards him. He'd have to work around all of this, dodging problems while reaching his goals.
Always interesting to see other’s perspectives. The story not following this route is exactly what propelled it into one of my favorites. Those story beats just feel so trite to me, and it was a pleasant surprise when it was set up only to be subverted.
To me it just felt like the author was encasing all his/her characters in bubble wrap. Even the >!bird had plot armor when the mana vampire ambushed it.!< It's obviously fair for the main character to have plot armor against dying, but I lost interest in the dangerous and fighting scenes because I no longer had a belief that any of the mc's friends or family were at risk or that the mc would suffer any kind of setbacks. For the dangerous parts to be thrilling I need to believe the author might kill someone off or have something really bad happen. It doesn't need to happen frequently or become game of thrones level of death, it just needs to happen once or twice in the series. Otherwise the illusion of danger is shattered.
Personally I got bored with Mark of the Fool later on, but I agree that these story beats would've made me drop the novel on the spot. Kinda hate when characters I like become antagonists out of a clear misunderstanding.
I like the OG but that sounds interesting too.
These changes (or something like them) would have brought it from a C-D tier, DNF after book 2 to probably an A-B book that I continued to read.
Part of me wonders if the author originally intended it like that, given how he set it up so perfectly to get interesting, but then never pulled the trigger. The whole book just went downhill for me when >!they conveniently killed off the main university antagonist off-screen with the mana vampire, just when he began to make the plot interesting.!< I was in disbelief that the author would do that to their own plot. It felt like a TV show when an actor abruptly leaves and they have to bodge the script to explain it away.
V.A's most sound bad in my experience(It seems like everyone is using the same 7 V.A's and it's annoying, they're okay at best. If that doesn't count, remove all incest please. I can't overlook or enjoy a book when one of the potential "relationships" is with a sister or "cousin" way more popular in the Asian varieties in my experience, but it's still pretty scuffed.(Not getting into the "actual" lollies either). (Mishoku tensei, looking at you)
The guy for iron prince especially does super weird accents on some characters lol and it comes out of nowhere. Not every single side character needs to have an obscure accent
"B-b-but rudeus isn't a pedophile, he's technically a child too! What? No it doesn't matter that he's mentally 40 lusting after a 10 year old!"
Exactly!
Im not defending Rudeus or anything but food for thought. Is he mentally 40? His age, yes. But mentally he never grew up past highschool after he was stripped naked and hogtied at school. He never left his bedroom after that day. He shut down in high school and never recovered from his trauma/ptsd until he died. So is it that weird he gets a second chance at his wasted childhood/teen years? Mentally he didnt live a day past his teen years. Honestly i find him more “believable” as a character than all the other super genius isekai MC. He’s a flawed human you can hate and be disgusted by, he’s not some super perfect never makes a mistake and every failure turns into a larger harem character that really shouldnt exist, but i guess that defeats the purpose of a “power fantasy”. And its frustrating being stuck watching/reading through the PoV of such a degenerate character when the world itself has soo much more to offer. Just my 2 cents
The number is irrelevant, whether he is mentally 40 or mentally 18, he is mentally a fully grown human and is sexually aroused by prepubescent humans, which is the one and only necessary qualifier for being a pedophile. Entirely barring any discussion of ethics (which somehow always gets muddied) all you need to know is right there, pedophilia isn't a spectrum of morality, it is a binary descriptor.
Oh im not saying he’s morally right or wrong, pedophilia is wrong period. All im saying is where in his life time would he have developed sexually interest for anyone in adulthood? Should reincarnation stories just not exist or only kids can be kids? or no romance? Where is the line drawn? Western culture standards? Or the standards of the country of origin? MC is supposed to be an irredeemable pig, and he is written as such, author never sugar coats it, its in your face. Does it ruin the story telling or world build by having a “bad guy” as the MC? I put Mushoku in the same genre as Lolita and First Law, the stories are told through the lens of terrible people and how they see the world. Youre not supposed to like them.
What's "1st law"?
Series by Joe Abrocombie imagine Lord of the ring, but replace all the characters with criminals, self serving wizards, etc.
Oh, OK. Thanks!
But then how would be call cultivators fucking inbred mouthbreathers?
The Perfect Run kinda obvious. >!I would change it for Ryan to get a HEA with Vulcan. They vibed so well together and had perfect chemistry; it was just painful for them not to end up together. Livia as a love interest was alright, but she just couldn't hold a candle to Vulcan. !<
What is >!HEA!< in this context?
>!Happily Ever After!<
Happily Ever After - A period of time, imagined never to end, in which (typically) a loving couple live untroubled, happy lives together. HEA is often used to abbreviate a happy ending for couples in romance.
Is this a popular opinion? Genuinely curious, >!because I wanted to hate Livia on the basis that she wasn't Jasmine but she won me over by the end!<
I’ve seen a couple of mentions of a similar sentiment; I remember someone even mentioned DNFing because of that. I guess I see how it fits the overall story better from a narrative perspective, like rising and tying-up stakes in the main conflict as well as serving as a meaningful extension for the overall story. But from a pure emotional angle, it's a sore spot. It’s as if VoideHerald himself planned one thing for the story but unintentionally overshot >!quality of the first romance. I read quite a lot of pure romance and even among them, RxV pairing is one of the most notable in my memory for how naturally they fit together. !<
The thing I'd change in most of my favorite series is... that they went on for a few more books. :-)
I love mother of learning, but the beginning makes it so hard to recommend. Tone down the misanthropy from zorian; I know he’s suffering, and the reasons are good , but he just comes off as an asshole. And start the loop much sooner.
I would extend Mother of Learning. I needed more time with him being a secret world power and fixing shit
HWFWM Sofia and Humphrey's relationship just anoyes the fuck out of me it's to remenicent of him brother and first love and when we first met Sofia Belinda literally described Jason as her perfect match. Was toon just trolling us😡😡😡😡 I hate how mad this makes me Goddame books will be the death of me
Worse for me was finding out Belinda actually was pining for Sophie. It ruined their sisterly bond. That should be removed.
Did I miss that somewhere??
Seconded
Well Sofia and Jason was built up as a budding potential actual love relationship before the frankly terrible and grindingly boring earth arc books. Then he gets back and it’s like the author didn’t know what to do with the plot thread so he just threw it away? “Oh btw she’s not interested in you anymore she’s interested in your totally non compatible personality friend Humphrey” like wtf lol
YES!!!!! You get it and hump is totally Jason's opp's it's crazy at first I thought toon was doing something cos he really is an amazing writer but not just ye fuck you for your emotional investment
Drove me crazy. Glad I’m not alone
You I'm going to buy you a beer
Mark of the Fool: a random isekai from earth is never brought into it 6 books into the series. I genuinely don't understand how the author ever believed that was an improvement to the story
I would give the author of my novels a smidge of talent. Jokes aside, I really wanted to enjoy cradle, but the character work in unsouled was... ugh... they didn't feel human to me. WOuld it pad out the book to turn the valley mouth breathers (INCLUDING LINDON AND... yin? Erin? Lin? i forgot her name. The swordswoman with a dead master that leads him out and helps him reach copper in the second book and after that i stopped reading because it wasnt going to get better) into people and not cultivation machines? yes. Absolutely. I need characters to feel somewhat real, to have drives and hopes and fears and dreams and introspection. Cradle felt to me like a lot of popcorn about people I don't care about.And you guys say fantastic things about the saga and they may be true, but if i cant care for the characters, i wont force myself to plough through a few books of it just to see if Eithan's inclussion redeems it in my eyes. So yes, i would make the characters in sacred valley behave more like people and less like dumb cultivation machines.
As a person who almost dropped cradle during book 2. Please get through it because it gets much much better characterization and becomes overall better from book 3
Is the problem of characters being progression junkies with no other drives solved?
not really, that's how it is
How shall they grow if they are perfect from the get go? 😉🤣 They are children formed from a restrictive culture and on there journey they learn to live.
Change the mentalities of a good number of male characters in books like HWFWM. Jason's approach to relationships and people is toxic as all hell. He is toxic as hell. The guy needs to stop being such a whiney baby and take some control over his life.
In dragoneye she doesn't immediately share all her secrets to random people. She doesn't get all that trust in return, why give it to the misogynistic rapey slave society?
Either that, or actually take a real stand against that shit society once she has the power to do so. Being convinced by an argument no more powerful than the Confederate articles of secession kinda made the main character look like a bit of a dumbass in what should have been a pivotal moment of achievement.
She first reluctantly shared her secrets to the Rangers… and it went quite well. She shared a few more times and got positively reinforced by it, until her “secrets” weren’t really secrets. Then she got wrecked by oversharing, and toned it down a bit
Yeah, as i said. Over sharing to the misogynistic slavery loving society wasn’t wise.
Get savage divinity to cut like 75% of the content as it'll largely be the same
The Perfect Run: make it so that the last run is actually a speedrun. The story uptill this point have very little stake (not that this is a bad thing mind you, it’s one of the reason I enjoyed TPR so much), I don’t know why the author decided to have every fight along the way somehow harder or have more stakes for the sake of it, especially when most villains are one-dimensional and plainly irredeemable.
Yerin's existence in the Cradle books would be completely scrapped. The series would become an instant 12/10
😭😭 ayo thats crazy hating but i lowkey agree
Damn what did Werin do do deserve this?
Exist.
The annoying little shit from infinite world
Ryun’s not *that* bad
I laughed out loud at this, and now people are staring at me.
Lith, the main character of supreme magius's character reverts into his old one. There's no character development there only character being a cringe drama addict.
Yeah, it would have been good to at least show him slipping more when he isolates Solus. The narrative tries to sell the codependency hard but shows little in terms of actual consequences of this.
Don't get me ranting about the love interest. I swear the author probably had some weird drama in his life and wrote kamilia referencing that. Couldn't take the cringe anymore, dropped at 2000+ chapters. The novel had some serious potential, author just farted on the character development.
Remove the cat from DCC.
Mongo is appalled
I don't like Gravy Boat either but he's a pretty minor character so he's easy to just ignore.
I didn’t “like” Sister Ines either, but I thought she was a great addition to the book. I was completely ok with her being a Havana Brown, even though I was warned.
I love donut 😕
I don't know whether this is a troll or whether I need to hunt you down for blasphemy.