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Messages - Seomus

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Author Q&A / Re: Unholy Consultation - *SUPER SPOILERIFIC*
« on: July 30, 2017, 02:07:20 am »
pirating is the worst. Sorry to hear that, Scott. Me and many of my indie author friends have all had our work pirated, too. The thing is, it's hard to tell if that's really your book there or if they've just pulled your book off amazon and are really hosting malware or other destructive programs to scam you because you often have to download their software first. Really foul ones sell the ebooks like they're a legit site but probably are stealing your credit card information in the process.

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Literature / Re: Steven Erikson (The 3.5 million word journey?)
« on: August 01, 2016, 09:45:40 pm »
Quote from: Redeagl on August 01, 2016, 07:49:45 pm
Also what exactly is The Deck Of Dragons ??

It's the universes version of the Tarot deck. It is tied directly to the gods and the warrens, changing as the fortune changes. They come in houses: Light, Dark, Shadow, Life, and Death I believe. Think of them as suites. There are also some unaligned cards. Then each house has positions: King, Queen, Knight, Magi, Herald, Soldier, Spinner, Mason, Virgin. These titles can have different names for different houses. Like Mason is only in Death. He's called Builder in other suits.

Each of these cards represents a god or an Acendant or a person. They are always changing who holds the lesser roles, while the Major roles (King, Queen) don't change much because they are usually held by the most powerful god aligned to that aspect. These cards can then be used to tell the future and show how the various gods/ascendants are involved with the world and events.

It can help to think of the Malazan world in D&D terms (because this shared universe of Erickson and ICE came out of their shared D&D campaigns they ran together, building their world and also why the two authors disagree on somethings, like what sex K'rul is. It is also why they write in different parts of the world. In fact, the whole backstory about the Emperor, Dancer, Laseen, etc. is based on their actually D&D campaign). So if you've played D&D Ascendants is like hitting Epic Level on your character sheet. You've gotten so powerful you've moved past regular mortals. You're ot a god, but you're hanging with them and you might become one if people worship you enough. Warrens, then, are like the various Planes of the D&D Universe, Plane of Shadows, the Elemental Planes, the Astral Plane, etc.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] Things you wished had been in TGO/want in future books
« on: July 18, 2016, 08:05:13 pm »
1. I would love to see Wracu, the the consult is holding back. Hopefully next book.

3. I think being trained to read faces is very important. How can you know if the Dunayain child your training is "defective" if you can't read his face. How can you understand your own passions if you don't know how they make your body react so you can understand and recognize the darkness coming before and acting upon you.

5. What Mimara did with that Chorae will be very important. Think of that scene as a demonstration of her power. She restored reality being affected by the outside. That has to be important to whatever her role in the books are.

I want to know more about the consult, but I didn't expect too much seeing as the book was split in half and I bet all the juicy stuff is in the Unholy Consult.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] Kelmomas Skills
« on: July 17, 2016, 07:20:39 pm »
Quote from: Wilshire on July 17, 2016, 01:08:47 pm
I had that same thought as I was responding - why are the Consult, but more specifically the Inchoroi, outside of the influence of the Gods. It might just be that the Nonmen have something going with their Holy Deep. It seemed like when Sorweel was descending into the abyss down in Ishterebinth, that at some point Yatwer's hold on him diminished or disappeared entirely. Could be that the Gods can't see the Consult because they are similarly hidden deep underground under/in a topos.

Now that is an interesting line of speculation to pursue. If going underground distances you in some way from the gods. But the abyss of Ishterebinth didn't strike me as a topos. Nothing...disturbingly unnatural happened (though a deeper read of the Great Ordeal is needed). No hellfire, no seeing your own corpse, no undead dragon thing. I agree he was distances from Yatwar, though he did manage to survive. It's hard to say if Kellhus interferred with Yatwar's plan by sending him to Ishterebinth or not.

Now I'm sure Golgotterah is Topos central.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] The Prince of Hate
« on: July 17, 2016, 06:57:47 pm »
Quote from: Madness on July 17, 2016, 04:25:09 pm
I'd imagine there is more to the swazond that we don't know yet.

I find it incredibly interesting that Cnaiur gave Serwe one true swazond.

I just read that part today in my reread of the series, and what Cnaiur said about the Swazond to Serwe after marking her really jumped out at me this time: “The man you have killed is gone from the world, Serwë. He exists only here, a scar upon your arm. It is the mark of his absence, of all the ways his soul will not move, and all the acts he will not commit. A mark of the weight you now bear.”

Are the Scylvendi trying to deny the gods, whether it was once intentional or not, the souls they crave to feed on by marking the swazond? And if so, that might piss them off. And, as they say, none bear more swazonds then Cnaiur.


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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] Best bits of the Great Ordeal.
« on: July 16, 2016, 09:55:39 pm »
Quote from: MSJ on July 15, 2016, 08:48:35 pm
Cnaüir urs Skiötha, and his damned, smoking ruin of a soul. I don't think it was fan service. TBH, I think that he will have a critical role in TUC. If he doesnt, I will be hugely disappointed.

Bakker doesn't strike me as the type of author who would do that. Everything in his books is there for a reason and serves either narrative development, character development, or idea development (the philosophy of the series)

The nuke was the most surprising. Just hearing Kellhus telling everyone to run, the fear on Katyusus's face. Great scene of first tension, what's about to happen, and then destruction. Also meeting Kellhus's other son and the boy.

I loved seeing Cnaiur. I knew he wasn't done with the story. I had a crazy theory that he might end up being the no-god. Cnaiur, when he's traveling with Kellhus across the Scylvendi steppes, he stares at Kellhus and thinks over and over "What do you see?" And that question always makes me think No-God.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] general A few questions + the only thing I didn't like
« on: July 16, 2016, 09:48:12 pm »
Kellhus reads souls in so much as he reads how the soul moves the persons emotions, as exposed by even minute biological change (respiration, pulse, blush reflexm micro-expressions). He's not seeing their souls directly.

Whether Kellhus is fooled by Yatwar/Sorweel, Serwe is. I always took it that the goddess is putting some sort of mask, showing the responses to fool the Dunyain. Moenghus, not Dunyain, isn't able to see whatever Yatwar is. The fact that Kellhus tells Serwe she needs to make Sorweel hate them wouldn't be necessary if Kellhus didn't already see Sorweel's hatred, so while it's not confirmation it is points in that direction.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO SPOILERS] Great Quotes from TGO!
« on: July 16, 2016, 09:42:17 pm »
Radiating concussions, blowing souls in their thousands from the crests and summits, puncturing the very clouds, blasting them outward, dilating the iris of the sky.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] general A few questions + the only thing I didn't like
« on: July 16, 2016, 01:51:00 am »
Quote from: robizeratul on July 15, 2016, 09:27:20 pm
1) this is something from previous books...but why did the consult kill the emperor and his mother? What was the point? With him alive Kelhus' conquest would have been harder, no? 
 
2)Did the Consult intervene in the Unification Wars? Where they working against Kellhus' ambition or just "camping"? 
 
3)What "bad thing" happened during the unification wars? I remember a couple of characters mentioning this event, but I don't know what it is. 
 
4)Why did Saubon die? was that the plan all along? Didn't Kellhus know he was in Danger there? 
 
5)why did he rape the general? 
 
6)What's up with the "tall" nonmen? are they simply giants? or is there something more here? 
 
7)And the one "revelation" I didn't like...was the Dunyain reading souls. What was the point of all this training if they can just "read" souls? Or is this something only Kellhus(dunyain schoolman) can do ? 
 
Did he start out noticing expressions and slowly started seeing souls? if so, why can't he "turn it of" ans simply see sorweels deception? Am I being deceived yet again? this doesn't make sense to me...

1) The consult sent two skin spies to keep tabs on the emperor because they needed to keep the holy war in check. They probably never replaced him becasue he is never alone. Then the emperor puts the move on mommy and she, being a skinspy, is totally into it until he realizes she has a penis. He freaks out and she goes into damage control and kills him.

2) I don't recall anything concrete, but I don't see why the wouldn't.

3) Probably the standard atrocities of war, see they First Holy war for examples.

4) Saubon died because he couldn't get away from the nuke. It fit Kellhus plan to get Proyas into a position to lead the holy war and make all those decisions. Saubon no doubt would have fought with Proyas for control. Whether Kellhus knew about the nuke or just seized the opportunity to sacrifice Saubon so Proyas could keep following the condition ground Kellhus made for him.

5) To condition Proyas to lead the Great Ordeal without him. See answer 4.

6) There is a refrence that great nonmen never stop growing. Apparently, it wasn't a metaphor but literal.

7) Kellhus has walked paths no other Dunyain has. And Kellhus couldn't see Sorweel because Yatwar has god-entangled him, the way the WLW has uneering grace and maybe so does Kelmomas.

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The Almanac: PON Edition / Re: The Slog TWP - Part Three: The Third March [Spoilers]
« on: July 15, 2016, 04:10:14 am »
Quote from: morkypep on July 15, 2016, 12:00:06 am
One thing I liked while rereading this was seeing that Kellhus actually has feelings. Hes not entirely robotic. He expresses pity when he almost kills Cnaiur on the beach. Watching Esmi almost fall made his heart skip a beat. He actually cares about her. In his delusions while on the Circumfix with Serwe he prays for her to come back to life. Real interesting stuff. This makes his appearance of instability in the next trilogy make more sense. It started here.

He feels outrage in TDTCB when Serwe is raped by Cnaiur right after he claims her as his prize. Kellhus ponders from what darkness the emotion came from. So he definitely feels something for Serwe far earlier.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] Kelmomas Skills
« on: July 14, 2016, 12:05:22 pm »
Quote from: H on July 14, 2016, 10:34:24 am
I pitched a theory here in the ARC subforum that perhaps the Gods are actually blind to self-moving souls.  I don't think it has too much to do with being deffective, even though I do have a feeling that Moe, Kellhus, Koringhus, Kel, etc. are in fact all defective in some way, not to mention Inrilatas.

The idea I had was that since to Gods are essentially the Darkness the Comes Before, then they can see the whole chain of cause and effect that guides the world.  Kellhus is outside that though, as are other self-moving souls, because they are part the Darkness.  I think this is a reason why the Gods are also blind to the Consult and to the No-God as well.

This doesn't preclude that Kel might be "God-entangled" with Ajolki though, but could just be supplemental.

If the gods are blind to Kellhus then how did the WLW predict Kellhus would be in the throne room at that moment? It was Kelmomas that changed the WLW vision of the future, not Kellhus.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] Kelmomas Skills
« on: July 14, 2016, 03:06:44 am »
I was thinking Kelmomas being invisible to the WLW, and thus Yatwar, had to do with him having two souls. But then I read some good stuff on Kel being a nanidar for Ajolki. Bakker did go out of his way to remind us of Kel killing the beetle before Ajolki's altar which on the surface seems like just a way to show Kel's personality when introducing him, but now we are given hints that it is far more important, else why did Bakker bring it back up?

I think Kel is a defective. Most of his siblings appear defective in some ways. I don't think it has anything to do with Tekne. Kellhus would likely have noticed any of flaw in her potential and wouldn't have bred with her.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] I finished the book, confused about something.
« on: July 14, 2016, 01:56:45 am »
Quote from: CondYoke on July 14, 2016, 01:50:11 am
I too read it that he was the agent of Ajokli, but this theory is interesting too;
"Why does Kelmomas stand outside the sight of the gods? How else could his being there have been unexpected? He's like the no-god, at least to the WLW. I was thinking that the entire time reading Kel spying on WLW."
He is a twin, whose pair is dead- maybe that is essential for God-blindness, or 'graced', or becoming a god (or whatever Kelmomas is)? Hey, was Cnaiur a twin?  ;)



I was thinking it might have to do with the twin, but the beetle offering with Ajokli also works. Having Kel find out about narinder while investigating WLW is also illuminating what he is makes for great writing. One scene doing multiple narrative work.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] I finished the book, confused about something.
« on: July 14, 2016, 01:02:46 am »
Quote from: MSJ on July 14, 2016, 12:54:24 am
Quote from: Seomus on July 14, 2016, 12:46:54 am
Why does Kelmomas stand outside the sight of the gods? How else could his being there have been unexpected? He's like the no-god, at least to the WLW. I was thinking that the entire time reading Kel spying on WLW.

I took it because he was a Narinder of Ajokli. He received Unerring Grace, therefore he was cloaked by Ajokli against Yatwer.

Poor Kel, all his sneaking around isn't because he's amazing, but because he's narinder. He can't take credit for anything now.

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The Great Ordeal / Re: [TGO Spoilers] I finished the book, confused about something.
« on: July 14, 2016, 12:46:54 am »
Why does Kelmomas stand outside the sight of the gods? How else could his being there have been unexpected? He's like the no-god, at least to the WLW. I was thinking that the entire time reading Kel spying on WLW.

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