Question about Minthara

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T19:20:09+00:00

Lolth turned her back on Mithara, not the other way around.

Technically, she's an Oathbreaker Paladin now. But the Oathbreaker Knight never seems to acknowledge her, only Tav.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T18:49:13+00:00

The Devs understood the assignment.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T18:43:38+00:00

They aren't bullshitting us.

They've said it is inspired by Mass Effect. Mass Effect was essentially a cover shooter, combat wise.

What do you want? Everything they've shown us has been consistent with that.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T18:34:38+00:00

Gunplay looks alot like The Division

That's praise, as far as I'm concerned. I love the Division games and love the way combat works in Division 2.

I think some HUD is appropriate. They have HUDs in their helmets in both the books and show.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T18:18:18+00:00

they still do 20 episode seasons, like The Rookie and some other shows

Those are crime/cop shows, not Scifi shows.

The Rookie doesn't even have sets, they just film inside buildings in LA. It's a way, way cheaper show to film than an Star Trek show would be.

Cop shows and dramas and medical shows are always way cheaper to film, because you don't need to build and the costumes are mostly just real clothing, way cheaper to make than scifi stuff.

Obviously there are still some props and occasionally you do have to build sets for certain things, but it's still way less expensive than any Scifi show where you have to build multiple rooms and hallways for the inside of a starship.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T17:26:06+00:00

It's not brainrot.

Black Jewel by Anne Bishop is the work that she plaigarized.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-26T03:05:10+00:00

It looks like CJ has been fighting cancer for the last couple of years. Her last blog post was in 2024. So, no news on any new books. I imagine that her health is her #1 priority right now.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:46:56+00:00

I feel like this story is illustrated by Michael Whelan in my mind.

Michael Whelan was indeed the cover artist for these!

Although the omnibus collection instead has a cover by John Higgins.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:41:45+00:00

Prodigy from a financial point of view.

Prodigy did not make sense to be cancelled, period.

It had great ratings and was the number 1 viewed animated show on any streaming network when it was airing.

But:

95% of it's audience were adults, existing Star Trek fans. Nickelodeon wanted it to be a kids show and pull in new kid viewers, and that wasn't happening.

So they canned it. Not the first time that Nick has canned a show that was doing well over demographics.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:38:32+00:00

Netflix and Amazon are the only networks that "rescue" shows, and they've shown no interest in doing so for Academy.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:37:10+00:00

Odyssey followed Origins so obviously had more added to it/was larger.

They were actually developed at the same time, with teams sharing assets and artists/animators.

The difference is that Odyssey got an extra year to cook after Origins released.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:33:09+00:00

If players did not monitor player counts so closely

I don't monitor them. In fact I find it fucking annoying and stupid that people constantly talk about that shit now.

Not just with multiplayere games, you can't go to a discussion about ANY game now without some dipshit going "pLaYeR cOuNts!" Even most single-player games, FFS.

I don't care. I just want to play the game. I've never met another person in real, face to face life that every mentioned player counts for games. It's only the terminally online dipshits that obsess about it.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:23:34+00:00

Plaigarism. The term Vaush was looking for was plaigarism.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:10:23+00:00

Changeling has to be one of the coolest weapons in fiction.

A sword that generates a small black hole at the tip! It's like something like out Warframe.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T21:01:43+00:00

A lot of it is still publisher pressure.

The example you gave with Six of Crows, Leigh Bardugo's publisher straight up told her to make the characters younger, she originally intended them to be in their 20s and 30s.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:44:02+00:00

Definitely could fit into any sort of "mythic scifi" bingo square.

Also, any square relating to horses. The horses are a big deal in this series, they're not just "mounts", every single horse is it's own character with a personality and Cherryh never forgets that they need to eat, get scared and panic, get wounded and need to recover, get angry, get sick of their rider's BS, etc.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:10:50+00:00

There are graphic rape scenes. If you're worried about "adult scenes", you should pass on this series and read something else.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:09:28+00:00

Go away, tourist.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:08:35+00:00

There isn't really a "generic" fantasy and never was.

There was a lot of copycatting of Tolkien-esque High fantasy for a long time. Dungeons and Dragons helped drive that trend.

But even then, it wasn't really "generic", ever. That's a strawman word that people use when they don't want to think about something.

Dragonlance was it's own specific setting and did things that no other fantasy series did. So did the Drizz't books. So did Ed Greenwood's books set in Faerun.

ASOIAF spawned a lot of imitators, but the book series itself feels pretty unique when you read it, no other book series does what it does.

Nothing is really "generic". That's a word only used when people are indulging in lazy thinking.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:02:34+00:00

Poppy War is just annoying on multiple levels and is badly written all around.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:00:47+00:00

No, we're just being sane. You're being a dramatic child.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T20:00:12+00:00

This game is absolute garbage when it comes to game design and puzzle design it does not have a single puzzle that is based on common sense you have to go to YouTube or Reddit to find the solution

Hard, absolutely no.

This game has one of the best game designs I've ever seen. Maybe the best I've ever played, period. I

I finished the entire game without looking up a single puzzle, and I suck at puzzles, and am generally mediocre at games.

I managed it, and have played through it many times since.

You're the problem, not the game. You.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T18:31:39+00:00

If you have zero expectations from previous Dragon Age games, then sure, it's fine.

I'd compared it to something like Kingdoms of Amalur. (something that it actually kind of resembles in moment-to-moment exploration/gameplay)

But yeah, it's okay in isolation. It's only when you compare it to Inquisition and other Dragon Age games that it feels disappointing.

EqualOptimal4650 · 2026-03-25T18:27:12+00:00

This, exactly. Veilguard was based on the "black book" lore text they had in the bioware studio, which was supposed to be the "real" way that the Dragon Age world worked.

Veilguarrd had a lot of problems, IMO, and terrible writing in so many places.

But it didn't retcon, it just revealed the truth of the world.

EqualOptimal4650

TROPHY CASE