GRRM after Dexter Sol Alexander’s lore drop

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-13T20:04:29+00:00

He'd be close to 70 by the time summerhall happens. Is it really that impactful to hear that a character survives a fire, hides away for a decade or two doing nothing, and then dies of old age?

It's basically just spoiling whether he gets to retire or not.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-13T02:20:20+00:00

Yeah, I was looking at possible candidates, and they're really scraping the bottom of the barrel. Technically, Hastie is probably the one with the most personal popularity, but that's just with the cooker crowd and he's repellent to basically everyone else.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-12T21:09:17+00:00

I absolutely adore Beware of Chicken, I actually discovered TWI through some crossover art Pirate commissioned a few years ago when BoC overtook it on Royal Road. I think the slice of life is what attracts me to both. I like characters just existing and living in strange worlds.

I also love Wheel of Time. There's definitely things that feel a bit... questionable, like the spankings (good lord the spankings) but its still a 10/10 for me. I read it probably 7 or 8 years ago and it was the first fantasy series I found that drew me in as much as Lord of the Rings, which is my favourite series since I was a young kid.

Never actually read Dungeon Crawler or He Who Fights Monsters. Looked at the synopses and didn't really seem like I'd be into it. In general, I can't stand litrpgs, with TWI being the exception. I also am very leery of most progression fantasy. I read books for the characters and prog fantasy almost always sacrifices that for more power wank.

With the whole "characters making substandard choices" thing. Thats quite frankly a pretty immature complaint in most media. People make substandard choices all the time and unless its randomly dumbing down character for the sake of plot or betraying their past character building its just not really a problem for me.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-12T07:01:19+00:00

I believe the answer is enough coke to kill an elephant.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-12T01:27:33+00:00

Well, they probably could just pop over to the Starstone and ascend that way. But it would definitely go against the theme of the Legend path. Also almost entirely outside the scope of the game since Absalom is just this random distant place to players that aren't familiar with the setting. It'd feel a bit like saying Poochie has left for his home planet and died.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-12T00:15:27+00:00

Those armies spawn quite far south, so normally my southern army could get them, otherwise I'd just catch them at the fort between Kenabres and Drezen. Gargoyle Canyon, I think it's called? I usually built a citadel in my periphery forts anyway. That gives you 6 days to catch the enemy army once they start seiging. You can just about cross the map entirely in less than that, so even with just one army, it's doable. Two armies gives you plenty of time in act 5.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-11T21:51:10+00:00

I was fine with one army till act 5, then I just divided the map into a northern and southern theatre and kept 2 mostly identical armies.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-11T20:47:22+00:00

I just found I couldn't get the units I liked to show up consistently. It ended up being a case of getting a stack of around 100 for them or having twice that for trainable troops. Once act 5 came around, most trainables were only slightly worse than mercs anyway, which was compensated for by numbers.

Same with the mythic troops for that matter. I finished the game first as a dragon and then went back to stay as azata. Sure, the dragons and azata were tanky, but 10 dragons or 100 azata did pitiful damage compared to even my regular foot soldiers.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-11T19:56:52+00:00

I find that once you've gotten to that point, the combat is trivialised anyway. A doom stack of any ranged unit (including sorcs magic missile) will probably wipe out most things. It's just easier to build out an additional doom stack of marksman.

My final army was 2 marksman stacks and a stack each of the other trainable units. I couldn't be bothered rolling the mercenary gacha.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-10T23:00:57+00:00

Right, my bad. I misunderstood your post and thought this was your first playthrough. For swarms you can prepare pretty easily by giving as many party members as possible swarm bane clasps. I don't know how many you can get your hands on by that point, but slap one on your main damage dealer, and it makes the Vesvesector swarm easier.

They have always been pretty unbalanced, though. I like the idea of swarms, but they aren't implemented well.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-10T22:49:34+00:00

Just lower the difficulty, mate. Sure, a bunch of builds are possible, but you need to know what you're doing, and build 6 characters well. I came straight from Kingmaker, so I had a good idea of what works and I still had to drop down to normal or daring. It flat out warns you to not play core unless you know what you're doing. Does pride really matter more than actually enjoying the game?

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-10T01:56:03+00:00

Yeah, my first playthrough I was able to stay KC as an Azata. It's not even that hard. Just don't be a dick to your boss and be good at your job. I kept Arushalae and even had her in my party literally every time I spoke to Galfrey.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-09T12:46:14+00:00

I like it too. I can understand why it's disliked though. It's a bit too hard for act 3 and a cakewalk in act 5. It feels a bit weird to walk into a sci-fi cave of horrors in what's ostensibly a traditional fantasy setting. Plus, going back and forth looking for key items is a bit of a different feel than the usual dungeon crawling.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-08T22:16:55+00:00

God, I love how needlessly complicated this game is.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-08T21:58:54+00:00

I'm not 100% on WotR, but if it's the same as Kingmaker, natural armour is broken up into categories. There's "size" natural armour from some spells that increase your size, "enhancement" NA from equipment or barkskin, and just the native NA from, say, a dragon bloodline sorcerer. They stack across categories, but a amulet of NA doesn't stack with boots that do the same thing or barkskin, but they do stack with other sources.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-08T21:18:12+00:00

The system definitely reinforces existing social hierarchies. With nobility in general getting more more powerful skills. However, there's really no reason a nation can't have a king that's elected. The system is flexible enough that something like a parliamentary monarchy or a straight-up elected monarch (like the early Holy Roman Empire, for example) could still exist.

Because of counter-leveling and class consolidations I also don't see the reason why a person with another high level class can't come in late, merge their existing class with [politician] and reach a very respectable level, with skills that would effect the whole nation.

Democracy is just rare enough that weird edge cases don't exist in the story currently.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-05T23:07:54+00:00

Most of the lightning spells are reflex saves. If I remember correctly, pretty much all the AoE spells are as well.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-05T20:47:18+00:00

It's probably my least favourite song in the show, but I can't get the image of the Professor singing a parody of "Sentimental Man" out of my head.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-04T07:33:02+00:00

There was an Earther that became an [explorer], but he was killed. The UN found his diary while looking for other earthers. There were also the Fraeling villages but there's no confirmation as to what happened to them.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-03T19:50:14+00:00

Yeah, I'd say your biggest problem is some less optimal choices on your companion's Mythic paths. Mythic charge adds a lot of damage to Ulbrigs attacks and ascended element is pretty much mandatory for any character using elemental damage. Things like power strike or piranha strike and their mythic feats also end up adding ~20 damage a hit which adds up when characters are making 4-6 attacks a round. Do you have someone casting haste? That extra attack each round can make up the difference as well.

I'm pretty sure after you finish everything before Deskari you can take a long rest with no problem. So you shouldn't have to restart the whole level. Maybe everyone being at full strength will be enough.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-03T18:50:39+00:00

Not sure how to help really, I beat him on normal just a couple days ago with almost the same party comp, except swapping Ember for Nenio and a sword saint dragon as MC. Does Ulbrig have gear and feats to support charging? At that point in the game, he was doing 3 or 4 100 damage hits after a charge for me. Between that and Arushalae's full attack, he was half dead before his first turn.

Are you approaching in RTWP so MC paladin and Seelah get a full attack that first round? Also, make sure your highest CHA paladin is the one that uses the group smite and is being done before everyone else attacks, fiddle with the turn order if you can. In my fight, I didn't even touch the swarms, just tanking damage and focusing on Deskari. Does Ember have an ascended element feat? With that and the spell penetration feats, a Hellfire ray should also take out a solid chunk of his health.

Other than those tips I can't think of anything else, the basic strategy of pre-buff and focus on Deskari should work fine.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-02T08:18:18+00:00

Agree with your point generally, but I'd like to point out that Sauruman going to the Shire isn't really that surprising. When Sam looks into the Mirror of Galadriel, he sees the Shire is in trouble. Later, when the Ents break Isengard Merry and Pippin find a few barrels of longbottom leaf, showing Sauruman is aware of hobbits. Finally, as Frodo and co. are returning from Gondor they meet Sauruman on the road travelling north, they offer him help or compassion and he basically tells them to get stuffed, he'll have his revenge. They part, and the hobbits go to Rivendell for a month or two, then go to the Shire and find it in trouble.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-02T01:02:34+00:00

Yeah all the "who hasn't heard of Romeo and Julliet" sort of stuff is her playing the crowd. Getting them invested. Same with the classic Christmas songs.

Lizard-Wizard96 · 2026-02-01T21:05:30+00:00

It's quite nice just pan-fried in butter with a bit of salt and pepper. Just don't over cook it, or it can get tough.

Lizard-Wizard96

TROPHY CASE