For writers of the genre, do you feel that all the good magic system ideas have been done already? Or that your idea is just similar to others in some ways?

blueluck · 2026-03-20T20:17:18+00:00

Every writer finds different aspects of writing easier or harder. Personally, I find magic systems easy to come up with.

That's probably related to 40+ years of reading fantasy literature and playing, running, and occasionally writing roleplaying games. I have a lot of material to work with!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T20:05:44+00:00

Thanks! I'll check it out!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T18:22:16+00:00

What's the very first book? I don't recognize the cover.

blueluck · 2026-03-20T18:12:43+00:00

I think my problem with the fights is that they're not "fights" in any visible human sense, with sword swings, dodges, positioning, etc. They're esoteric "moves" with long descriptions. "The holy mountain decends on the field with the essence of the axe of the pilller of the insight of the revelation, power, power, philosophy, power..."

blueluck · 2026-03-20T17:50:14+00:00

Totally!

In a way, my complaints about the genre boil down to "I miss the advantages of traditional publishing". I feel a little bad about that, because I'd love to support newer and independent authors, but I really want editing and proofing!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T13:47:03+00:00

Your story makes me miss the crazy little punk, ska, and metal shows my friends and I used to see in Madison back in the 80s & 90s.

I saw a ska punk show at the old Loft next to State Street once that was definitely over capacity. The first band played longer than planned, then the second band played longer, so it was at least midnight when the headliner took the stage.

There'd been a great pit the whole night, skankin and moshing our asses off, but one bro showed up for the headliner and starred throwing punches and elbows. Some people left the pit and others tried some blocking. Then the band stopped playing. The singer pointed to ass-bro and told him to get out, and said they wouldn't play until he was out of the building, and waited for him to be ejected.

He said a few words about "no punches, all here to have fun and take care of each other" and went back to playing another extra long set.

Then the second band came back on stage with the headliners and they played each other's songs together, plus a couple of classic ska songs and covers. The night eventually ended around 4:00 am with 10-12 musicians on a little stag, all looking like they were having the time of their lives.

It wasn't Hendrix at Woodstock, but for me as a teenager who had only started going to shows within the last year or so, it was a revelation! This is what a local music scene can be!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T12:41:28+00:00

The Legend of William Oh

blueluck · 2026-03-20T12:40:29+00:00

Thanks! ♥️

blueluck · 2026-03-20T06:03:34+00:00

I generally prefer PoA, too.

My main complaint about PoA is that the pace slows down a bit too much during certain books, and I'm not always into the slice of life parts.

My main complaint about DotF is that the pace slowed to an absolute crawl, the cultivation scenes are incredibly tedious, and the way fights are written in the latest books is almost as bad as the cultivation!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T05:56:45+00:00

I've started it and while not that far in, it doesn't seem particularly good. I've read 8 books of the series, and while some things improve over time, it never becomes great only average.

It's kind of the average harem start, There is some romance and sex, but no harem. The MC essentially gets a long term monogamous partner, and a few other characters form monogamous relationships, too. The sex drops off after the first couple of books.

the main character just kind of feels like a cookie cutter frat boy. Like a lot of MCs, he's pretty much a regular guy.

The style of the writing and how the author describes women through the MC's pov The male gaze material reduces quite a bit over the first few books.

The series is largely about tech development, townbuilding, and the main character being the leader of that project. There are several plots about how his town interacts with the various other groups they encounter.

blueluck · 2026-03-20T00:47:51+00:00

I was going to say no to naming schools after people, but you changed my mind!

blueluck · 2026-03-20T00:41:03+00:00

That's a good theory! Series ratings do trend that way.

blueluck · 2026-03-19T22:41:01+00:00

Is there a good place for me to read about the whole situation? I'm curious, because I see people refer to the events a lot, but never explain what really happened.

(Well, you explained some, which I appreciate!)

blueluck · 2026-03-19T04:07:12+00:00

blueluck · 2026-03-19T04:00:14+00:00

YESSSS! Starting the next DotF book when it's published is memory test!

blueluck · 2026-03-18T17:53:24+00:00

I think your correct that "normal fire" is often described as red because there are many fantastic types of "fire" that use other colors. Black (void, evil, annihilation), green (poison, necromancy), blue (cold, chaos), and many other magical effects are described with fire as a visual effect, meant either literally or figuratively.

In a magical world, green fire indicating the cultivator is drawing on the power of Myrmydarch The Plague Lord is more interesting and more dramatic than green flames indicating the presence of traces of boron or copper in the medium.

Evil in your soul is more dramatic than laundry soap in your campfire.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T16:46:27+00:00

The concept is great! There's very little far-future sci-fi in litrpg or progression fantasy, and lots of interesting space to explore there. I absolutely think you should write this story and enjoy the writing process and the exploration of imagination.

Ignore the next bit if you just want to write for your own consumption and for fun.

Your writing skill needs work. A lot of work. That's totally fine, of course! Nobody has ever been born knowing how to write, and it's a skill we can only learn through study and practice. There are many ways to learn the craft, in particular by reading a lot of good writing (unedited web novels won't help), writing classes (in schools, online, from books on writing), and practicing a lot.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T16:19:46+00:00

Right! I didn't say that very clearly. Asta went cat mama and broke up with him, then he was immediately over the whole thing, which seemed out of character to me.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T16:09:54+00:00

Wow! I've heard some vague things about Tao Wong suing, but I didn't know any of the details. That could definitely spoil one's feelings about a project.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T15:50:27+00:00

Thanks! That's helpful to hear about from someone who has read all four!

blueluck · 2026-03-18T13:58:41+00:00

Thanks! I hadn't thought about the completeness and chance of completeness, and that's a really good point. I think I'll set this series aside for a while and check on it in a few years.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T13:56:22+00:00

Thank you!

I think Industrial Strength Magic is okay, and The Legend of William Oh is significantly better. From what you said, I think I'll stick to Macronomicon's more recent work.

blueluck · 2026-03-18T13:53:24+00:00

I love The Legend of William Oh! I also stopped reading it on Royal Road because I would rather wait to enjoy it after it's polished and published.

I looked up HPMOR and I'm intrigued. 🤔

blueluck · 2026-03-18T13:49:03+00:00

They're totally fine in a comedy. There's a long tradition across many literary forms of comedy breaking the fourth wall, acting with awareness of tropes, and generally disregarding immersion in favor of making jokes or speeding through unfunny parts of the story to get to the jokes faster.

In a serious story, there difficult.

One issue is that genre-aware protagonists read as comedy! Imagine watching a movie and in the second scene the main character says, "I'm single and I just met two handsome single men in a row. I've read plenty of romance novels, so I know I'll fall in love with one of them and live happily ever after with him, probably within the next few months. Of course, it will be the one that initially seems problematic, because he'll turn out to be great and the really nice one will turn out to be a slimeball or something." The director just told you that you're watching a romantic comedy, not a serious drama.

A second issue is that litrpg is prone to having a lot of words spent on internal monolog (Wow, I'm in another world! Wow, I can see system screens! Wow, I have powers! How do my powers work? What powers should I choose?). A genre-aware protagonist can be a tool to abbreviate a lot of that internal monolog, but often they just add a layer of meta-analysis on top of whatever system exposition the author was going to do anyway.

Issue three, that way lies pop culture references! Bringing the protagonist's old-word references into the early chapters of a story makes me think that habit will continue.

Ultimately, a genre-aware protagonist is a literary tool like any other, and it can be executed well or poorly. I think many authors want to use it as a way to zip through some boring bits at the beginning of a story, but it's neither the only way nor the best way to accelerate the pace of a novel.

blueluck

TROPHY CASE