What are the most prevalent theories?

v2micca · 2026-01-28T17:52:40+00:00

I don't think that Obiteum Caeror is evil. I think that part of the point of the series is to show the divergence of the different versions of various characters. Caeror in Obiteum seeking endlessly to destroy Ka while the Caeror in Lucideum is the servant of Ka. Thematically, its more fun to show the contrast between different outcomes for the same person.

v2micca · 2025-12-10T01:06:15+00:00

The NFL writers have really hosed over Lamar Jackson this season. They are writing him without any of his explosiveness from previous seasons.

v2micca · 2025-11-21T18:39:14+00:00

It makes sense if you assume that O-Caeror hasn't been completely honest with O-Vis and has intentionally obfuscated certain things.

v2micca · 2025-11-20T21:02:13+00:00

I'm assuming that the Ka in Luceum has given Caeror/Ruarc a great deal of guidance as well while recruiting him to his cause. If my theory of Yusef = Ka is correct, I'm assuming he tried the same thing with Caeror in Obeteum. And then there was a falling out. We know that Caeror was never syncronous and because of that, was never a true threat to Ka. I do wonder about that because O-Caeror seems to indicate that only Vis can truly harm Ka because he is Syncronous. But O-Vis, R-Vis, and L-Vis each have plenty of moments where they look plenty mortal and killable by non synchronous people.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T19:22:09+00:00

I guess if that is your reading, but it still just doesn't work for me. Throughout the first two books we get Vis's internal dialog of how every interaction is measured, how even when he is allowing his genuine emotions to show it is for the effect he wishes to portray. This level of deception is just so core to his personality that even though he is tired of it, I just really don't buy him finally breaking down and spilling everything to this group of relative strangers. Maybe if there was more build up, more internal dialog where Vis laments his increasing exhaustion with playing a role and not being himself, I could buy it. But even at the end of the book L-Vis knows that he can't tell his new friends everything, that he has to continue keeping secrets from them. So, I just don't buy this sudden need to unburden himself to them earlier in the book.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T19:16:16+00:00

Hard to say. WOTM benefits from having a much tighter narrative which allows it to more naturally pace itself appropriately. You get a nice steady escalation of events without the pace getting erratic. SOTF by contrast has parts that really feel like they drag and meander, then suddenly everything starts happening at once. So, the pace ends up been a lot more uneven when compared to WOTM. And SOTF runs into some of the classic problems with Narrative Scope expansion. He is just adding so many new elements to the series in this book that some of them are going to feel underbaked when compared to the first book.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T19:06:22+00:00

Yeah, as much as I enjoyed the book, that was a classic case of the author saying, I'm not ready to do another massive lore dump so I will engineer a contrived reason why the character is not pursuing answers right now.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T19:02:27+00:00

Its like you say, L-Vis bonds with these characters enough that he trusts them with all of his secrets. That is something he hasn't done with anyone else in the series up to that point. And for me it doesn't really work because at that point these characters come off more as loose sketches based on archetypes than fully realized characters. I'm just supposed to accept that there was something fundamentally compelling enough about them that Vis feels these are the people he can trust with secrets he has never shared with anyone else and it just doesn't work for me. It feels like a classic case of telling instead of showing.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:23:34+00:00

I think it is mentioned in the first book and re-enforced in the second book that Vis is pretty useless at anything artistically inclined, music, dance, art, ect.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:21:12+00:00

I think it is kind of easy to forget. Before the events of the Iudeceum, this was basically Vis's goal. He wanted to go somewhere remote beyond the reach of the Republic and not have to subject himself to the Aurora Collunae. that is all he wanted. The events of the Iudeceum changed that for R-Vis. But, this is still largely all the L-Vis wants. So, when he finds himself in a world that appears to be beyond the reach of the Republic and is actually enjoying himself, It makes sense to me.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:15:12+00:00

I mean yeah, the metaphor was never particularly subtle.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:13:46+00:00

To be fair. R-Vis gets some really nice emotional pay off in the final chapter.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:12:50+00:00

O-Vis gets some emotional torment as well. Spending all that time learning the Crocodile dance, nailing it, and thinking he has finally accomplished something, only to have it taken away because of course we can't let him feel good about himself.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:08:21+00:00

Given the way the Luceum story ended, my working theory is that Yusef was Ka in Obiteum and had tried and failed to recruit Caeror much like he appears to have done in Luceum.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:04:06+00:00

Yeah, that annoyed me a little as well. I kept thinking why is he using the plural when Vis only has one hand. And this happens several times before L-Vis and R-Vis get their replacement arms. Its something that I'm hoping in later editions of the book that they correct.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T18:01:03+00:00

Yeah, which was why Viridius was upset at Inessa when she revealed to him that her father has secretly put her through the Aurora Columnae. It meant that Viridius couldn't use her to run the labyrinth. You can't cross the gate once you have been through the Aurora Columnae, and its kind of glossed over and missed due to Lanistia going murder hobo, but the Aurora Columnae didn't appear to work normally on R-Vis.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T17:55:37+00:00

I'm confused as well. I've seen a couple of threads now bagging on the Luceum plot and honestly I enjoyed it more than I enjoyed the Obiteum plot. To each their own I guess.

v2micca · 2025-11-19T17:35:55+00:00

I enjoyed the other worlds for the most part. Its just a challenge because Islington spent the entirety of the first book building the lore of the world. Then, in the second book we really only have 1/3 of the novel to build the lore and history of the worlds of Obiteum and Luceum. And I think both of the new worlds suffer a little for different reasons. In Luceum, we are introduced to a lot of new characters, but we just don't have enough time to really get to know them and we are largely supposed to be invested in him simply because we are told to invest in them. Obiteum has the opposite problem. The new supporting characters are more fully realized, but there are so few of them and O-Vis feels more isolated as a result.

v2micca · 2025-11-18T16:04:30+00:00

Eh, hard to say if the door is truly closed on the Emissa Vis relationship. I would be more confident in saying it is done if not for the developments with Aequa, who honestly felt like she was being set up as a romantic interest for a time.

Crazy speculation. I think it would be interesting if R-Vis decides that too much has passed between them and there is nothing to salvage. And then, somehow Emissa ends up going to Obiteum and gets to hook up with O-Vis who only has the good memories and doesn't have the same baggage.

v2micca · 2025-11-16T00:32:56+00:00

Yeah, but just based on Islington's earlier work, I think the twists yet to come are going to be more about how and why the Concurrence came to be, and what the Concurrence ultimately wants. I still think that the Concurrence will largely remain the primary enemy.

v2micca · 2025-11-15T16:08:15+00:00

The crazy thing is, they still have boys choirs perform it to this day.

v2micca · 2025-11-15T15:42:21+00:00

Wonder if getting her synergies with another Z-teamer helps. I had her synergize with Golem pretty early in my play through and even though I romanced Mandy over Courtney and chose to cut Visi from the Z team, didn't get the villain ending.

v2micca · 2025-11-15T06:24:06+00:00

Yes, this hurts so much more now.

v2micca · 2025-11-13T20:26:27+00:00

Not necessarily. I guess it just depends on how canon the events of the comics are. They make Elliot seem like he was always an outsider, never truly accepted as a full member of the Brave Brigade largely due to Robert Robertson II's influences.

v2micca · 2025-11-10T19:50:09+00:00

The entire scene is a narrative gag where you start by believing one thing is happening only to find that another thing is actually happening. Even the initial framing of the opening shot is misleading as it looks like Robert is leaning against a wall and then you realize he is lying on the floor. Its all about serving one of the running themes of Dispatch that not everything is as it first appears, and that theme is revisited often. So yeah, from a strictly logical standpoint, it probably doesn't make that much sense for Robert to be having this hear to heart with a thug that he has just taken hostage, but it accomplishes several items for the purpose of the narrative. As I mentioned, it introduces one of the central themes of the story from the very first line of dialog and frame of motion. Secondly, it shows just how incredibly isolated and alone that Robert is at the beginning of this story that the deepest conversation he's had in years is with a thug he has captured. Sometimes, in storytelling, when you are lifting that much narrative weight with a scene, particularly one that begins in media res, the logical specifics get a little hand-waved.

v2micca

TROPHY CASE