Subject: *Smacks Self - I keep forgetting that it's only 9 books*
Author:
Posted on: 2015-04-14 23:01:00 UTC
I like it! :D
And that'd be an interesting bit of meta to dig into - assuming, of course, that we had the time!
Holy carp, this is nerve-wracking...
Anyway! I'm glad to meet you all (I've been in chat a few times before, but not many of you were in there.), and I hope it's not too much to take another newbie on board.
Some of my favorite canons include the Young Wizards series, Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, Person of Interest, Generator Rex, the Discworld books, Steven Universe, and various original works.
I look up to all of you (especially the ones who've published missions/other works recently - I have a blast reading your stuff!), and to a relatively large extent I'm influenced by your opinions. You mean a lot to me. ^^
So! I hope you're doing well (and if not, I send Optional!Hugs and/or Good Vibes in your direction.), and that things go well here.
To our world of weird! Have a hobnob juicebox. There's a random side effect, excluding death because that'll just kill the mood.
Aaand, I am now blue. :P
Thank you!
That makes one more Young Wizards fan around here, which is certainly good.
Anyway, have two cents. You never know when you'll need to put them in somewhere.
I think the Powers are going to have to appoint an Advisory for the Board before too much longer... ;)
hS
And I'll keep a hold of these two cents, thanks! :)
I think there were two recently-Unclaimed Badfics, last I checked...
Welcome to this little slice of the internet. Have a pet alligator. Be careful he bites.
I'll probably have to donate him to a more proper habitat, though. XP
Hope you're doing well! ^^
That was one of my favorites when I was younger! Only ever really had the first three, the eighth, and the ninth, though. Did the tenth ever come out?
But it's scheduled to come out February 2nd, 2016! Look up "Games Wizards Play." ;) Mrs. Duane also wrote some things about it on her tumblr (dduane), if you want to check that out.
I mean, a year away isn't very woo, but it being an actual thing that will actually happen is woo!
I need to reread that cat spinoff.
Granted, there are sequels (I only got to read the third one - The Big Meow. It's on a website somewhere, though I can't remember where. XP).
At least we know that GWP is a thing! \o/
I'm glad to hear there are sequels! I'm hoping to re-familiarize myself enough to go bug Alloy and Ginger by shoving them into the Young Wizards universe...
Oh — which book had the Ponch reveal? I'm not saying what it is because spoilers, but I remember reading that one. >
(Dari's still my favorite, though. She made a species; how could that not be awesome? ^^)
And it was the eighth one - Wizards at War. :)
I agree with you about Dari, too. She's awesomely-awesome! ^^
I loved the whole silicon planet thing so much. Giant planet-AIs, a species' creation (and creation "myth") playing out with a dash of code wizardry, some denying precedent, and a redemption? Yes PLEASE. None of the others have ever topped High Wizardry, IMO.
(And it's totally my headcanon that the "It didn't show up to mine, said that It had a headache" version of the Lone Power was the one dealing with Dari's living computers.)
High Wizardry has always been a strong contender for my favourite of the series, for much the same reasons you list. Also, y'know, the Doctor has that little cameo in there...
Was the 'headache' ordeal Mamvish or Irina? I think it was one of them, but can't peg which. (Also not 100% sure I've got the names right, so this post may just be a comedy of errors I wish I'd never written... owell!)
hS
And you got both names right, don't worry. ;)
No minis in this thread (...yet? Don't want to tempt the Ironic Overpower TOO much).
Actually, speaking of Mamvish... I'm wondering whether her Ordeal has certain parallels to Darryl's. Specifically, I'm wondering whether the sum total of her 'Ordeal' was in actually bringing herself to say the Oath.
I read Mamvish as being very... not quite self-centred, but definitely self-confident. I can't help but wonder if she used to be [even more?] arrogant and sure of herself - to the point where reciting an Oath which promises to help everyone else, rather than just doing what she thinks is right, might have been a serious challenge.
This is part of a wider musing, specifically: a lot of the Ordeals we know about seem to have one aspect of the wizard in question as both a challenge to overcome - and as the weapon they need to use. Kit is a loner who's more comfortable around machines - he has to learn to work with others (Nita, specifically), but also gets a lot of use out of inanimate objects. Dairine is... uh... enthusiastically naive, which gets her into heaps of trouble - but also lets her do 'the impossible' simply because she refuses to admit that it is impossible.
I'unno, maybe I'm reading too much into it... but Diane does like to theme things like that. Even non-Ordeal things like Ponch in War fall into this pattern: he used his loyalty to Kit, but also had to overcome it.
By this theory, Mamvish's overconfidence in herself had to be overcome to actually read the Oath - but was also so powerful that the Lone Power bought it and 'had a headache'. Like I say, it's just a theory - but it fits a lot of the facts.
(Which of course leads down the path of 'so what would MY weakness/strength be', but that way lies madness and/or utter thread derailment. Though the fact that there's canonically an instance of Middle-earth out there leads to some interesting notions...)
hS
I've had that particular thought before. ^_^
Also, just because we're on the subject, I'unno how interesting really old PPCer chatplays are to anyone, but, well, the Lone Power is in this one. A version of Him, anyway. We nicknamed him Leofric, which is a bit of a horrible joke. *eg*
~Neshomeh, late to the party, Dai, etc.
Because I have a certain association with that name (it's an in-story pseudonym of someone else's non-published OC), and the Lone Power would likely NOT be pleased. XD (One day I'm going to be brave enough to plug said writer's works everywhere, and screw all the consequences!)
I can just see him as a scruffy, irascible parrot... ^_~
I am left with the rather worrying thought that Middle-earth is like the Lone One's world in the very first book: a world mostly abandoned by the Powers. Seriously: from the moment they raised the Pelori, the Valar pretty much let Melkor and Sauron (both incarnations of the Lone Power, for my money - unless Melkor was just a patsy? That's possible, given that he's the one who kept getting captured...) have a free hand in the place. Oh, they occasionally popped over to wage a brief war, but after that, they just... left.
Can you imagine a world where the Powers are actually concerned getting taken over by the Lone Power no less than four times? Srsly. The Valar have gone the way of the Powers in Ireland: they've made their own faux-Timeheart, and are quite happy to let the rest of the world go hang unless it really gets on their nerves.
(O'course, all this hangs on the other half of the question: when Ponch created Arda [goodgrief], did he make it with a history? Or did it literally spring into existence at the moment of the downfall of Numenor and the Reshaping? In the YW multiverse, was Arda ever flat?)
(Leofric: he's a very... forthcoming version of the Lone One. Reminds me of whatsername, from Holiday...)
hS will stop typing before any more brackets app(ear of drat)
I was thinking the Champion would be Manwe, but yeah, that does kinda suggest the PTBs gave up at some point.
On the other hand... Each race gets its own temptation, right? For the Elves, that would have to be the War of the Jewels, with Melkor being the incarnation of the Lone One. There could well have been wizards in play that we don't know about.
For Men, Numenor seems like a very good candidate—in which case they fail the test, even if the Lone One also suffers a setback—but Sauron continues to be active in the world. What if the real trial comes later, maybe sometime during the Fourth Age, when Men become the dominant race on the planet? In that case, there might well be wizards to make sure things don't go totally pear-shaped.
I have no idea if this makes any sense, or where it leaves the War of the Ring in the grand scheme of things... just throwing some thoughts out there.
And then, that raises the question of what happened with the Dwarves and Hobbits, or has it yet? ... And heck, how does the creation of the Dwarves fit in? Dairine created a new species (unless I am badly misremembering), so I don't see why one of the Powers couldn't, I guess.
(Our theory on Leof was that even the Lone One needs a break sometimes, especially when each of His incarnations is going through the rocky process of being redeemed. Infinity is a lot to keep track of. [Jenni got a dose of strong medicine on this subject later on.] Also, he was inspired by a couple fanfics: "On the Care and Keeping of Shoulder Angels" and "Welcome to Timeheart." They're what got me into the fandom, so they both have a special place in my heart.)
~Neshomeh
I always had the impression that the Choice was close to the beginning of a race's lifespan. And we know that Tolkien wrote them in for both Elves and Men. The Eldar faced a Choice of whether to follow Orome or stay in the dark; Men...
Actually, I think I can meet you halfway. I don't think the Eldar had a single, unified Choice - Melkor never tried to tempt them at Cuivienen, and Orome showed up before he could. But we know the Noldor had a Choice - whether to listen to the counsel of the Valar, or to race off after Melkor. And, um... they call it the Fall of the Noldor for a reason. ;) So yes, I think the War of the Jewels was the Choice for the Eldar, spread across both halves of Middle-earth - and I think all the Elven races failed, one way or another.
The Noldor, obviously, went psychotic, with many of them actually dealing death to their own kin; House Feanor would definitely qualify as being under the Lone One's control. The Vanyar failed the other way - they stayed aloof from everything, just like the Valar were. There would never be a Vanyarin wizard, because the idea of interacting that much would be anathema.
The Teleri? They had a hard test, with the Kinslaying, and it's no surprise that they retreated into fear of death. But that was a victory for the Lone Power all the same (if not one for the Morgoth).
And the Sindar? I think the Girdle of Melian is their failure. They walled themselves off from the world out of fear, just like their cousins in Alqualonde.
And all of this happens at the same time - in the very short period between the death of the Trees and the First Battle (which was probably around the same time as the Kinslaying).
But what about Men? They didn't have long to wait. Andreth tells the story of how Men fell: by listening to the voice in the darkness, instead of the voice within. They learnt to fear death, to the point where they rejected the idea that they were born with it in place. In YW terms, what they rejected was the idea of Timeheart - the idea that there is a good reason to die out of the world. And except in a very few cases (early Numenor, and Aragorn), they never really remembered that.
I don't think Numenor or the War of the Ring were Choices, any more than the events of most YW books - dramatic though they are - were (though, come to think of it, Deep, High, and Holiday all are...). They were just the actions of the Lone Power in his majesty.
As to the other races: Hobbits are human, according to Tolkien, though I myself suspect some interbreeding with the Dwarves. And Dwarves... are very like Dairine's folk; they're made from rock, remember? They also have the look of a species which didn't particularly succumb to the Lone Power: they live a decently long time, and have at least rumours of reincarnation. I don't remember any of the dwarves we know particularly fearing death. Obviously they didn't pass with flying colours - that only happened once, we think - but they seem to have done pretty well.
And... oh, all right, one more:
Who can we peg as wizards among the Eldar? Elves who do their best to help everyone around them, to slow down the entropy of the universe, and are willing to give their own lives in order to continue that cause?
Well... I know, I know, it's me saying it... but that sounds a lot like Finrod. Y'know, the guy who befriended every species he possibly could - who was the voice of reason in every confrontation between Elves which he could weigh in on - who expressed a deep interest in the details of the Fall of Man - and who, ultimately, gave up everything he had in order to free a Silmaril from the Lone Power's grasp.
And who died in the dungeons of another incarnation of the Lone One. Oh, I bet Sauron was delighted with that...
(Can you have two incarnations of the same Power in the same place? We know they can get as close as, say, Ireland and America - but can they actually meet? Can one aspect of the Lone Power follow the orders of another? I don't think there's a canon answer to that one...)
hS talks a LOT
I like it! :D
And that'd be an interesting bit of meta to dig into - assuming, of course, that we had the time!
Wait, where are we on the Board? Yeah, still five threads under us - that's at least a day or two, even at current rates.
Another Ordeal: Ronan. What's his weakstrength? I'm gonna go with 'unwillingness to surrender control'. He spends a lot of time agonising about a certain passenger of his, and also gets very prickly when it looks like Nita's going to be running things in Ireland back in Abroad.
And on his Ordeal, we know he 'took in the sea' to save the Roman invaders of Ireland. That was simultaneously using and overcoming his weakness: using, because the act itself was one of letting something vastly more powerful do something that really should have overwhelmed him, if he weren't so stubborn. Overcoming, because he let the Romans land, when he knew they could take over his country. For an Irish nationalist, that's a massive surrender of control, passing it off to other people - invaders.
See? The theory fits, or can be made to fit, which is close to the same thing.
As for myself, because self-inserts are fun... I'd guess 'trivia'. Because... well:
If you gave me magic powers, I would almost certainly transport myself into Middle-earth if I thought I possibly could. Not to stay or anything, but... just to see if it was possible. Which is very clearly the setup for an Ordeal - it occurs to me that except for Mamvish, all the Ordeals we know about take place away from their own world.
So there's me in Middle-earth, filled with trivia. I can easily come up with a bunch of scenarios that both make use of my trivia collection - both relating to Arda and relating to, y'know, physics and such - and also drive home the point that a) I don't know everything, and b) just knowing isn't enough anyway.
If pressed for a plot... Numenor, in the last days, probably even after the Fleet has sailed to make war on Valinor. The Lone Power (Sauron) is physically present and, in fact, in absolute control of the island - except for a bunch of renegades who are about to flee, and Tar-Miriel, the dethroned Ruling Queen. We know, canonically, that Sauron lost his body in the Fall of Numenor, which was not his plan, and suggests possible wizardly intervention. We also know that Miriel died there - which lines her up neatly for the 'sacrifice' theme of the story.
hS writes stories in his head, can you tell?
Eagerly, as a matter of fact. :D
For someone who likes pondering 'what-if's and reading what others can come up with, this is a wonderland!
Please, have this. *rifles through pockets* here is a magical cookie. At least I'm pretty sure it's magical. On the subject of those various original works you enjoy, mind letting me know what they are? I'm out of good stuff to read.
Check out this thread! There's a ton of awesome suggestions in it. {= )
(Also, hi, SMF! Welcome a'Board!)
~Neshomeh
... Though with most of them, I'm only acquainted in passing. More summer reading recommendations, then!
And thank you for the welcome. :)
Heylo, greetings, &c. Here, have this can of SPAM. Don't ask where it comes from, you might not like the answer.
/Not sure if I should call you 'Des' just yet... >.>
And it's fine! Not like I can eat regular spam though (I am Jewish; I must never have the pork. :P), so the SPAM will probably sit on a desk forevermore. Probably.
Call me Des. Everybody calls me that and it prevents the creation of various mini-Boarders (such as Dresden, Desdenelle, and the like).
Also, עליכם השלום! Heretical (weak agnostic atheistic) not-identifying-as Jew here.
And Shalom right back at you! Granted, that's pretty much my exact status, too. (I still live w/family, and probably will through college, we just haven't been to temple it a while. >.
First time I hear someone calling a synagogue 'temple'. Something new every day, I guess.
Nah; We've always called it Temple Beth Shalom. Must just be a local thing. :P
I'd hazard a guess and say you're probably American. (Israeli here.)
Granted, I knew you were Israeli already (I read the Board frequently). :P
A sight for sore eyes indeed.
(Don't ask. Or, do, by email. It's sur DOT nhm AT gmail DOT com.)
It's probably better I don't ask (though I WILL take note of that email!). ^^; My parents would be mad as heck if I gave out my email (or direct address, for that matter) out to people, though, so don't expect contact TOO soon. :P
If there's one thing I learned at the army (aside from manipulation and WON'T YOU BECOME A MAGICAL GI) is patience.
Loved the books, love the movies! So aside from one of my own shed feathers, have a pet-sized foodimal of your choice! Just remember not to eat it by accident, okay? ;)
Thank you for the gifts! I shall stow away the two Foodimals (Marshmallow + Mini-Tacodile) and love them for always and always. ^_^ And, y'know, never eat them. :P
Steven Universe, huh? I've heard nothing but good things about that show, where can I watch it?
I will gladly accept your offer of a hug. Things are starting to get busy at UNCC.
Also, have a block (wheel?) of Tiffany Aching's cheese! ^_^
SU is on Cartoon Network Thursdays at 5:30; reruns are on CN West at 8:30, and you can watch them online (though not on an official site) as well.
That would be UNC Charlotte, yes? If so, we're in the same state! :D
And thank you very much for the cheese. ^^
Welcome to the board and here is an urple colored light pen.
No, I'll be fine. XD Awfully tacky after-images, though. I shall cover the light-giving part in felt!
Thank you for the pen! ^_^
Here, have a mini-Tacodile Supreme! Seat down, pull up a chair, call the cat a bastard and let's sing:
The wizard's staff has a knob on the end~
Eee! Another CWACOM fan! :D I'm VERY pleased to meet you - now, to convince my parents to let me keep this little guy...
Anyway, how's the newbie life? :P
(There's also a forum, at flintlockwoodslab proboards com, if you're interested.)
People here are simply FANTASTIC! You'll get used to the community in no-time! Heck, I've joined the day before yesterday! :D Well, now we can have a contest: which one of us, newbies, will get the permission first! :D
Wait, how'd I do that twice? Ah well - I've heard NM'NMs (IS that how they are spelled? I'm not quite sure) are delicious!
(nm) is added automatically when there is no message to your subject. So, if you type (nm) in the subject line, you get NM&NMs.
Enjoy your meal, and welcome aboard.
HG
Welcome to the community! For your newbie gift, have this Underwater Toaster. Just... Be careful with it. There's a few issues with proper use and all that.
Thank you!
This'll take me a little while to figure out, though. Should it be submerged before being plugged in? After? Will soggy bread turn into soggy toast?
But seriously, it's cool. ^^
Have a +3 vicious shovel! Careful, it does recoil damage.
I'd better store this someplace safe - never know when you need a hole, after all!
Thankies. ^.^
I'll go and assume that you already read The Original Series and The Constitution, right? So then, I'll give ya the traditional newbie gift! A replica of The One Ring that makes its wearer explode, fortunately it can only be used by Sues.
Also, take this 天鯉(ten-koi, Heavenly Carp), it just needs a pond or a water tank to live (or you can just cook and eat it, I heard is delicious).
I made sure to read all of the links at the top (bar On Writing PPC stories, which I'll read at a later time).
And thank you for the Ring - I'd better lock this up. ;)
Now, the 天鯉 probably won't fit in my house (there's no suitable location for a fish here!), but I'll probably give it to one of my friends who actually has a large aquarium. ^^;
Welcome aBoard! As your gift, take this whistling skunk! If the urple bow around its neck becomes too much, feel free to remove it. ;)
Hm, looks like we don't have many series in common (I've read the first Young Wizards and The Wee Free Men and enjoyed both but haven't been able to find others in the series...serieses. Thing.), but that doesn't matter. Hope you like it here. :D
Eeeee, hi! *Waves*
Not sure I can keep animals (the result of a combination of allergies and too little room); perhaps I'll donate it to a Sanctuary?
And most libraries should have at least one Young Wizards book (there's nine now, and a currently-only-online NME version, which is more up-to-date technology-wise), along with several Terry Pratchett books (though they'd be in different places, I'd think).
I like it here already! ^_^
Those books I read? Yeah, the only ones in those series they have.
And yeah, everyone here is super-nice and friendly and cool, so you should fit right in. ;)
Is that the only library you can access? If there are other local libraries - or even an online-accessible one - they should be available. :/
And thank you for saying that! :)
