MERCEDES-LACKEY Digest 958 Topics covered in this issue include: 1) oops/Foresight by dsarik-+AT+-PO-Box.McGill.CA 2) Slighty Irate Fluff by Renee Mic Markowicz 3) Villains / "Karal" / Brothers / Van's Bardic Gift *wink* / Rec.M by "Herald Michal" 4) Horses/character abuse/Darkwind&Elspeth/Pernese songs/Firesong by Jefferson or Rain 5) Re: oops/Foresight by "Linda Malcor, Ph.D" 6) Cennyd-Poem / Villains / Burnout / Van. by mealink-+AT+-syd.au.swissbank.com (Kerry Mealing) 7) Hulda/ttfn by davidt-+AT+-cet.com (D H Tiffany/Shawn Marie Walker) 8) Re: Apologies by DawnRain 9) Re: Slighty Irate Fluff by tygriss-+AT+-juno.com (Sara A Youngblood) 10) Re: Genderless by DawnRain 11) Re: Darkwind/Elspeth (and a little Vanyel) by DawnRain 12) Re: Villains / "Karal" / Brothers / Van's Bardic Gift *wink* / Rec.M by DawnRain 13) Van. by "Linda Malcor, Ph.D" ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 17 Nov 96 22:01:06 -0500 From: dsarik-+AT+-PO-Box.McGill.CA To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: oops/Foresight Message-ID: <199611180335.WAA28545-+AT+-sirocco.CC.McGill.CA> Sorry guys. I have no clue how that last post got onto the list. I *thought* I sent it to Mel privately. Oh, well. ----------- Danya said, among much else: >>>That's not what I meant. Misty repeatedly had Vanyel told that his Foresight was NOT what HAD to happen, that he could do something different to change the outcome--then he goes blythely ahead and does absolutely nothing to change anything (so why bring up the whole possibility in the first place?). Vanyel's Foresight apparently doesn't work like Herbert's Leto or Paul Atreides, where mutlitple paths are visible and the "prophet" can pick the "best" (not always the most pleasant) one. THAT would be a valid reason for calling a Final Strike.<<< Granted his foresight doesn't work like it does in DUNE. However, I thought that when they were telling Van that what he saw didn't have to happen, it was most likely to happen. His deciding to become a Herald made it more probable. In order to avoid the future he saw, he would basically have to change a fundamental tenet of his philosophy and personality -- his self-sacrificing devotion to the People of Valdemar. Seeing as he (and the many people he saved) liked himself the way he was, he wasn't likely to change that just so he wouldn't die in such a manner. But, think about this. Let's say he *did* make that fundamental change in attitude... say he didn't become a Herald... who would have stopped Leareth then? Van sure wouldn't have. Can you imagine what his Foresight dreams would have entailed then? The rape of Valdemar? How would he react to that? Think about it a bit. Let it gnaw on the back of the heels of your thoughts for a while. Then write what you think. love, deniz sarikaya, High Priestess |But she had the trick of making a little of Procrastination and Holy |island right in the middle of time, and of Custodian of the B-Day List. |your knowing, which is what time does to Confused? Write me! |you. -- Robert Penn Warren dsarik-+AT+-PO-Box.McGill.CA ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 22:54:42 -0500 (EST) From: Renee Mic Markowicz To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Slighty Irate Fluff Message-ID: I'm sorry for posting this to the list, but I just had a rather disturbing experience and needed a forum for my irritation. I'm concerned with a matter of, well, I suppose you could call it etiquette. I have been having slight altercations with my roommate for a couple of weeks. As far as I knew, they were nothing serious - just the typical things that happen when you share living space with one person for three months. I had just finished running up the stairs for the third time (two flights) when I ran into my R.A. (resident advisor). He asked me why I wasn't downstairs at the meeting for roommates who are switching rooms. I asked what this had to do with me and he replied that my roommate was switching out of my room. Truthfully, my roommate was no great prize (she had her boyfriend sleeping in our room at least 4 out of 7 nights a week - no matter how much I protested) and I wasn't particularly sorry to see her go. Here's the clinch - they wanted _me_ to move out of my room and into a smaller one so that _they_ could move into our room! And I had to find all of this out via a third party! This whole mess might not have bothered me so much if my roommate had at least had the guts to tell me to my face that she wished to move out. That's just common courtesy. If you are having a conflict with someone, you just don't go behind their backs to get it taken care of. You try to talk it out with them face-to-face first and work it out. The fact that they naturally assumed that I would be more than happy to oblige them in removing myself from my room upon request... AAARGH!! I just sincerely hope that they're happy with each other and may they get "exactly what they deserve". Thank you all for allowing me to rant. I seriously needed to get this off my chest so I could concentrate on my studying. BTW, what's your collective take on all of this? I think that I'm right in being a bit ticked off about this, but I could be completely out of line. ObMisty: I supose I _do_ need one... Do you suppose that this is why the students at the Collegium (Heraldic) don't have roommates? For that matter - why do the bardic students have roommates and not the Heraldic? What about the Healers?... Or the Blues?.... :) Renee flare-+AT+-udel.edu |"I'm trying to find a polite way of saying 'drop University of Delaware |dead' and not having much luck." Pre-Veterinary student | -Vlad Taltos **High Priestess of |"Don't bother being polite. I died before the Procrastination** |Interregnum. Will you take the job?" Confused? Just Ask! | -Sethra Lavode http://udel.edu/~flare/index.html ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 21:31:26 +0000 From: "Herald Michal" To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Villains / "Karal" / Brothers / Van's Bardic Gift *wink* / Rec.M Message-ID: <199611180432.VAA13474-+AT+-web.azstarnet.com> Heyla! Jake spake: > It seems that Misty has lost her penchant for making a good bad > character. I mean, off the top of my head, all of the antagonists I > can think of who were evil seemed to be shallow. Like Falconsbane > ("Mwa ha ha! I'm evil because I can be!") or that healer-turned-bad > in White Gryphon (Kestrachern.. whatever). Evil mutant Wyrsa? Even > Tremane and Charliss seem lame. :( What ever happened to the > manipulative psychological, but understandably motivated, bad guy? > Like the main antagonist from Dark Sun Rising.. someone who's evil, > yes, but you understand why and even sympathize with him. Yeah . . . villians with all these strange psychoses are interesting, but how can you sympatize with them? Nobody gets too upset when you shoot a mad dog. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% I wrote: > > I actually read all of SW (that's the first one, yes?) pronouncing > > Karal "kar-AL" and then it sort of hti me...wait a minute...that's > > just an alternate spelling of Caral. ::sigh:: > > Isn't Karal some east-european spelling of Carl? I'd thought the > Karsites some combination of eastern europe and middle eastern > cultures. Probably. I think we ended up agreeing that most of Misty's "variant" names are just less common RL names. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Mat wrote thusly: > > >Ick. Even FAP is better than M-C. FAP I'll even occasionaly > > >leave on, if no one else is in the vicinity (my little brother > > >loves making fun of Fish "meow-ing".), > > > > Mine too, actually. > > Little brothers deserver regular strangulation. Mine does anyway. > My parents seem to have some sort of sentimental attatchment to mine, though. ::shakes his head:: %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% I *really* don't want to get into the Van's Bardic Gift Discussion (TM) either, but about Savil testing for it: is it really just something you can check for, like any other talent? If it is, why couldn't she just have done a quick scan when he first arrived in Haven instead of having to have him sing for the Bardic class? %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Mat wroteth: > > There is a new newsgroup: rec.music.filk that seems related to > > some of our discussions. It's moderated and just starting up. > > Well, it's not up on my site yet, but, AFAIK, it's not supposed to > be moderated. Semi moderated; I think there is one person who doesn't check each individual post, but can pull a users access for repeated offenses. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% And Jake again: >>What's this? Consider it an ostentatious display of filling my >>lighter with lighter fluid and making sure the striker still works. > >Aha! But I have my patented Ring of Fire Resistance (patent pending) >right here. So there. :PPPPP You may have to fight TSR for the rights to that one. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% >I saw this in one of the desc. for a digest, but my server won't let >me access it...so does anyone know what the size of Valdemar is >(relative to something in US) If this is a FAQ, private email will >suffice I believe Misty said it's about the size of Indiana. (ITIHTTIAWI) %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Vrondi, are the tapes there yet? They should be by now. Finally. ::sheepish gryn:: %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Looks like that's about it for now. I'll probably have to stay home with my cold tommorrow, though, so maybe I'll get to the *last* three days worth of mail. :P Ajax: "I do hate the proud man, as I hate the engendering of toads." Nestor: [aside] "Yet he loves himself: is 't not strange?" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | Herald Michal Alderan Skysong, Chosen of Tyr | | President of the VEVUWEC and member of the DDMF | | God of Useless Facts and Irrelevant Information | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 06:55:39 -0800 From: Jefferson or Rain To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Horses/character abuse/Darkwind&Elspeth/Pernese songs/Firesong Message-ID: <328F276B.E83-+AT+-earthlink.net> Tresta wrote: >> And now I offer to you all that this kind of mental link between a horse and rider is not really such a farfetched thing. I do this; mindtouching the horses is part of my Gift.<< I just had to put in my 2 cents here - my mum raises Belgian draft horses for show. These are utterly huge creatures, standing around 6'5" at the shoulder - and my 5 year old grew up playing with them in the corral. The horses would just very gently *wuffle* her hair, nuzzle the top of her head, and hold very still when she'd come near. It's like, they knew that she was small and vulnerable and would take care of her. Horses are very *psychic* - it is a lucky person who gets to have a close relationship with one. Still Tresta: >> Does it seem to anyone else that realism might call for at least *some* of the mistreatedto be completely isolated, with no one at all to care about what is happening to them?<<< Well, Jamie (the little boy in _Wheels of Fire_) was pretty isolated. He had Joe - but even that was a tenuous thing. The little girl in _When the Bough Breaks_ was very isolated as well. Nobody knew what was going on with her until MacLynn and the teacher stepped into the picture. I loved ML's disclaimer at the end of her SERRAted Edge books which basically said "Elves are not going to rescue you. If you're being abused it *isn't* your fault and here are some places you can go for help, but you actually have to go and GET help". More Tresta: >>Is anyone else dying to know...are they married, or aren't they?! I know they had that beautiful little ceremony in Winds of Fury (my favorite of the three, I think, and mostly because of the way they are with each other), and Selenay made a reference to handfasting, but Misty never lays it out in black and white.<< I think in Hawkbrother tradition, when you accept the feather from your partner's bondbird, that signifies marriage. And, when you give it back, that signifies *divorce*. So, as far as Darkwind, Elspeth and K'Sheyna are concerned, they are married. Any handfasting ceremony would've been for Selenay's/Valdemar's benefit, and wouldn't have changed things between Elspeth and Darkwind at all. Cennydd asked a question in a previous post, but thanks to my trigger-happy delete action, I don't have it any longer. I believe it asked for a specific example of a Teaching Song that wasn't a History, but actual instruction. "Drummer beat and piper blow, Harper, strike and soldier go. Free the flame and sear the grasses, Til the dawning Red Star passes" which seems to me to be instruction to keep your Holds green-free when the Red Star is making a Pass. And this Teaching song seemed to outline the relationship between Holder and Weyrfolk, in that the Dragonmen were to be honored, but still had to behave themselves: "Honor those the dragons heed, in thought and favor, word and deed Worlds are lost or worlds are saved, from those dangers dragon-braved. Dragonmen avoid excess - greed will bring the Weyr distress To the ancient Law adhere, prospers thus the Dragonweyr" I think there were more in the book about Lessa and Ramoth. FireMist said (regarding Firesong's personality change): >>In other words, yes he did change, but not because Misty lost his bio (like she did with Elspeth), but because of the mage-storms. although. . . I wonder why he didn't go bonkers in the Pelagirs, or in Hadorn if he is so affected by the way magic has warped a land<<< I think that Silverfox said it was a really gradual change brought on by the original storms. The mages in White Gryphon changed over a number of years and nobody noticed until they just up and left, or went nuts. So, he wouldn't have started to lose it until the Magestorms began, which was after he got back from Hardorn. And even then, it began with a very minor shift in his attitude and sortof spread like a cancer until he was out of control entirely. My husband wants to go on-line. I have to share the modem now. . . Peace my friends, rainwood, aspiring but not officially appointed yet, priestess of Domesticity and Laundry ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 20:52:56 -0800 From: "Linda Malcor, Ph.D" To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: oops/Foresight Message-ID: <199611180452.UAA10123-+AT+-latimes.com> At 04:05 AM 11/18/96 GMT, dsarik-+AT+-PO-Box.McGill.CA wrote: > In order to avoid the future he[VAN] saw, he would basically have to change a >fundamental tenet of his philosophy and personality -- his self-sacrificing >devotion to the People of Valdemar. I didn't get this from the books at all. Especially when Van arrives at the appointed location and realizes there are four mages instead of one. Something had obviously happened to change his vision already, so he had every reason to believe that the sequence would not play out in the pattern he had Seen. Call it the George Bailey School of Foresight, but Van had obviously been seeing an alternate future to the one he walked in to. The proof that he could change what he had seen was right there. So why not change it so he wins and gets to live semi-happily-ever-after with Stef? I don't recall a single one of his visions that said unequivocably that in order for Valdemar to be safe and happy Vanyel had to commit suicide. All I recall them saying was that when Vanyel met Learth, Vanyel would die, unless something happened to change that vision. To set up something like that in a story and then not pay off is bad form. It's like Beauty going on her merry way and no one ever falling in love with the Beast. >Seeing as he (and the many people he >saved) liked himself the way he was, he wasn't likely to change that just so >he wouldn't die in such a manner. That's my point. He had everything he needed to not die and still save the day. Instead he kills himself in a fit of stupidity and Stef gets one of the rawest deals I've ever seen handed to a literary character: "Congratulations! You come back from the dead to be with your lover, you get to see him a handful of times, and then he commits suicide needlessly and you get to spend sixty or so years alone talking and singing about him all the time." I really don't like the idea that Misty did that to a character on purpose when she didn't have to tell the story that way (anymore than I like Melanie Rawn running characters through with swords or dropping from heart attacks for no good reason). I prefer to think that this was simply a plotting glitch. (Larry said in an interview that Magic's Price went to press without so much as a comma being changed--and he implied that maybe that wasn't the greatest thing ever to happen to one of Misty's works. Misty says in her Dragon*Con interview that she works from character, letting the story grow out of the character--yet that is not what both she and Larry say in other interviews happened with the LHM trilogy: It was plotted out in advance. I think this was just a case of Misty forcing a character to try to fit a predetermined plot instead of letting the plot grow out of the character as she says she prefers.) >But, think about this. Let's say he *did* >make that fundamental change in attitude... say he didn't become a Herald... >who would have stopped Leareth then? Van sure wouldn't have. Can you imagine >what his Foresight dreams would have entailed then? The rape of Valdemar? >How would he react to that? Actually, nothing of the kind would probably have happened. Learth was after Vanyel. Learth was attacking people that Vanyel loved because Vanyel loved them. Learth was after power. If there had been no Vanyel, Valdemar would have been small pickings power-wise compared to the Empire. Besides, your hypothetical situation has nothing to do with my point. I'm not saying for a moment that Vanyel shouldn't have gone to stop Learth. Of course, he should have! If he hadn't, he wouldn't have been Vanyel. I'm saying that Vanyel _should_ have been able to stop him. The later books even make it clear how ridiculously easy it would have been for him to do so (All he had to do was to physically damage the mage's body, and the "soul" would have moved along; the army followed the body, not the soul; dead body, dead leader as far as the army is concerned--end of war because we know Learth _did_ die in that strike and he didn't magically reappear and raise the army again and destroy Valdemar, which now had no Vanyel to protect it [and, conversely, had no Vanyel to attract anything like Learth].). Danya ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Nov 96 16:18:09 EST From: mealink-+AT+-syd.au.swissbank.com (Kerry Mealing) To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-vanyel.herald.co.uk Cc: kerry_mealing-+AT+-il.us.swissbank.com Subject: Cennyd-Poem / Villains / Burnout / Van. Message-ID: <9611180518.AA15033-+AT+-syd.au.swissbank.com> Whew. The fluff round here makes my carpets look clean! *grin* > Cennyd wrote: > > While we are in the realm of quotations, there is a poem I specially like > > but I cannot remember who wrote it. Can somebody help me on that please? I > > may be misquoting, but as fas as I remember, it goes: > > > > We are the music makers, / and we are the dreamers of dreams > > wandering by lone sea breakers / and sitting by desolate streams > > world losers and world forsakers / on whom the pale moon gleams, > > yet we are the movers and shakers of the world, / forever, it seems. You've probably seen it recently in my sig - I really like & have been using it for years. :) The poet is Arthur O'Shaughnessy, 1844-81. (I put in the "/" line delimiters above because I remember seeing the original like that). The remainder of the poem is: With wonderful deathless ditties, We build with (up?) the world's great cities, And out of a fabulous story, We fashion an empire's glory; One man with a dream, at pleasure, Shall go forth and conquer a crown; And three with a new song's measure can trample an empire down. We in the ages lying, In the buried past of the earth, Built Nineveh with our sighing, And Babel itself with our mirth. And o'erthrow them with prophesying To the old of the new world's worth For each age is a dream that's dying Or (And?) one that is coming to birth. That's from memory, the words I'm a little unsure of have the bracketed alternatives beside them. But that's basically it.. Lady Sophia wrote: > RE: Flat villains. Rod Calligan from Sacred Ground is one of my favorites > - he is pretty stereotypical Misty-villain, in an understated sort of way. > Robert and the Mestizio priestesses in Burning Water really were > interesting, too - they were just tempted because they were greedy. IMHO, > Misty does a lot better with people who end up as bad guys, due to > possession or whatever, than people who are just evil. Bad guys are just > evil, and good guys are just good. Well actually the point was, Robert and the Mestizio priestesses weren't really evil - they weren't there anymore, really - Robert certainly wasn't himself and I wouldn't swear that he chose to be possessed.. I don't know somehow, yeah, what Burning-Water did was bad, granted, but I have a certain sneaking sympathy for him, in the same way I have a sneaking sympathy for Loki in the Norse Legends. BW was hard-done-by, originally and the Spanish Conquistadors (sp?) did slaughter his people, both unintentionally with disease, and intentionally. The inexcusable part of his return was victimizing the descendants of his enemies, as his enemies. The possession and sacrifice of Robert/Burning-Water is one thing (and in fact, you could parallel it to the Christian Crucifixion), the sacrifice of others, took him across the bound, to what we can consider evil. But that doesn't make him a less sympathetic character. It was interesting to note through the text that there was a sub-theme that the majority of the victims had bad-karma (though not, one would assume, sufficient bad karma such that they'd normally be diced & sliced). (Though again, I resent the sexually-aware-but-single female victim being chosen - more grist for the sexually repressed Misty grill Heather?). Again though, that's what makes classic characters - ones we can sympathise with - and really, the majority of ancient gods (and yes, I include the old- testament Christian God) have been known for smite their enemies and the enemies of their people. Misty got the bad-guy right that time - she collared onto an archetype (not a stereotype - an archetype is a character larger than life, but with flaws & foibles). Ditto with COTN - the bad guys there, were bad, but not uncomprehensibly so - they were shallow & petty .. but they were addicted to their hit and self-centred enough not to want to give it up. And the characterization of Dave & Di was great. Hmm, I'm not firing today. Heather, come say what I want to say please? :) :) There folks. What she'll say. (As opposed to my normal: Yeah, what she said). Jake wrote: > It's happened. I'm suffering BURNOUT! *thud* My book is at a stonewall, my > roleplaying is dead, my writing is uninspired.. I can't even come up with > humor anymore. How do you other writers combat this? Help.. I listen to music, kill myself with exercise (swimming is great because I tend to clear my mind, what Larry Niven once called white-dot focus, martial-arts also work because you tend to focus very tightly while sparring - black-dot focus). Listen to music, read books that make me misty-eyed, go out and garden. Danya wrote: > At 09:48 PM 11/17/96 GMT, Chris & Sean Talbot wrote: > >No that is not always the case. Vanyel stalled as much as he could. > > That's not what I meant. Misty repeatedly had Vanyel told that his > Foresight was NOT what HAD to happen, that he could do something different > to change the outcome--then he goes blythely ahead and does absolutely > nothing to change anything (so why bring up the whole possibility in the > first place?). Vanyel's Foresight apparently doesn't work like Herbert's > Leto or Paul Atreides, where mutlitple paths are visible and the "prophet" > can pick the "best" (not always the most pleasant) one. THAT would be a > valid reason for calling a Final Strike. Firstly, he did change the outcome. He won. Secondly, he's the most powerful mage in Valdemar - who is he going to call in time? Thirdly, this is his best -and- only chance of stopping both Leareth and the armies in one fell swoop. Yes, he could probably have pulled the sides of the cliffs down, but Leareth is a better mage, with more backing, with other mages and far more nodes - he could have cut through the cliffs as he did before (using up only a few mages, or his nodes, or even the blood path power of the death of his soldiers) and Van would have used up most, if not all of his power. Note also that the cliffs were only 30 foot high where they were - it's not as if he could dump a whole mountain down the pass. (A pass generally being the gap between two mountain peaks). It's also possible that Leareth could have countered Van's strategy of taking out the walls. Remember, Leareth not only cut the pass, he -shielded- his expenditure of power, which from all accounts doubles or triples the amount of power required. Stopping the army wasn't enough. He had to take Leareth out and the only way to get near enough to Leareth was to pose a sufficient problem that Leareth would come to deal with it personally. Reverse the order - the primary threat was Leareth. The secondary one was the army. Also, the walls are solid rock, small fission (they're the nuclear bomb type) explosions may not even bring them down given that they were already glassy etc from previous heat-exposure. Hiroshima isn't totally flattened either.. Evidence? The totality of Van's final strike wasn't enough to blast the walls into a pile of rubble. You're talking a lot of power there, to do that to a solid wall (as opposed to weak unsupported concrete structures), especially if he's opposed.. On the whole, while I argue the other side, I do tend to agree, I would have been pulling the mountains down, and worrying about Leareth coming through afterward. The problem would be to survive because you'd be using your power for offence, not defence, while Leareth could concentrate his power on surviving the rock-walls. It'd be much worse to die & leave Leareth still there. (After all, an -average- Adept can summon hordes of things from the netherworld). What annoyed me most about the thing was that Van never came up with adequate defence against mage-winds - the guy was a creative, more-or-less brilliant mage. The sad part was that he seemed to lack the in-depth training that Savil or the Tayledras had - he seemed to have the basics down pat, but not the in-depth theoretical knowledge that they had - he winged it based on hypotheses and intuition without necessarily having the background to let him think of things like losing his ground so that his shields could spin with the winds. On Yfandes choosing, the wording suggests that she saw this specific outcome. She could have seen it two ways - through Van's dreams - anything he dreamt that strongly about, she would definitely have seen in his mind; and she could have seen it through her own foresight. The wording "when I chose you" suggests that she saw it herself. Whether it was specific or general? I'd say specific - it doesn't take much foresight to guess that an Adept Herald-Mage (any Herald even) and a companion are likely to die in the field, together. > And if Learth was so good, why did he mess around with the Pass in the first > place? Why not simply move troops the Imperial way, with a good, > old-fashioned Gate? Slip into Valdemar alone, find a lonely spot (such as > an unoccupied Way Station in a forest) and Gate in your army--who's going to > notice, even if it takes you weeks? Leareth couldn't make Permanent Gates remember. And the Web would have picked him up immediately (I think we can assume that he was aware that the Heralds had -some- kind of early warning system, given the number of feints he apparently had at their border - eg Krebain). Plus, if you think the pass was a bottleneck, a gate would be much more so.. And Gates kick up a fair ruckus in the magical ether as well... Cheers, Kerry. "For the song and the sword and the pipes of pan, Are birthrights sold to a usurer; But I am the last lone highwayman, And I am the last adventurer." ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 21:21:14 -0800 From: davidt-+AT+-cet.com (D H Tiffany/Shawn Marie Walker) To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Hulda/ttfn Message-ID: On Fri, 15 Nov 1996 HTH asked; >How do you figure Hulda as being particularly interesting, Dog of >Pogyts? She was sadistic and power-mad and treated everyone as a tool >or an enemy. This sounds like every other Misty villain to me. The >only unique thing I recall about Hulda is that she was female, and >Misty's villains generally are not. What do you think makes her >different? Please don't hit me! 8-{)# Ok, seriously? To start with, Hulda's character seems different every time we see her. I guess I see so much contradiction and assume that it means we havn't *really* seen what drives her. It seems like there ought to be a back story on her, where with a great many of Misty's villians (the psycho in WG leaps to mind) who cares? I just think she seems more than one dimensional, maybe even more than two. Doesn't quite make 3-D though. I'd say the same about Ma'ar (version 1.0) and posssibly the nameless one in WG, they had some depth, intentional or not, that Misty hasn't explored. About WG, I really would have liked to have some more depth there on the nameless one and the caste breaking thief. People who defied their "perfect" society, were they the only ones? Maybe that has something to do with why I liked the Tremane parts of the 1st two "storms" books (still no SB) so much, Misty was finally giving us a look at the "enemy" instead of using cardboard cutouts. On a RL note I'm going to have to postpone the list until Mid-December soon. Too much to do, too little... well you all know the song. may the wind be always at your backs. David Tiffany, God of Typos Dictionary, n. A malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic. -Ambrose Bierce ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 22:25:53 -0700 From: DawnRain To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: Apologies Message-ID: <328FF361.78B1-+AT+-geocities.com> Jaguar wrote: > Depends on whether or not you count Falconsbane...he was definitly > more than one person. Whether or not in the sense of MPD...well, that's > debatable. I think it falls more under possession. But good point! Star ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 18 Nov 1996 00:27:52 EST From: tygriss-+AT+-juno.com (Sara A Youngblood) To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: Slighty Irate Fluff Message-ID: <19961117.232509.4543.0.Tygriss-+AT+-juno.com> On Mon, 18 Nov 1996 04:06:38 GMT Renee Mic Markowicz writes: >I'm sorry for posting this to the list, but I just had a rather >disturbing >experience and needed a forum for my irritation. > >I'm concerned with a matter of, well, I suppose you could call it >etiquette. I have been having slight altercations with my roommate >for a >couple of weeks. As far as I knew, they were nothing serious - just >the >typical things that happen when you share living space with one person >for >three months. I had just finished running up the stairs for the third >time (two flights) when I ran into my R.A. (resident advisor). He >asked >me why I wasn't downstairs at the meeting for roommates who are >switching >rooms. I asked what this had to do with me and he replied that my >roommate was switching out of my room. > >Truthfully, my roommate was no great prize (she had her boyfriend >sleeping >in our room at least 4 out of 7 nights a week - no matter how much I >protested) and I wasn't particularly sorry to see her go. Here's the >clinch - they wanted _me_ to move out of my room and into a smaller >one so >that _they_ could move into our room! And I had to find all of this >out >via a third party! This whole mess >might >not have bothered me so much if my roommate had at least had the guts >to >tell me to my face that she wished to move out. That's just common >courtesy. If you are having a conflict with someone, you just don't >go >behind their backs to get it taken care of. You try to talk it out >with >them face-to-face first and work it out. The fact that they naturally >assumed that I would be more than happy to oblige them in removing >myself >from my room upon request... AAARGH!! for a >moment more> I just sincerely hope that they're happy with each other >and >may they get "exactly what they deserve". recalls >the connotations to this Shin'a'in proverb> > >Thank you all for allowing me to rant. I seriously needed to get this >off >my chest so I could concentrate on my studying. BTW, what's your >collective take on all of this? I think that I'm right in being a bit >ticked off about this, but I could be completely out of line. > >ObMisty: I supose I _do_ need one... Do you suppose that this is why >the >students at the Collegium (Heraldic) don't have roommates? For that >matter - why do the bardic students have roommates and not the >Heraldic? > What about the >Healers?... >Or the Blues?.... :) > >Renee >flare-+AT+-udel.edu |"I'm trying to find a polite way of >saying 'drop >University of Delaware |dead' and not having much luck." >Pre-Veterinary student | -Vlad Taltos >**High Priestess of |"Don't bother being polite. I died >before the > Procrastination** |Interregnum. Will you take the job?" >Confused? Just Ask! | -Sethra Lavode >http://udel.edu/~flare/index.html I can truthfully say it is NO fun getting literally kicked out of your space (been there, done that, wrote the movie script!). It was dishonorable and very low thing for someone to do. But they WILL get theirs. (begins to mutter over a simmering cauldron, adding salamander toes to the mix...) ;) I think I can for all of us that we're thinking of ya and hope it works out soon. *Hugs and more hugs* Tygriss-+AT+-juno.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 22:31:02 -0700 From: DawnRain To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: Genderless Message-ID: <328FF496.2FC9-+AT+-geocities.com> Becky Anne Christensen wrote: > > >Cennydd continued: > > > > >Please note that even the Shadow-lover is not genderless. He/She is > > >always gendered, it just seems to change. > > > > The only text evd I can come up with is in MPromise, when Jaysen says > > farewell to Van after the former has talked to the 'male' Shadow-Lover, and > > Jays refers to Lady Death "SHE promised you will not be > > alone, Van" (or words to that effect). > > Hmmm, well, whenever I read that, I had taken it to mean that She > refered to the Goddess, Kal'enel (I think, I probably got that spelling > wrong) you know, the Shin'a'in one. :) He did continue to serve her, so > it would make sense she would be looking after Van. Just a thought. I hope I have those quotes attributed correctly. If not, my most sincere apologies. However, I dissagree about HER being Kal'enel. When Lord Death spoke to Vanyel he made it clear that he was not a god. I believe that he/she appeared in the form that would make the Shadow Lover most comfortable to the newly de-bodied spirit. That's IMO, of course... MorningStar ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 22:39:42 -0700 From: DawnRain To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: Darkwind/Elspeth (and a little Vanyel) Message-ID: <328FF69E.687C-+AT+-geocities.com> singer-+AT+-iglobal.net wrote: > I have also wondered just how old Darkwind is. We can make a rough guess > about Elspeth based on references Misty throws in about the passing of > time, and character statements about ages, but when I tried to do this with > Darkwind (the most concrete thing I had to work with was the part about the > age of the gryphon's children, and how old Darkwind was when they were > born...) made him even younger than Elspeth by a couple of years. Not that > this is impossible or weird or anything, but at one point on WoC he refers > to her as "young Elspeth". and she is about 25, from what I can figure. > And Darkwind, by similar calculations, would only be 22, at the most. Can > anyone help me with this? He's around Skif's age. I don't have the book with me, and unless it's SEVERELY important to have the exact words or I'm really curious, I'm not going to go get it, but it's when Skif's talking to Wintermoon and asks how old he is, and Wintermoon starts off by saying "You are about Darkwind's age, I would guess" not exact wording, of course. There is what I can give you... MorningStar ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 22:49:24 -0700 From: DawnRain To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Re: Villains / "Karal" / Brothers / Van's Bardic Gift *wink* / Rec.M Message-ID: <328FF8E4.751F-+AT+-geocities.com> Herald Michal wrote: > I *really* don't want to get into the Van's Bardic Gift Discussion > (TM) either, but about Savil testing for it: is it really just > something you can check for, like any other talent? If it is, why > couldn't she just have done a quick scan when he first arrived in > Haven instead of having to have him sing for the Bardic class? Having him sing for the class was more a way to show him what the necessary gift was, and that he didn't have it, as gently as possible than proving to everyone else that he didn't have it, IMO. I think also that hearing the person in question make music is also the easiest way to check, it just kind of reaches out and hits you like Medren's did Van the first time Medren played for him. Also, he had been checked before by that Bard that rode out to Forst Reach, they were just double-checking for Savil since Van was so set on it. If you want text ev, I will go look... I just don't have the ENERGY right now! Star ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 17 Nov 1996 23:57:31 -0800 From: "Linda Malcor, Ph.D" To: mercedes-lackey-+AT+-herald.co.uk Subject: Van. Message-ID: <199611180757.XAA11968-+AT+-latimes.com> At 05:45 AM 11/18/96 GMT, Kerry Mealing wrote: >> >Firstly, he [Van] did change the outcome. He won. I never got the impression from Van's visions that he thought he lost; just that he thought he died--a self-fulfilling prophecy, as it turned out. >Secondly, he's the most >powerful mage in Valdemar - who is he going to call in time? If I'm remembering the scene correctly, the idea was that he'd take care of the mage while the Valdemaran army came and took care of the army. It was handling the mage and the army both that was the problem. (Sort of like the situation in Arrows where Griffon takes care of the mages while everyone else worries about fighting.) >Thirdly, >this is his best -and- only chance of stopping both Leareth and the >armies in one fell swoop. Yes, he could probably have pulled the >sides of the cliffs down, but Leareth is a better mage, with more backing, >with other mages and far more nodes - he could have cut through the cliffs >as he did before (using up only a few mages, or his nodes, or even the blood >path power of the death of his soldiers) and Van would have used up most, if >not all of his power. How would Van be using up power? He works a relatively minor spell to undermine the cliffs. The cliffs fall into the Pass on top of Learth and company. Learth has to use his power to dig himself and his army out, draining himself. Meanwhile all Van has to do is sit back and recharge. (A situation that wouldn't have arisen anyway, although Van couldn't have known that, because Ma'ar would have skipped out rather than bothering with the damaged body.) >Note also that the cliffs were only 30 foot high where >they were - it's not as if he could dump a whole mountain down the pass. Assuming the debris meets in the middle, fifteen feet of stone and earth coming down on top of you is almost as good as a mountain. It's certainly going to break your casting concentration for a while--if not a leg or skull or something else in the bargain. (A >pass generally being the gap between two mountain peaks). If I recall correctly, this was a pass that Learth carved magically through the mountain. Directly through the mountain. He did not take advantage of the natural pass. He did not enlarge an existing pass. He just went straight through. That's why Vanyel was so puzzled by the expenditure of energy. It was a waste. It made no sense. And it bottle-necked at the actual pass, enabling Van to make his stand in the first place. >It's also possible >that Leareth could have countered Van's strategy of taking out the walls. >Remember, Leareth not only cut the pass, he -shielded- his expenditure of >power, which from all accounts doubles or triples the amount of power >required. Van couldn't know that, and he didn't even try to find out if the walls were shielded. A mage almost never thinks to shield the surfaces around him when those surfaces are not part of a building that belongs to him. >Stopping the army wasn't enough. He had to take Leareth out and >the only way to get near enough to Leareth was to pose a sufficient problem >that Leareth would come to deal with it personally. Huh? Learth was marching with his army as far as I could tell. He sent his underlings against Van to wear him down, then stepped in, hoping to deliver the coups de grace. And Van fell for the tactic. >Reverse the order - the primary threat was Leareth. The secondary one was >the army. Exactly. Van only has to drop the part of the walls around Learth. He doesn't need to collapse the entire pass. Take out the commander, and the bad guy's army usually falls apart, especially if they are magically controlled. (Look what happened when Griffon lit a few mages on fire.) >Also, the walls are solid rock, small fission (they're the nuclear bomb >type) explosions may not even bring them down given that they were already >glassy etc from previous heat-exposure. Hiroshima isn't totally flattened >either.. Evidence? The totality of Van's final strike wasn't enough to >blast the walls into a pile of rubble. You're talking a lot of power there, >to do that to a solid wall (as opposed to weak unsupported concrete >structures), especially if he's opposed.. But he supposedly HAD a lot of power, especially before he drained all the local nodes in his exchanges with the four lesser mages. When he is described as having the power to level half of Haven, I didn't get the image that he would kill the people and leave the buildings standing. I got the impression that he could _level_ half of Haven. Certainly he could have done the same with a quarter mile or so of stone walls. > >On the whole, while I argue the other side, I do tend to agree, I would >have been pulling the mountains down, and worrying about Leareth coming >through afterward. The problem would be to survive because you'd be using >your power for offence, not defence, while Leareth could concentrate his >power on surviving the rock-walls. It'd be much worse to die & leave Leareth >still there. (After all, an -average- Adept can summon hordes of things >from the netherworld). Ah, but certainly Van's shields would have held long enough. He already knew what the place looked like. He didn't have to step out and say, "Hi, I'm here!" He could have waited until Learth was at the desired spot, then blasted away, and while Learth and the mages are looking for him, the walls are tumbling down! >What annoyed me most about the thing was that Van >never came up with adequate defence against mage-winds - the guy was a >creative, more-or-less brilliant mage. The sad part was that he seemed >to lack the in-depth training that Savil or the Tayledras had - he seemed >to have the basics down pat, but not the in-depth theoretical knowledge >that they had - he winged it based on hypotheses and intuition without >necessarily having the background to let him think of things like losing >his ground so that his shields could spin with the winds. Good point! I was wondering about that myself. Danya ------------------------------ End of MERCEDES-LACKEY Digest 958 *********************************