LaughingTree said:

LaughingTree said:

Be glad that the vastly overrated Gormenghast did not have more influence on the perception of the fantasy genre.

JackT said:

Again, it comes down to personal preference. I personally feel LotR is "vastly overrated" as literature but I recognize that some friends of mine totally disagree. I also feel the comment that "fantasy would not exist without Tolkien" is vastly overrated. Preference in fiction is very arbitrary and there is no "right answer". But I maintain that GoT was probably more influenced by Ivanhoe style than LotR style.

LaughingTree said:

Even if you don't like LotR, you shouldn't say that.

LaughingTree said:

Agree here.

I am always amazed that Tolkien and Martin are mentioned together so often, seeing as they as authors and their work could hardly be any further apart.

Saturnine said:

You see the same thing with Robert Jordan. BTW Rothfuss is the best thing to come along in a long time.

I think he can say it is overrated just fine - his personal preference. Saying it is bad for the genre is a much tougher statement that saying it is overrated which is all in the perception on how it is rated! It is on many lists for top 100 books of all-time however...so it is rated pretty darn high.

I enjoy LoTR just fine, the tough part being that it was written YEARS ago and writing (and reading) has changed a bit from being able to talk about what Hobbits like to eat and smoke for entire chapters.

Jordan and Erikson both have the same sprawling epic fantasies, that I can eat only a little of at a time as well. I can handle Erikson more than Jordan, since he doesn't have multiple different emo teenagers through most of it. I just re-listened to Wheel of Time (the first book) and could barely finish, especially with the women characters involved.

Rogue30 said:

I did say that and I'll say it again.

I've had an English Lit professor who specifically mentioned it as an example of shallow "genre fiction" along with Stephen King and Danielle Steel not worthy of the topic of an English Lit paper. Although she was a bit of a feminist and Tolkien has no female characters of any depth whatsoever. His male characters are almost exclusively very shallow archetypes with little complexity. The only character I found to be even somewhat interesting was Gollum. But even so, Tolkien's writing was not very intricate or challenging and the plot was highly predictable IMO. I also personally got a little sick of how all his descriptions of the evil southern humans who followed Sauron were always "dark and swarthy" looking. The LotR just did nothing for me.

I read LotR in the early 1990s around the same time I first read Zelazny's Amber series and Herbert's Dune series. I personally found Amber and Dune to be far superior works of literature than LotR. So to me, LotR was definitely vastly overrated. I don't rate it even close to Amber which Zelazny easily could have written had LotR existed or not. Zelazny's Amber is probably the most underrated fantasy series ever written. And I even think GRRM is a big fan of Zelazny if I'm not mistaken.

I agree that 1st Dune book is better (although Amber was so boring that I couldn't read further) - personal taste of course is undebatable.You can say that LotR did nothing to you.

I just only wanted to say that if you say "overrated" you are talking about other people ratings, isn't it? It's just as you would said "other people rated this too much, they are wrong". We don't talk about cards which is better, we talk about culture facts. I mean, you don't have to like Beethoven's music, but if you say his music is vastly overrated, people may take you as ignorant fool. No offence, I hope you understand what I mean.

Rogue30 said:

I wanted to continue this conversation so I started a thread for it in the Off Topic area if you are interested.

Rogue30 said:

Other people's ratings are just as subjective and based on personal taste as my own. Quality of subject art, books and music cannot be determined objectively by the arbitrary ratings of whoever is a gatekeeper. Just because LotR makes it on some popular list of "Top 100 Books" does not mean that objectively those are the top 100 books ever written. They just happen to get attention for certain reasons. For instance Tolkien generally gets extra props for his world building and creating a language and all that, things that are only tangentially background related to his actual character development, choice of characters and plot lines. Any person is certainly qualified to claim that something is overrated especially if they can support those comments with reasons. For you to state that no one can claim something is overrated without being an "ignorant fool" essentially means you think subjective greatness is a limited popularity contest which is utterly ridiculous IMO.

And I have never, ever heard any literature professor or any "authoritative" person on literature state that someone is an "ignorant fool" for claiming LotR is overrated (and I have been claiming that for 20 years or so to very well read people who have read all the commonly considered greatest authors of all time). I certainly wouldn't compare Tolkien to Beethoven in any way. Even among the biggest LotR fans I know in person no one ever compares Tolkien to the greatest writers of all time. That standard of subjective "greatness" should be reserved for truly great authors that have stood the test of time (and can actually write about female characters) like Doestoevsky. So I would recommend that you don't call people "ignorant fools" in person for thinking that Tolkien is overrated. It makes you look like you can only resort to childish name calling instead of being capable of engaging in rational debate. It doesn't help your case in any way.

The next time you are in a book store or library, flip through Shippey's The Road to Middle Earth. A lot more structure and thought is contained in LotR than probably all of the works in the fantasy genre in the last twenty years or more. You can still find it unbearably boring (Titus Groan is probably the most boring book I have ever finished reading), but it is more than just pulp genre fiction.

schrecklich said:

I've read the Silmarillion. I am well aware of how much background work went into it and how some fans are way into that aspect of it. IMO that is tangential to whether the LotR trilogy itself is compelling or has any true cross-over appeal. Again my complaints with LotR trilogy have to do with the lack of any female character depth whatsoever, most characters being too unrealistic cardboard cut-out good guys or bad evil guys, the hobbits are incredibly boring and get old very fast, and there is no intrigue in LotR. To me the fantasy world building background does not make up for all that. The LotR trilogy were the most boring books I ever forced myself to read even though by the end I had to skim over hobbit chapters to actually finish it as they just got too painful to do anything but skim. I kind of wish I never read it so I would never be commenting on it. The whole hobbit, elf and dwarf thing just turns me off as well and isn't my style.

Also I would argue that just as much structure and thought went into Erickson's Malazan series which is a more complex plotline with far more characters and twists than LotR. Malazan also has a more detailed and complex mythology associated with it. And as far as complex political intrigue, Amber is more intricate and far more compelling to me. It also a more interesting concept.

LaughingTree said:

QFT. Although much more inconsistent to me than Tolkien (many more books though), I find the world, the writing, and the mythology far superior. But, different strokes for different folks.

I'm confused about Alliance.

In the podcast, they say that Alliance does not affect the setup phase due to the wording of the card. The card says "Before drawing your setup hand, name a house..."

If you name the house before you draw your setup hand, then why would it not affect the setup phase?

LaughingTree said:

<childish calling>It's not trilogy </childish calling>

Rogue30 said:

Haha thats not name calling, its a valid point you are making

@ SWhiteboy- I would imagine that it's to prevent people playing a deck with several out of house cards from many houses, then just waiting to draw their setup hand and then declare their "alliance" to whichever they happen to have the most of in their hand. It either forces a guessing game, or forces deckbuilding in reasonable ratios to a particular alliance.

@Laughing Tree, et al- While the Lord of the Rings trilogy and mythos at large may not be to your taste, I think the level of disregard that you all have for it is far beyond what is warranted. An extremely important thing to remember is the style and genre that he was going for. He was not writing fantasy as we know it today, which is assumed by many comparisons with Martin, Jordan, Rothfuss and the like. He was writing epic fiction more closely related to something like Beowulf. If I were to set up a comparison that said Hard Case is better detective fiction than A People's History of the United State because the latter has far fewer bad asses and an exceptionally small number of detectives, mysteries, and leggy dames it's really no wonder that Howard Zinn's fantastic work does a poor job of being something that it's not. On the other hand, as an epic, the Lord of the Rings mythos is quite good and in regards to worldbuilding, no one else has come close.

Tolkien's intention was to write a mythology for England. He stated that in an interview or it was a letter he wrote to a friend. I have the quote in my Tolkien Encyclopedia which is around here somewhere.

Kennon said:

That's not what I was talking about. I was asking why the people in the podcast think that Alliance does not affect the set-up phase. The card says that you name the house before the setup draw...so it should work during the setup phase.

Haha, as one of the people on the podcast, I'd point you to the wording of something like the Neutral Faction house card which specifically references "or place during setup" while the Alliance agenda only mentions playing cards which by default is the standard playing from hand action that you aren't actually doing during the setup.

I think Erickson basically ripped off Glen Cook.

Kennon said:

Kennon, you make some good points although I am not sure you need the “et al” since I was the one making the more extreme takes and I wouldn’t want anyone else getting blamed for my opinionated self.

We can just agree to disagree as I personally feel Erickson surpasses Tolkien in world building and if we expand to all types of fiction I feel there are others that certainly come close if not in breadth of a single epic world certainly in talent for imagining multiple worlds. Also I don't think comparing a work of fiction (Hard Case) to non-fiction (Zinn) is the best analogy example but I grok the point you are making and it is a valid one. So fair enough, you and I am sure plenty of others disagree with me on the world building part. That is beauty of subjective works of fiction IMO. Everyone can focus on things they like.Cheers

Oh and JackT, Erickson loves Glen Cook and did model the Bridgeburners after The Black Company but he really goes so far beyond anything Cook has done that I wouldn't call it 'ripping off" at all.

Haha, and regardless of any of the literary arguments, the reason I brought it up on the show is because I just think it's a fun LCG. Expect me to bring it up more often. Hmmm....

Would anyone go for a Kennon's Corner segment where I take 5 or 10 minutes every couple episodes to talk about a different LCG?

Kennon said:

I'm over the literary arguments. Twitter debates this evening on a much more personal issue have burned me out on making any arguments regarding favorite fiction if you know what I mean haha

And I think that would be interesting. I did enjoy listening to your discussion of other LCG although my wallet cannot support it at this time

Kennon said:

I'd be down with that, of course I'm crazy and play and collect all 4 LCGs, not sure how many others have trouble with game buying impulse control like I do