On 7/8/05, Howard Brazee <howard at brazee.net> wrote: > The difficulty will be in convincing us that he can slowly learn to > wield the power we saw without turning Vlad into a Superman before > Steve's ready. He can simply say that Steve can't do all of that, > attributing it to not being in those extraordinary circumstances. > Eventually though, similar circumstances can occur again for some type > of desired climax. On the other hand, such an enlightening weapon can > allow personal growth and temptations > > Steve has to be more interested in how to use GodSlayer to make his > cycle of stories work than to make it a deus ex machina. Deus ex machina would be more of a problem if the Vladiad were a series of adventure stories--and Yendi comes close at times, but Orca and Teckla aren't fundamentally about problems you can solve with a dagger in the eye, even if it's a Great Weapon. Actually, if deus ex machina were capable of messing things up, we'd have been sunk from the very beginning of Jhereg; it's not like any one of Morrolan, Aliera, Kiera, Sethra, or Noish-pa wouldn't make a dandy deus ex. Well, maybe Noish-pa hasn't yet had his moment of glory--but he *did* solve the teleportation problem, without which we'd have to spend the first half-hour of /Dzur/ puking Vlad's guts out instead of enjoying Valabar's. :) I wonder how old Vlad is now. Twenty-seven-ish? He was eighteen or so at Taltos, twenty-one-ish at Jhereg, Teckla, and probably Phoenix. Max Wilson -- Teach him horsemanship, and archery, and to hate every lie. -Herodotus, on raising sons