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[Tvtyrant]

Pact was certainly his weakest work but I’m surprised to hear you didn’t like the ending. I think it’s probably his best one.

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The issue was that the ending starts with the besieging of the house by the Duchamps, Johannes and the other family. The targets switch constantly from there until the lawyers attack, in a kind of endless combat scene. Fighting out of the Abyss to get away from the Barber felt like the actual climax, the fight in Johannes' place felt like a bad add on. They had already done the "fight through the hoard of monsters then desperately beat the boss" three or four times by this point, it felt dull and over done.

Especially since their final solution was to shove the demon into the Abyss along with the town, the solution they had been fighting against to begin with!

[uncool]

I just finished Pact, and I think Wildbow has Stephen King issues. There is so much anticipation built up that the ending fails to feel satisfying.

Eh, I disagree, but maybe only technically.

Spoiler: Late Worm and Pact Ending

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The end itself I found better than either of the other two. "I deem this done." has a finality and triumph the others really lack; it's more comparable to Scion killing Behemoth than to Worm's ending. What I will agree with you about is that the leadup to the end is...tiring, and minus Johannes's surrender to the Barber, doesn't have many strong points until that end. From Blake setting out to destroy the Duchamps to the end, the only major plot points I remember well are beating Mara, sanctuary, the trip through hell, and the end, and the transitions between those was rather weak - to the point that I'm not sure I have the order right.

Pact is weeeeak.

Strongly disagree with you there. At the very least, I'd consider it a strong piece of fiction. It has strong worldbuilding, narrative, and character coherence and intercoherence that contribute to its themes; most fiction (and most writing) barely keeps coherence.

[Tvtyrant]

Eh, I disagree, but maybe only technically.

Spoiler: Late Worm and Pact Ending

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The end itself I found better than either of the other two. "I deem this done." has a finality and triumph the others really lack; it's more comparable to Scion killing Behemoth than to Worm's ending. What I will agree with you about is that the leadup to the end is...tiring, and minus Johannes's surrender to the Barber, doesn't have many strong points until that end. From Blake setting out to destroy the Duchamps to the end, the only major plot points I remember well are beating Mara, sanctuary, the trip through hell, and the end, and the transitions between those was rather weak.

Strongly disagree with you there. At the very least, I'd consider it a strong piece of fiction. It has strong worldbuilding, narrative, and character coherence and intercoherence that contribute to its themes; most fiction (and most writing) barely keeps coherence.

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Worm had several great endings, Wildwood just wouldn't stop. When Worm kills Coil, when Worm walks out of the high school after taking over the city, when Scion kills Behemoth. The entire Scion vs. The Multiverse arc was exhausting and dull for me, I get bored with large set piece fights. I quit One Piece for a while due to Marineford, and quit Naruto due to the Ninja War arc.

Yeah, Rose taking her place and casting the city into the abyss was a good ending. The lead up had the same problem with the Scion conflict; I don't need an eternally escalating conflict to feel invested in the story, the opposite is true.

If the story had switched to Blake vs. Rose as the ending when she allied with Alister I think I would have liked it more.

[uncool]

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Worm had several great endings, Wildwood just wouldn't stop. When Worm kills Coil, when Worm walks out of the high school after taking over the city, when Scion kills Behemoth. The entire Scion vs. The Multiverse arc was exhausting and dull for me, I get bored with large set piece fights. I quit One Piece for a while due to Marineford, and quit Naruto due to the Ninja War arc.

Yeah, Rose taking her place and casting the city into the abyss was a good ending. The lead up had the same problem with the Scion conflict; I don't need an eternally escalating conflict to feel invested in the story, the opposite is true.

If the story had switched to Blake vs. Rose as the ending when she allied with Alister I think I would have liked it more.

The problem is kinda inherent to how Wildbow writes; he has a strong theme - throughout all of his works - of "Existential differences can exist - and can only be solved by uniting against a common existential threat." Which...is one of the themes I like in his work, largely because many works deny that existential differences can exist at all, but it leads to ever-growing alliances being created in the face of ever-escalating threats.

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I honestly do think the ending was necessary - the worldbuilding itself militated against a simple peaceful resolution between Blake and Rose, and either of them "winning" would have felt wrong to me.

And I think I disagree with you about those points in Worm really being endings. They were...strong stopping points, but they still left the work feeling unfinished to me. Skitter doesn't really have a nearly-complete character arc until revisiting the high school and having both popularity and the system working in her favor, and after that it leaves the heroes' arc unfinished.

[Tvtyrant]

The problem is kinda inherent to how Wildbow writes; he has a strong theme - throughout all of his works - of "Existential differences can exist - and can only be solved by uniting against a common existential threat." Which...is one of the themes I like in his work, largely because many works deny that existential differences can exist at all, but it leads to ever-growing alliances being created in the face of ever-escalating threats.

Spoiler

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I honestly do think the ending was necessary - the worldbuilding itself militated against a simple peaceful resolution between Blake and Rose, and either of them "winning" would have felt wrong to me.

And I think I disagree with you about those points in Worm really being endings. They were...strong stopping points, but they still left the work feeling unfinished to me. Skitter doesn't really have a nearly-complete character arc until revisiting the high school and having both popularity and the system working in her favor, and after that it leaves the heroes' arc unfinished.

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If "the End" means there is no more story to tell, maybe. Ending with her identity getting revealed but the town liking her would be a strong ending implying the eventual destruction of the status quo.

Ending with Behemoth dying would be similar, but implies the heroes are going to win and wipe out the Endbringers.

Ending where they did finished the mystery of the story and completed the worldbuilding, but it also finished that world. I have no more interest in its sequel then I do Mistborns, a series with a very similar arc and climax.

On another note, I realized I was slightly irritates that Green Eyes wasn't Alexis or Tiff. Especially with Alexis falling into the Abyss I fully expected to find out time is sideways there and they were the same person.

[Ibrinar]

I read the daily grind now (basically guy finds a door in his office that opens each week in a office dungeon dimension, and starts looting it. Recruits some friends too.) It is a good read.

[halfeye]

I read the daily grind now (basically guy finds a door in his office that opens each week in a office dungeon dimension, and starts looting it. Recruits some friends too.) It is a good read.

That's a bit confusing, there's a comic called that with talking animals (not especially furry, and no humans), which cites a comics competition that the author entered as the source of its name:

http://pandora.xepher.net/daily/

Hm, found it, looks okay so far.