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Hereafter [Worm x Fate/Grand Order]

Reader mode
For my two cents with Hector's scene...

It's definitely fishy. It plays on the rules of the world in a way that can break immersion. But I'm not immediately against it. For one, the cast has yet to discuss the events beyond "How did I not die?" part of the fight. There's still the chance that the oddities are intentional and brought up.

As for that intentionality, let's not forget that Jason's group has Medea who was watching Chaldea during this event. It's possible that she, being a Caster from the Age of Gods, could have given Hector a mystic code that gave him pseudo presence concealment. That isn't to say that's what happened, but to say that COULD have happened.

It's a bit too early to press the "Calling BULLSHIT!" button. Let's give the author the benefit of the doubt that this wasn't just an asspull to separate Taylor and introduce an OC Servant.
 
Barghest Blue said:
They already talked about how taking Taylor off the field forces the Twins to survive on their own, does it really need to be spelled out for the people in the back who weren't paying attention that each additional person the Twins don't have with them will further disadvantage them?
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How is the twins surviving on their own if the very first thing they are doing is going over to retrieve Taylor?

I mean, honestly, I see a lot of people being incredibly emotional in defending the author against everyone who thinks the chapter has an issue. And others who are trying to defend their point that this chapter has problems. Can we please calm down? No need to be so angry about it all.

And for those wanting to know if we should or shouldn't be calling foul, go pay the author's patreon. He's got future chapters in there. He slowly releases his work here weekly for those that don't pay his patreon. Otherwise, let us wait for the next weeks/months to find out if we should be calling foul or not.
 
CCMax said:
How is the twins surviving on their own if the very first thing they are doing is going over to retrieve Taylor?
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They still have Emiya, Mash, Drake, Euryale, Asterios, and 'Calliope'. Only Arash and Bradamante went after Taylor.

I'd be alright with all the criticism if they actually made sense, or the people complaining thought it all out. Instead it reads like people are complaining that the characters aren't displaying Spacebattles Competence. For example, everyone that has complained about them missing Hector sneaking up on them has apparently forgotten that it happened in a magical hurricane. Now, maybe some people are able to display perfect awareness in a hurricane, but Clark Kent isn't there, so I don't know what they're expecting the characters to do instead. They don't get to complain about the author not putting enough thought into things when they're putting even less thought into it.
 
Barghest Blue said:
They already talked about how taking Taylor off the field forces the Twins to survive on their own, does it really need to be spelled out for the people in the back who weren't paying attention that each additional person the Twins don't have with them will further disadvantage them?
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What was actually said was:
Because that was his goal. He wasn't there to fight the Servants, he was there to make sure his side won, and the easiest and quickest way of accomplishing that was by killing one of the Masters — and by taking charge of the conversation the way I had, I'd shown him that I was the most experienced of the three of us. The leader.

A sigh hissed out of my nostrils. It couldn't be helped. Cowering and forcing the twins to try and take the role was… Well. Among other things, I wasn't that kind of person.

"He's treating this like an actual Grail War," I said aloud. "He went after the enemy Masters and made sure to target the one who looked most like she knew what she was doing."
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Taylor, in her inner monologue, explicitly lampshades the fact that he could have killed her, that that was what he was trying to do. But she's a squishy human, ignoring the fan-theory that she's a Demi-Servant of herself, so why would a Servant have to try to kill a squishy human when they can just kill the squishy human?

The justification that he takes her off of the board also works if he just straight up kills her. There's no guarantee how many Servants might go try to save her, and no guarantee those who do don't just end up right back on Drake's ship. If he wanted to actually accomplish his goal, why didn't he go with the safe bet of guaranteeing that she's no longer around when it is perfectly within his capability to do so?

This isn't me asking that question of the author, because this isn't something that "needs to be spelled out for the people in the back", as condescending as that is. It is, again, a question of why Taylor and Arash do not bring it up, and it is a question of why Emiya didn't bring it up - presumably we would have seen that if it was mentioned during whatever conversation the twins had with Olga and Romani.

This is a story where we see the introspective inner thoughts of a character, and when it's something that that character should pick up on, it's a glaring issue when the readers visibly see that she doesn't. Same goes for, again, Arash and Emiya, though to a lesser extent Emiya.

Taylor is the most egregious, because Arash could just be waiting to bring it up and Emiya might have said something and we just not see the results of that.

But, also, once again, it's fine so far, but this is where the warning light comes on for me. Her not taking special notice of that, when it makes no sense if taking her off of the board is the real goal, is her holding an idiot ball for me. The line that "oh well either way he was trying to drown me" is a little worrying because, again, why not kill her directly and guarantee she's off the board?

You don't have to proselytize how it's not an issue to me Barghest. I'm offering my criticism of the story to the author. The author is able to take that or not. My criticism is that it breaks character if it's not noticed, and it's okay for now, but if it continues to just be something they never think of that'll bug the hell out of me, because it goes so against who the characters are, and I'm letting the author know that.
 
Barghest Blue said:
They still have Emiya, Mash, Drake, Euryale, Asterios, and 'Calliope'. Only Arash and Bradamante went after Taylor.

I'd be alright with all the criticism if they actually made sense, or the people complaining thought it all out. Instead it reads like people are complaining that the characters aren't displaying Spacebattles Competence. For example, everyone that has complained about them missing Hector sneaking up on them has apparently forgotten that it happened in a magical hurricane. Now, maybe some people are able to display perfect awareness in a hurricane, but Clark Kent isn't there, so I don't know what they're expecting the characters to do instead. They don't get to complain about the author not putting enough thought into things when they're putting even less thought into it.
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Ok but it seems like everyone who is defending is outright dismissing everyone who has issues with the chapter. Here are some that I thought of right now.

How is it that every single Chaldean Servants completely forgot that they can turn into spirit form. And that spirit form is perfectly great to go around spying/sneak attacks with? Because, hey, they were fighting multiple servants and apparently, everybody has agreed that going into spirit form isn't fair and not allowed. Which perfectly explains how Hektor can just stay around in spirit mode on the very small ship right next to all of the Chaldean Servants currently on high alert for an attack from physical servants only. And won't get discovered because of the no spirit form rule.

Or how about, killing a master of Chaldea would actually weaken the Chaldea side because it would most likely mean that they will lose servants permanently because they no longer have enough masters to support the extra servants. Or if for some reason they keep the servants, you now have servants who can't fight at their best because the fewer masters are now being forced to spend more magic to support the servants.

But, no, apparently killing with a spear was far too difficult and Hektor just shoved Taylor overboard instead. Going for a possible kill instead of a guaranteed kill. Especially because Hektor wouldn't know just how many Servants would be running off to try and save Taylor's life. And even a single servant greatly increases the chance that Taylor will survive her dip into the ocean.

So, yeah, I'll just wait until the next chapter but I'm pretty sure nothing will change or get explained away. Taylor getting shoved off the boat was put in solely so that they can get the new servant. And no other justification will be given. Nothing will be rewritten or changed.
 
Crescent, you're obviously determined to find something wrong that you can call a plot hole or poor writing so I'm just going to stop because it's obvious by now that nothing I could ever say will ever change your mind.

CCMax said:
How is it that every single Chaldean Servants completely forgot that they can turn into spirit form.
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They didn't, it just never occurred to them that the people chasing them could, because about the only thing spirit form is good (for Servants who don't have to worry about energy expenditure) for is being less noticeable. Asking that's like asking "Why didn't Lung think anyone could overhear what he was about to do and attack him?". At what point is that supposed to occur to anyone? That's expecting Spacebattles Competency.

CCMax said:
Or how about, killing a master of Chaldea would actually weaken the Chaldea side because it would most likely mean that they will lose servants permanently because they no longer have enough masters to support the extra servants.
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Three Masters, even together, cannot support the amount of Servants they have, the Servants actually contracted to Chaldea have an energy supply outside the Masters, and the ones who are won't be affected. Servants actually do understand the basics of their existence you know?

CCMax said:
But, no, apparently killing with a spear was far too difficult and Hektor just shoved Taylor overboard instead. Going for a possible kill instead of a guaranteed kill.
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Because he wanted to divide them, killing one person, doesn't give the advantage he got from not killing her. Now their forces are divided and far apart, as opposed to nearly untouched, with the most dangerous Servants separated from Euryale and the Grail. He didn't need to kill her, and doing so would have done less to disadvantage them. Hektor's victory condition wasn't to kill anyone, it was to make getting Euryale and the Grail easier, which he accomplished.
 
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Barghest Blue said:
You're obviously determined to find something wrong that you can call a plot hole or poor writing so I'm just going to stop because it's obvious by now that nothing I could ever say will ever change your mind.
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It is not your job to try and explain away any issues with the story that a reader may have. That is the author's job. It is up to them to make sure that the story they tell is coherent and that the story makes sense to the reader. Depending on the type of story being told, it is understandable if the reader is the one having issues. Such as myself back in early high school reading parts 2 and 3 of the Ender Wiggins trilogy. I was expecting more sci fi, instead I got politics and was very disappointed.

On the other hand, it is the author's fault when the reader doesn't understand. If the Chaldean's servants had said, "oh no, we're having trouble sensing each other and we're right next to each other," then it would make more sense for spirit form Hektor to not get discovered. Or if it had been shown that Hektor was immediately attacked and the best he could do was knock Taylor overboard, explaining why she didn't immediately get murdered.

But none of that happened. There is zero mention about the vortex (at least as far as I can find, maybe it is mentioned elsewhere that I didn't see) releasing a giant wave of magic making it hard to find anything. So that excuse about spirit forms being hard to identify makes no sense. And Hektor immediately attacks Ritsuka and the others just so that he can clear the space around him so that Taylor is completely undefended. And yet, he doesn't go for a straight kill, which would have been the tactically correct move. Remove a master, remove at least one servant and if not, weaken all the servants because one less master is feeding the servants magic.

Again, it isn't your job. Unless you are one of the authors/editors of this story. Either way, it is the author's job. But knowing how things went in the past? No answer will be given, no change will be made to the chapter, and we're stuck with this glaring hole where it is incredibly obvious it was solely done so that Taylor can meet the new servant.

Edit: Lol, I just noticed (since it has been a while since I read that chapter) but Mash was able to instantly detect a servant in another boat while they were in the maelstrom. So, yeah, how they heck did none of the servants detect Hektor who was in the same boat.
 
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CCMax said:
But none of that happened. There is zero mention about the vortex (at least as far as I can find, maybe it is mentioned elsewhere that I didn't see) releasing a giant wave of magic making it hard to find anything. So that excuse about spirit forms being hard to identify makes no sense. And Hektor immediately attacks Ritsuka and the others just so that he can clear the space around him so that Taylor is completely undefended. And yet, he doesn't go for a straight kill, which would have been the tactically correct move. Remove a master, remove at least one servant and if not, weaken all the servants because one less master is feeding the servants magic.
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Frankly, I'm just waiting on the next chapter. Because the best way to tell if something odd like this is intentional is if it's seen as odd in-universe. I'm hoping that it was Medea shenanigans that allowed that, and Hector didn't go for the kill because of his "Triple agent" role.
 
Barghest Blue said:
The author already gave everything needed to understand what's going on, admittedly this is a bit more difficult than 2+2=4 but high school algebra is more complicated than this. It's not the author's job to spoon feed everything to you.
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Huh, now I'm curious. First off, Blackbeard's crew wants the goddess. And Drake and Chaldea is standing in their way to do so. So how is not killing the masters supposed to help Blackbeard do that? Shouldn't his goal be to kill the masters to get the goddess? Maybe I'm missing something here but I'm pretty sure absolutely no mention was made that Blackbeard want's the Chaldean masters alive.

Or are you just making stuff up to support the author? Cause how do you know that Blackbeard want's the Chaldean masters alive and separated?

Barghest Blue said:
Three Masters, even together, cannot support the amount of Servants they have, the Servants actually contracted to Chaldea have an energy supply outside the Masters, and the ones who are won't be affected. Servants actually do understand the basics of their existence you know?
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Also, quick question about this? How does Blackbeard and Hektor know that the Chaldean masters have an extra energy supply to the servants? Cause I don't remember seeing a scene where Taylor and crew explained to Blackbeard and his crew that they have supplemental energy from an outside power source? As far as Blackbeard and his crew know, either these were strays (who never needed a grail to support their existence) or that these master's were incredibly good at supplying magic to their servants?

There has been zero explanation in the story to explain that Blackbeard knows that the Chaldean master's have an extra energy source. Regardless, it still doesn't make negate the tactical decision of killing the Masters as a good one. Again, regardless if they have an extra energy source, that energy is still flowing through the masters to the servants. And that still means a reduction in combat ability because the body can only support so much magic flow.

This really seems like you are using outside/meta knowledge that the characters in the story shouldn't know. Unless I'm mistaken and there was a chapter somewhere where Blackbeard was told about Chaldea and how they do things?
 
CCMax said:
And Drake and Chaldea is standing in their way to do so.
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They're trying sure

CCMax said:
So how is not killing the masters supposed to help Blackbeard do that?
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Let's say Taylor died, Arash and Bradamante would still be there. Good going, maximum effort, minimum gain.

CCMax said:
Shouldn't his goal be to kill the masters to get the goddess?
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No? His goal is to get the goddess, he doesn't need to kill them to do that, because them living isn't by itself preventing him from getting her, he just needs to get them out of the way. They aren't even actively trying to kill the Servants. Drake can't catch him so he just needs to grab Euryale and get away.

CCMax said:
How does Blackbeard and Hektor know that the Chaldean masters have an extra energy supply to the servants?
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They're Servants, they automatically understand that they need a supply of magical energy from another source, and exactly how much is required for that, especially in combat. That the many Chaldea Servants can fight as well as they can without any noticeable effort on the Masters means they have an additional means of powering them, meaning Chaldea has at least one Grail hooked up, because in case you didn't already know, the only reason the Masters of a Holy Grail War can support their Servants is because the Grail is helping provide enough power that the Masters are actually capable of filling in the rest. Taylor and the Twins are physically incapable of supporting the Servants they have with them purely by themselves, the Servants understand this better than anyone else.

CCMax said:
Regardless, it still doesn't make negate the tactical decision of killing the Masters as a good one.
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Is it? Actually, seriously, think about that. They are capable of supporting four Servants (that we know of, for all Balckbeard knows thy're supporting seven) with no noticeable strain between the three of them, removing one Master won't reduce their effectiveness by any realistic degree. By Taylor still being alive when she went overboard she drew away two Servants, that will have a noticeable effect on their combat capability. Blackbeard and Hektor are both experienced strategists and tacticians, they're able to weigh the costs and benefits of their plans of action.

Dividing an enemy's forces into two groups allows you to more easily defeat either group. And the three that were separated from Euryale were the three that most advantage Blackbeard to not be there. But killing any one of them would not have produced the same advantage. Kill one of the Servants, and they can be replaced. Kill Taylor and the Twins are inexperienced sure, but they are surrounded by talented and/or experienced people they can use to guide their actions. Taylor and her Servants don't even have to be dead, because as far as Blackbeard and Hektor are aware, they don't have a means of transport, meaning they're effectively nonexistent as far as fighting the main group is concerned. That's what I mean when I say they don't need to kill anyone, they just need them out of the way.
 
James D. Fawkes said:
Something like that is nowhere near enough k-kill you!"
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is this missing a "to"?

mugnin said:
Did anyone ever use Master's Clairvoyance at anytime at all?
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it's happened occationally

CCMax said:
And that spirit form is perfectly great to go around spying/sneak attacks with? Because, hey, they were fighting multiple servants and apparently, everybody has agreed that going into spirit form isn't fair and not allowed. Which perfectly explains how Hektor can just stay around in spirit mode on the very small ship right next to all of the Chaldean Servants currently on high alert for an attack from physical servants only. And won't get discovered because of the no spirit form rule.
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spiritual forms aren't generally effective for anything but moving through barriers and having a lessened presence/low energy usage. infact servants can still damage other servants in spirit form but now the spirit form servant can't defend themselves. it seems to be implied that the reasoning for why he managed to use it effectively here, was that he jumped on while davy jones and sam distracted the crew, being the only nearby thing in the ocean that could conceivably be a threat aside from blackbeard who was falling behind. and given that a servant can be distracted from their mana sense, it's not really that surprising that he used the split-second lack of awareness to make his move. spirit form isn't generally a good way of hiding, as servants can still sense them, even if it's a bit harder than normal, unless you're in an ideal environment, which Hektor kind of was here, 1) near a giant magic maelstrom that was bound to saturate the area around them, 2) nearby distraction, 3) people focused more on getting away from the external threats than actively looking through their own ship, 4) having great speed stat to act before the others. it's mostly just a matter of analyzing what he's doing and how, and you can read between the lines how it all hangs together.
 
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Something to think about is the Blackbeard seems to have enough intuition and knowledge to have a vague understanding of how the throne of heroes and servents work. He may be avoiding killing her to make sure if she has a spirit, her legend doesn't have an ending like was killed by Blackbeard and wants revenge.
 
You seem absolutely adamant that splitting the group was Hektor's goal? But shouldn't his goal be to weaken those protecting the goddess?

With a dead master, you've weakened the servant's combat abilities. Because you seem to have forgotten how a servant in full combat seems to drain the Master? Just because they have some outside source to keep these extra servants around, doesn't mean that the master's can provide all the magic for combat. And yes, this happens in previous chapters, especially obvious is the mentions of Taylor thinking about getting the twins used to the power draw of servants in combat. And there was that time where Rika was drained from Emiya fighting as well.

So, yes, the servants definitely know about power draw and that removing a master would have been a logical and tactical decision to make. Less masters to support the servants, force the servants into combat and with less masters, the time (and skills/abilities of servants that can be used) is reduced because the Master can only provide so much energy for so long.

Blackbeard wants the goddess. Hektor appears to be accomplishing that goal by weakening the ones protecting the goddess. And the best method to do is to kill Taylor. It affects their combat ability, can sow discord within the group, and removes a variable.

Instead, you think separating them is the goal. If you do that, now you've got a variable that you don't know if it is around and if it is still there, you don't know what it is going to do. And even then, the only guarantee that would reduce the number of servants is by one. It is only after the fact that Hektor would have known that two would have gone after Taylor.

And then there is Hektor, who came from a time where life was cheap and killing is easy. And instead of killing Taylor, just knocks her overboard. To myself, it doesn't fit. I can see where you are coming from on some of the points you are making. But I can't agree with the separation is the goal. Cause killing Taylor would have done a better job of weakening the Goddess' protection.
 
CCMax said:
Blackbeard wants the goddess. Hektor appears to be accomplishing that goal by weakening the ones protecting the goddess. And the best method to do is to kill Taylor. It affects their combat ability, can sow discord within the group, and removes a variable.
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Except if he kills Taylor, all the Servants are still there, there's less vulnerable members of the group, and those left are better protected, and they don't lose any combat capability by any realistically measurable metric.

With Taylor alive, there's her, and two Servants taken off the board with no known means of transportation, meaning that the group protecting the goddess is weakened (and how many fucking times do I have to repeat this before you finally understand) which means it's now easier to get through the group protecting the goddess.

Strategy and Tactics, the goal of the leader is not to kill the enemy, it is to prevent defeat and secure victory, in that order. Killing Taylor only does one of those, at best. With three Masters, killing just one of them doesn't have enough of an effect to be worth while, getting rid of at least one Servant is, because that Servant more directly affects the groups combat ability. Chaldea just needs to make sure one Master survives, killing Taylor would ultimately be nothing more than an inconvenience long term.

Also just thought of a personal reason Hektor has for not killing the person who seems to be in charge, whether they be called Taylor or Patroclus.
 
Barghest Blue said:
Crescent, you're obviously determined to find something wrong that you can call a plot hole or poor writing
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I have explicitly, multiple times, said the exact opposite. I cautioned that it may become a breach of character, in my opinion. I don't know why you decided to so doggedly argue against that.

I appreciate clearing up my confusion on Hektor's motive, since I forgot that he was in OG Okeanos, but the rest was entirely unnecessary, and I have no idea why you chose to lace each of your replies with such hostility.
 
Barghest Blue said:
Except if he kills Taylor, all the Servants are still there, there's less vulnerable members of the group, and those left are better protected, and they don't lose any combat capability by any realistically measurable metric.
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Sorry, I'd have to disagree with you. Killing Taylor makes perfect sense because it weakens the group, either some of the servants are lost because they don't want another master or they keep the same amount of servants but now there isn't as much magic to go to all the servants to allow them to fight at their full ability. That is much better than hoping that knocking Taylor would allow at least one servant to just go away busy with Taylor.

You keep saying 2 servants because that is what ended up happening but that shouldn't be the point you are making. At the time of Hektor attacking, he didn't know how many servants would skedaddle after Taylor. He knew at least one would do so. Anything more is a bonus.

I don't know why but it seems to me that you are saying that killing a master would actually strengthen Chaldea's side. I don't know why you keep implying that when that is wrong. Plus, again, you seem to ignore how the master's don't have unlimited magic to provide the servants with all the magic power they need to fight. There is a limit and just increasing the burden of servants onto fewer master's limits how much magic can go to those servants. You just keep ignoring that because it is a pretty big loss to combat capability.

At this point, I don't think we'll be able to convince each other on this point. Thanks for at least explaining your POV. I can understand some of it but some others I just can't.

Lol, not that it will make much of a difference in the story. I sincerely doubt any type of rewrite, adjustment, or anything else will be made. We'll just be stuck with it.
 
CCMax said:
Sorry, I'd have to disagree with you. Killing Taylor makes perfect sense because it weakens the group, either some of the servants are lost because they don't want another master or they keep the same amount of servants but now there isn't as much magic to go to all the servants to allow them to fight at their full ability. That is much better than hoping that knocking Taylor would allow at least one servant to just go away busy with Taylor.
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I thought that Blackbeard wanted all the beauties (including Taylor)? So killing Taylor whould be bad for that goal alone.
 
@CCMax You seem to like to bring this up every single time you add any criticism to this story at all, especially if it goes beyond a single post, so let me be perfectly and completely clear: the structure of the Patreon exists the way it does because of my buffer, NOT the other way around. If I didn't have a Patreon, the buffer would still exist, and the public release would still be behind how much I've actually written, because the buffer was built into this story's release structure for the specific purpose of making it possible to release even on weeks where I couldn't finish a chapter. This is so that there's never a time like there was halfway through Essence, when writer's block had me struggling to release consistently for something close to six months. The current structure wasn't even my idea, I copied it from other writers with Patreon accounts on SB. I just happen to have a larger buffer because I wanted to be safer.

I also absolutely do rewrite things that I think need adjusting, if I happen to agree with the people who argue that maybe I might have missed the mark. It has happened several times in this very thread. What I don't do is do massive, sweeping, whole-chapter rewrites that make drastic changes to the plot or the sequence of events.

Re: Hektor, a big part of your current arguments seem to me to stem from your assumptions of Hektor's goals and intentions. The idea that Hektor was trying to kill Taylor at all is entirely something the other characters — and Taylor — have concluded, not something Hektor himself has ever said or admitted to, and some of that will get cleared up if you read into his words and actions the next time he's on screen.

As a tangent, funnily enough, the idea to have Bellamy be the one who rescued Taylor, Arash, and Bradamante wasn't a decision made in Lost at Sea at any point at all, but actually a change I made at the start of Prince of Pirates. You can see this if you look closely at Taylor and Arash's conversation at the beginning of that chapter, because Arash saying he rescued Taylor himself instead of immediately adding in Bellamy and Bradamante is an artifact of the original plan that I left as it was so he could later say, "Well, okay, maybe I had help."
 
James D. Fawkes said:
You seem to like to bring this up every single time you add any criticism to this story at all, especially if it goes beyond a single post, so let me be perfectly and completely clear: the structure of the Patreon exists the way it does because of my buffer, NOT the other way around.
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My apologies but I have not done so in my past criticisms. At least, I don't think I have. Plus, I think I've only mentioned about patreon only twice, I think, in this recent discussion. If I really have been bringing it up, then I'm sorry. I honestly was trying to stay away from it and to only refer to it factually.

It is just that we've got two choices to decide on whether our issue with the plot point is a valid one or not. We either wait for you to post over the course of several weeks, or go pay your patreon to take a look there.

And yes, you are right, you have done some corrections in this story. So I'm sorry about my statements making it seem as if you have never done so. But honestly, it is so rare for you to make corrections that I just forgot. You normally double down on your story and won't even interact with the forum during those times.

Unless I missed it, there is no reason why the Chaldean servants completely missed Hektor. There is nothing in the story talking about rising magic levels from the maelstrom to make it hard to detect things magically. Heck, you've got Mash instantly reporting a servant almost as soon as the other ship appears and that ship would have been several hundred feet away at least. And you've reinforced just how small Drake's ship is, so having Hektor appear as a surprise just makes it all appear as author fiat. And then the next chapter Taylor gets introduced to the Pirate Prince.

So the entire sequence just seems solely written to introduce the Pirate Prince to the hereos. Hey, maybe I missed all the details explaining why none of the servants sensed Hektor on board such a tiny ship. I've made really stupid mistakes before. And if I did, I'm sorry. But I'm not the only one who missed these details, so maybe they should be made a lot more obvious. Otherwise other people wouldn't be complaining about it either.
 
The only real complaint I'll make about the chapter is that it feels like an opportunity was missed here. We had the chance for Taylor and the twins to be separated, to get thrown into a situation they had not accounted the possibility of... and now they already know where to find her, and are all of half a day away, with Blackbeard having lost them in the storm.

Maybe the next chapter will prove me wrong, but it just feels like the whole situation's been resolved very swiftly, before it can have a chance to actually meaningfully impact the plot.
 
When I stay out of arguments or debates like that when it's a matter of some of the readers having opinions about specific choices made in the story or specific sequences of events, it's usually for one of two reasons: first, the readers don't have all of the information and more of it will get revealed later on, so I would be spoiling stuff; second, me getting into an argument with anyone in the thread is very likely to alienate people, and the last thing I want to do is paint myself as stubborn, irrational, and snippy. Confident in my writing, yes, but never adamant that my way is the only way and the right way, and everyone else is just too stupid or ignorant to realize what I'm doing.

It's not to say I don't get frustrated. Sometimes, I just want to throw up my hands and shout about how Nasu would have gotten away with it without comment, about how people are much more forgiving of the stuff that they think Nasu has done wrong. But screaming that into the thread won't accomplish anything except to make me look immature and childish, so I stay silent. And sometimes vent to my editor.
Sir_Travelsalot said:
The only real complaint I'll make about the chapter is that it feels like an opportunity was missed here. We had the chance for Taylor and the twins to be separated, to get thrown into a situation they had not accounted the possibility of... and now they already know where to find her, and are all of half a day away, with Blackbeard having lost them in the storm.

Maybe the next chapter will prove me wrong, but it just feels like the whole situation's been resolved very swiftly, before it can have a chance to actually meaningfully impact the plot.
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I kind of wanted to do that, to be honest, but the team's resources just don't make it possible for them to be separated like that too easily. There's nothing stopping Taylor from waiting for the rest of the team to show up and nothing stopping the team from coming to Taylor, with the exception of an enemy that neither portion can fight on their own. Could they have agreed to sail separately down to the archipelago and meet up there? Certainly. But Taylor would never have dared tempt fate like that when Blackbeard is still snooping around.

Strictly speaking, this little subplot isn't meant to affect the overall plot of Okeanos, but have a different sort of impact entirely. You should understand what I mean at the end of next chapter.
 
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