The Dresden Files > DF Spoilers
Who is the most evil character in the Dresdenverse?
LordDresden2:
--- Quote from: the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh on December 13, 2017, 02:08:07 AM ---Changes demonstrates how "weak" the Council actually was, when it came to choosing to go on the offensive. In that situation the Red Court lasts a matter of days.
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After the Council came within a hair's breadth of being wiped out several times. By then, the tide of the war had already begun to turn.
Arjan:
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--- Quote from: the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh on December 13, 2017, 02:08:07 AM ---Changes demonstrates how "weak" the Council actually was, when it came to choosing to go on the offensive. In that situation the Red Court lasts a matter of days.
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The Council was not the main force that attacked in Chicen Itza so that did not tell anything about the strength of the white council. It is also clear from the book that nobody, except probably Odin, Mab and Uriel, anticipated this ending. Hidden strength does not prevent a war, it was not taken into consideration by the red court when deciding about the war.
The red court was quite confident and arrogant. They really thought they had enough strength to stop enything the white council could bring against them in Chichen Itza otherwise they would have brought their warlock and outsider allies but this was a private party.
--- Quote ---They have the strength to match a position of confidence.
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It is clear from the books that they don’t have the strength and that the white council depends on the support of Winter that is not really dependable or predictable.
--- Quote --- Refraining from genocide in the interest of a peaceful solution and restoring what had previously been established as centuries of co-existence is not looking weak, it is demonstrating that they are law-abiding members of the supernatural community.
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Except that this motivation is nowhere mentioned in the text. The only reason the white council want peace that is shown in the text is the cost of war for them which is very rational but does nothing to discourage the red court if they are not feeling the same.
And we are talking about the red courts motivation and how the white council appeared to be. I think the white council is part of the structure against the outsiders and is as such protected by the elders if the situation really gets critical but few know about that and it was certainly not in the red courts mind when deciding about war.
Because who was technical the agressor according to the accords if of tactical importance but it was always the red court who really decided about war or peace. It was always the red court who started the attacks. It was their perception of the situation that decided about war and peace. Not even the real strength of the council but the perceived strength. For preventing war it is better to look strong and be weak than vice versa.and the white council looked weak and acted weak before the war started and then the red court took a big part of their strength out immediately in archangel.
wardenferry419:
Back to the topic of most evil character, it seems Shagnasty is leading with Kemmler and Nicodemus rounding out the top 3. Is there anybody not on the poll that deserves a dishonorable mention?
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: forumghost on December 13, 2017, 02:52:44 AM ---The conceit of Urban Fantasy series is that they occur in the real world, so of course the statistics are the same- The story runs on the assumption that it happens in our world and we just don't know it (the Masquerade), so assuming that the number are negligible because the figures are the same doesn't work- eg, Tilly mentioned in Changes that the Red Court attacks described by Susan sound like the Mexican Cartels, because in the DF, the Red Court runs the Cartels. Saying that the statistics being the same proves the a non-factor is akin to saying that because WW1 happened IRL, the story is wrong and Kemmler wasn't really behind it in the DF.
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I disagree entirely. If the DV didn't have the same things that cause real world disappearances, or had less of them, I would be willing to consider this interpretation, but the evidence is that it does.
--- Quote ---2) A Symbiotic relationship would imply mutual benefits. There is no mutual benefits with the Red Court. The areas they controlled had people trained to act as walking juice boxes from a young age via indoctrination and drug addiction.
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And you don't see the possibility of, say, being taken care of in exchange for a blood donation a month, as better than, for example, living in the middle of something like the civil war in the Congo?
--- Quote ---3) It is literally impossible for the Red Court to reproduce via anything other than murder. It's a fact of their Biology. Why is it that you seem to place a higher right-to-life to the Red Court then to their Victims?
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I don't. I do, however, for the reasons I have listed, believe their reproduction is slow and costs very few lives compared to many other concerns in the DV, and therefor I assign those other concerns higher priority.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: LordDresden2 on December 13, 2017, 02:59:37 AM ---Two major things had already happened to upset the old balance of power before the story even opens. One was the rising influence of Nemesis, the other the technological revolution.
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Assuming for a moment that Nemesis is some sort of behind-everything boogeyman rather than a Fae-specific infection (which I do not actually believe, because there is no need for it, it does not explain anything not already solidly explained), it's still a specific individual disrupting influence. So that's an argument for attacking Nemesis, not for attacking the Red Court. If anything, it's an argument for allying with the Red Court against Nemesis; they are visibly not benefiting from its actions either.
--- Quote --- In recent decades, it's become possible to travel, communicate, and otherwise operate around the world in a way that the Wizards have great difficulty coping with.
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The ability of wizards to mess with technology does go a fair ways to counter that, and Harry has been able to contain that to some extent when he has tried, so I have a reasonable amount of faith that more skilled and experienced wizards would be able to do better.
--- Quote ---This made the White Council vulnerable, but the Senior Council and the rest of the older Wizards were not fully aware of how much that changed everything.
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You buy into Harry's prejudices on this front, then ?
--- Quote ---They had not waited centuries for the right moment, they waited at most a few years, 20 tops. Harry was a handy pretext, but absent him something else would have worked.
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We see what happens when the Red Court trespass on Winter in DB (they must have, to attack the Council in the Ways, because the Council only ave access to Ways in Winter); they get a through hammering in PG as a direct result of Faerie actions.
We also see what happens in Changes when they make a false peace offer; they get exterminated.
We see, in SG, Mab acting to punish Nicodemus for his violation of truce with the Archive in SmF.
The evidence does not come down in favour of Accords violations being trivial things to get away with. Therfore the Red Court absolutely need that casus belli.
--- Quote ---And as for being the aggrieved party, all they have to do is set up some situation where a Council member faces an intolerable choice, it's not that hard to do. Harry was just convenient.
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I'm inclined to think any loyal member of the White Council would be expected to have sacrificed one life to prevent a war. It very much seems to me that that is what Bianca expects; she does not read as suicidal.
--- Quote ---How does that save Susan?
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It doesn't. Why is Susan's life worth more than the tens of thousands the war has taken, and why should anyone other than Harry find his choice there acceptable?
--- Quote ---Ortega had already set things up in such a way (or been manipulated to set things up in such a way, the difference is moot) that there was no way to achieve such an alliance. It wasn't one of the options available.
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Believing that requires disregarding Susan's take on Ortega's motivations at the start of DM, yes ?
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