So we got to hear that forums are not hip anymore and that it was time to move on. As any programmer knows, how the software looks like is more important than the functionality. And young kids use Facebook now.

And that's the part that peeves me off the most about the situation:  the impression of dishonesty.  I say impression because I don't know Iago's mind and won't accuse him of dishonesty if he truly does feel the BB format is dead and we're all very reluctant users who'd much rather be on Facebook or Reddit, despite the copious evidence to the contrary.    If he's tired of it he's tired of it... this happens all the time.  Give it over to someone else, and if nobody wants to step up and JB isn't interested in professional management/hosting then let it die of it's own accord, but don't try and tell us something that's simply not true for what's likely the vast majority of us. 

Not to be too ominous or paranoid, but… are you so sure that Murphy is still Murphy right now?

I don't think she is, though in the normal PTSD human sense.  To reiterate:  She trained in physical combat for years with Odin's crowd (not going to try and spell it without a reference at hand ;-)) and came up short.  She focused her whole life on being an cop and had that taken from her.  She tried to take the moral high ground in taking possession of one of the Holy Swords and saw it broken to bits on her actions.  She may have some permanent disability from this last fight. 

People don't just walk away whole and unchanged from shattering events like that.  Everything she's based herself on has been brutally taken from her.

Not saying you were  but I didnt connect with it at all, and seeing that someone obviously loves it (a fan of the same author since we are on the forums lol) makes me consider that the fault was with me for rushing through it and being prejudiced against the genre.

I loved the book, but am generally not a big fan of steampunk.  To me, everything works or not based on your connection (or lack thereof) with the characters.  I read all of Codex, and while I enjoyed the action scenes and the magic (summoning?) system, I can't recall a single character a year or so after finishing, other than the villain (the bug queen).  The Cinder Spires characters need some fleshing out, but they started out a lot more vivid to me than Codex, especially the etherialists. 

It's hard to compete against a 15 book series, so I don't even try and compare against DF.  The opening book of CS is light years better than the first couple of DF, but that's not saying anything a DF fan doesn't already know. 

As to the setting, it seems to strongly hint at a steampunk genre in form only, with the eventual underpinning in harder SF.  No way to tell right now what JB has in mind, but it seems to be a stagnant colony on a hostile world that's lost most of it's tech and history.  The characters and story so far are more than good enough to keep me buying, but I'll be happier if it turns out that way.  My dislike of the steampunk setting is due to it usually having no plausible basis of existence, even with strong fantasy elements, and is used as a lazy crutch by authors to do SF or fantasy with a Victorian theme.  Steampunk as a technical regression from a higher-tech base is a lot easier to swallow, combined with the really intriguing physical setting.

Hopefully the characters grow on you, but even with the very best authors that's never a guarantee.