u/BuzzKir

I've just re-read the whole thing after 16 years, and was completely engrossed by books 1-3. I then read the rest of the series, which was less enjoyable to me for a number of reasons, but I'm still very impressed with the world-building, the characters and the authors' ability to blend fantasy and sci-fi.

Some of the other authors I've enjoyed: Liu Cixin (everything), Isaac Asimov (the Foundation series), Frank Herbert (loved Dune, liked Messiah, slogged through Children, didn't read any more), Robert Heinlein (Orphans of the Sky), G.R.R Martin (Song of Ice and Fire), Ursula le Guin, and others.

I didn't care for Stormlight archive, Wheel of time, Black company

I guess I generally like sci-fi a lot more than fantasy, but maybe there are other hidden fantasy gems like DGS. Would welcome some suggestions.

Warning: rant incoming.

I've re-read the series again after a huge period of time and some things definitely stuck out to me this time. In particular, just how Haplo is constantly getting owned by everything.

The very first scene of him is almost dying on arrival and being saved by a mensch in a lucky accident.

He does almost nothing in the first book, then he's off to Pryan for another ass-whooping - this time by the tytans (edit - *A tytan, singular) - and has to be saved by a dragon.

In book 3, it's just a train ride of first being stupidly captured by the undead, then by the Dynast, then being poisoned and needing to be saved again. His most powerful moment in all the books arguably also comes in book 3 - it's when he duplicates the food for the starving Sartans.

Book 4, has to be saved from near death by the Mensch again due to the magic-nullifying water, then gets owned by the dragon snakes and Samah on the beach.

Book 5, captured and tortured by dragon-snakes in the elvish palace, has to be saved by the Kenkari. Later, almost killed by Sang-drax.

Book 6, captured and almost killed by Hugh, then by Marit (has to be saved by Hugh). Owned in the battle for Abri and abducted by Xar.

Book 7, "killed" by Xar, has to be saved again, defeated by Sang-drax in the Seventh Gate fight, saved/healed by Xar.

I get that the main hero must be vulnerable but come on, this is ridiculous. I guess it's especially irritating to me because in the first books, he's hyped up as this literal demi-god walking among men and yet is rarely given a chance (by the authors) to show off his supposed awesome powers. Even a "mere" human mage (Sinistrad) does far more impressive things in his limited screen time than Haplo ever does in any of the books.

From "Terrible old games you've never heard of" (which I haven't watched) to Assassins disks (which, I can at least understand the desire to catalogue things) to playing random very BAD games on stream - and he readily acknowledges just how bad they are, and seems to genuinely suffer through it! - what's Ashens' fascination with shitty old games?

I can understand things like AVGN - that's the whole point of the show, to be an over the top comedy persona who hates bad games (even if the shtick became so, so stale for me personally a long time ago) - but Stuart is just being himself when he does it.

Is it a form of masochism? is it because he thinks the audience will enjoy it (but he never seemed the type to do anything just to please an audience)?

Hi everyone, I'm a 3D animator/generalist with over 12 years experience in the game industry.

Would be glad to help with your animation needs! I provide the full thing, creating the animation from scratch, engine integration and even authoring VFX/shaders where appropriate.

My demoreel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z8GraB4KTA

https://i.redd.it/xi1k9qpv185h1.gif

https://i.redd.it/dri1jl2k085h1.gif

https://i.redd.it/oattl5gs085h1.gif

I'm a 36 year old 3D artist and for years I've been almost creatively impotent - that is, hardly able to create anything, unless it's for someone else.

The last truly worthwhile project I did "for myself" was an animated music video for one of my favorite songs. It took months of boring work. Oftentimes I forced myself to work "just 30 minutes" on it, just to get things moving, because I lost motivation almost instantly - despite formerly believing it was my dream to create animated music videos.

That was 6 years ago.

I can do some SMALL stuff for myself. Like drawing - been dabbling in it since kindergarten, it's fun and you get visible results very quickly, unlike big animation projects or 3D art.

And then I look at stuff on Instagram, people creating these very impressive sequences just "for fun". It's moments like these I really start wondering if I'm even supposed to be a 3D artist?

Even to work on my portfolio, I had to ask people to commission me - at very tiny prices - just to be able to work on a long term project at any kind of reasonable pace and not giving up.

The feeling of responsibility to people is what drives me, not any inner creative urge. I only seem to be able to be a car on someone else's train, instead of being a locomotive myself.

I'd like to be a "real" artist and create long hard projects just for creativity's sake. But so far all I can do is find tricks and workarounds just to force myself to work.

And at the same time, the idea of just giving up entirely and choosing a different field feels very wrong, because I do get satisfaction out of completing projects and am often proud of them as a result - despite the process often being utterly boring.