The Hobbit Hole

I really like Brandon Sanderson. As a series, Mistborn is some of the most original material to come out in a long time. I would rank the original book, The Final Empire, as one of my favorite 20 books of all time. Besides, it’s hard not to like an author as candid with his audience as Mr. Sanderson is.

Still, I can’t say that I enjoyed Hero of Ages. It was just too much. I won’t say more than that for fear of spoiling something.

The book started out kind of slow I thought, but still good.

The middle of the book is really the best part. As I read it, I began to question who actually was the Hero of Ages. Since Vin was the one who let out the Deepness, (now called Ruin), it was plausible to me that she might not be the one. I thought it might be Elend. I even thought for a while it might be Spook, but that thought soon disappeared. There were other candidates that I mulled over as well. Perhaps to me the best thing about the book were the diversions that suggested different characters as being the Hero of Ages. He certainly kept me guessing. (And if you think that I’m inferring who is the Hero of Ages, I’ll just say that you need to read the book .)

But the ending just kind of went “thunk.” No real wrap up. Not that there were hanging threads about the characters. No, there was definitely a sense of closure. It just wasn’t wrapped up in a nice package, but kind of just dropped into your lap. (I’ve heard similar complaints about Stephen King’s The Stand).

If you care to discuss specifics, feel free to e-mail me at bilbo@<thisdomain>.com.

Last Saturday my son and I had the pleasure of attending the Worldwide D&D Game Day at Phoenix Games in Everett, WA. What a fun time we had!

This event was timed to coincide with the release of the Player’s Handbook 2. Due to this, the pregenerated characters were primarily classes and races from the new book. I won’t bore you with the entire cast, but I played the gnome bard and the dragonborn paladin. My son played the warforged barbarian. (Yes, I played 2 characters because we only had 4 players for 5 characters.)

The scenario was 3 back-to-back encounters with a minor skill challenge in between. It took us a little over 5 hours to complete, and we were the first group done.

The new classes are definitely fun. I love the new bard and the avenger will be on my short list to try. Still, I think I had the most fun with the paladin. I’ve never liked paladins in previous editions, but 4e paladins are lots of fun and fairly versatile.

Here are three of the players. I am on the far right and my son is in the middle. Sam, the DM’s brother who played the drow avenger, is on the left.

Here is a shot including Peter, our DM. He was incredibly enthusiastic and very good. April, his girlfriend, played the tiefling invoker.

Thanks to Phoenix Games for hosting this event. I look forward to future Game Days. There will be more than one this year.

I’m not the greatest at getting things done. I really, really want to join this cult. Amen.

This has to be the best Obama campaign parody I’ve seen.

Found at OMG Posters.