Recommendations Kingdom/Army/Clan/Sect development

Discussion in 'I'm Looking For...' started by Matteus, May 2, 2019.

  1. WinByDying

    WinByDying I can count to four

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    The (lack of) time aspect is something all of these novels share. Since all of these novels share the same flaw, they all break my experience reading them in a similar manner, and I lump them all together.

    As to why I say time is so important: I'm an engineer and have had a diverse selection of courses early on in college, chemistry, physics, mechanics etc. before specializing and then going on to work. If you put me in a world like that, I can explain basic scientific concepts, teach them the correct mindset to do science and teach them theories like Newton's gravitational theory, mechanics, basic chemistry and so on. What I cannot do is set up a huge variety of experiments, build or even make plans/schematic of the necessary tools, redo and tweak all of these experiments to get the desired results, confirm the results and prototype applications, get the working prototypes to a point where they reach the (e.g. efficiency) requirements, scale the prototypes up for deployment in e.g. a factory, and so on. There's a lot of nooks and crannies in technological development past the purely theoretical. The use of having one modern engineer in an old society is actually ... surprisingly little.

    All these nooks and crannies were explored in the past by a large amount of scientists over the past hundreds of years. While science 100 years ago doesn't compare to science now in terms of knowledge volume, don't underestimate the amount of steps and amount of theoretical/practical knowledge. Additionally, knowledge of materials (which eventually evolved into material science) changed quite a bit from the middle ages to 100 years ago.

    In short, it's too much, with too little resources, in waaaaay too little time.

    Tales of the Reincarnated Lord solves this problem - by introducing less technology. Mechanics and gunpowder are from what I remember all that's involved, which makes it a lot easier to swallow that first of all he knows these things, theoretically and practically, and second that he's able to get these technologies in use. Additionally, there's a lot more delegation involved in order to grow something of a scientific community. It's still a bit ridiculous if I think about it, but it doesn't break my immersion.
     
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  2. WinByDying

    WinByDying I can count to four

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    That's all I'll post, I need to get back to work. And it's been so long since I read this novel or any kingdom building novel for that matter, I don't think I have much to contribute here.

    I can advise to take a look at manga/manhua, there's some interesting ones IIRC that don't involve tech. Can't remember names though, sorry.
     
  3. Daresan

    Daresan Well-Known CN Master

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    Well i still disagree cause for someone like me who is just looking to pass time Release that Witch was a treat and very enjoyable. It was well written from different perspectives, no 1d characters and i dont think progression was unbelievable cause it is different world where witches existed. So like to make gun powder what do you need ? Saltpeter or NCO3 ,sodium and charcoal. Honestly it is no big deal for a prince who has knowledge to make. While i definitely think it started becoming ridiculous at some point but at the begginning it was excellent.

    I have read Tales of Reincarnated Lord and enjoyed it but i will definitely rate it much lower than Release that Witch be it writing or the plot. Mc was pretty sick with women and hotblooded, He won everytime with those bandit who had iq in the negatives. Mc is not actually smart but everyone else are retarded fucks in that novel. Grandmaster Strategist is much better on every aspect compared to Tales of Reincarnated Lord. The only reason i like it is because kingdom building novels are scarce but the plot and writing is really low level.
     
  4. WinByDying

    WinByDying I can count to four

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    If you actually read my wall of text, you'd know I don't have a problem with gunpowder in itself. I have a problem with most other technological advancements portrayed in RtW. It is important to note though that even with gunpowder, there's variations to the formula. Varying types of weapons used different ratios of ingredients as well. There've also been varying types of gun designs throughout history. See? While the principles of gunpowder are easy, the practical applications require a lot of experimenting and technical experience. That's a big deal. The scientific process is a big deal. These things require time. To conclude, the RtW author does not seem to understand how technological progress comes to be, and how that progress interacts with society. He understands the basics of the workings of simple versions of the technology, not more than that. If you don't care about how this works in the real world compared to the novels, then good for you, but it doesn't make my personal complaints invalid.

    The difference between TotRL and GS is that TotRL has a transmigrated protagonist. (Un)surprisingly, his modern mindset differs quite a bit from a medieval mindset regarding things like economy and warfare. That, in combination with the more modest technological progress makes everyone else look stupid. In GS there is a leveled playing field: the protagonist is a normal character in his world. It's hilariously ironic: the author of TotRL actually writes a proper transmigrated protagonist (doesn't happen often if at all), and readers think all other characters are retarded. No, that's what a modern mindset in combination with starting resources does for a protagonist. Do note that the world of TotRL starts adapting to what the protagonist brings to the table later on in the novel.

    For RtW, the magical phenomenons in the world are easy crutches to disguise the fundamental problems with its portrayal of technology, society and culture. Problem for me was, the portrayal of technological advancement and the society wherein it happens was so bad that the crutches weren't able to compensate. Criticize whatever other parts of TotRL, I don't think it's a perfect novel by any stretch of the imagination, but it does the technological advancements way better than RtW, much closer to how it works in real life. That's not an opinion, that's a fact. But again, if you don't understand or care about it, then it won't bother you.

    Comparing GS directly to TotRL or RtW isn't really fair. GS is one of the better if not best novels on this site, and the tech advancement through transmigration trope that TotRL and RtW do is hard to pull off well.
     
  5. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    There are a lot of things I like about this post. I find that while overly rapid technological improvement is fun, it's not particularly believable. And books that aren't that believable just don't as much lasting appeal.

    What I prefer in terms of these kinds of stories is some modest technology coupled with a heavier emphasis on tactics, strategy, politics, and other policy based improvements. The human aspect of these building stories are the best part about them, and it's honestly more interesting than the technology side of things. The books that I find do a good job of this are 燃烧的莫斯科, 大争之世, and 步步生莲. Any halfway decent Three Kingdoms books is going to be good for this as well. I'm also reading one right now that does a few things well but I have serious misgivings about in other areas.

    I'm constantly puzzled when I see this kind of praise for "Grandmaster Strategist". I've read about half of it and while it seems decent it's not especially great. In particular I feel that the characters are on the weak side and that they're difficult to engage with. Is it really that good, or is a lot of the praise coming from the fact that very few similar books are translated? I always feel I'm missing on something about it.
     
  6. Jojofann

    Jojofann Well-Known Member

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    Romance of the 3 Kingdoms
     
  7. Wick

    Wick Black van owner

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    The holy roman Empire (webnovel).
     
  8. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    Is this book actually good though? I said earlier that I'm currently reading a book that I have misgivings about and it's written by the same writer as "the Holy Roman Empire". They even take place in similar settings (in my book Franz-Josef I just died) so I'd expect a lot of callousness and racism unless the writer has changed a lot.
     
  9. Wick

    Wick Black van owner

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    As far as i remember his las book was about Ferdinand I building his Bulgaria Empire, the only thing is the author look like have opinion on Japanese so he always potrait them as lunatik that doesn't following Europe politics rutine.
    And he always like to find a way to disseminated USA because they pose a threat to his hegemoni plan.
     
  10. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    There's also the part where the protagonist (and the writer) loves his genocide.
     
  11. Wick

    Wick Black van owner

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    I don't remember of there was genocide, what i remember was he migrating the native.
     
  12. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    That's what genocide is. Besides, the protagonist keeps on wanting to slaughter lots and lots of people and the only reason he doesn't do it is that it would ruin his image.
     
  13. starblade

    starblade Active Member

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    Also the racism. Apparently primitive black people couldn't be risked tainting his nation and only be used cannon fodder even when he has a human shortage problem and already building schools for his immigrants to africa.
     
  14. Wick

    Wick Black van owner

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