Higher mental capacity of reincarnated peeps can be explained if they come with developed brain or its equivalent in soul or somthing. Human babies are pathetic, because we all come with relatively simple blueprint. Brain gets made and its useless empty shell. It needs to learn to work, and as one of the most intelligent species, it takes a while to develop it to that lvl.
Don't even let me get started with 'genius surgeon/doctor' woman that gets reincarnated and somehow manages to spot diseases with 9999% efficiency as if diagnostic tests were decorations in her textbooks. And did someone mention something about basic economics in fantasy novels? Some days I wonder how these people managed to graduate middle school.
My favorite is when said genius doctor somehow cures their meningitis/rabies/sepsis-ridden patient with acupuncture or some entirely unrelated procedure. Especially if they do so right after bragging about how they’re a 21st century modern medicine doctor.
I have to agree with this in cases when the past-life personality is the core. However personally I prefer the seemingly rare stories where the new personality isn't overwritten by the past-life personality, those tend to work best if the old memories return late or gradually over time, possibly even incomplete.
Ah, precocious children is one of the worst trope for me, too. And I don't mean "oh she's so precocious, reading books at her age instead of eating her own boogers" I mean "wow these kids act like dang university students, what the heck? Why isn't anyone extremely unsettled by this". I chalk most of it down to the author having no idea what they are talking about due to a lack of experience. Same reason why a lot of isekai... romances are horrendous. Can't expect someone who has never talked to someone they were attracted to to know how deep relationships work. Same reason why someone who hasn't even been around babies to know that it's really, really creepy to see a 1yo baby revolutionizing technology and commerce
Oh yeah! Those are pretty great too! I can think of... 2 stories that it happened, so I agree with the rare part, but... They're definitely pretty great! \(^^)/
If it's a fantasy world, okay, maybe it really works like that - the soul didn't drink the water of forgetfulness which is the reason babies lose memories and are less developed than they should be mentally in that world. Or to put it better, "It's magic, I ain't gotta explain shit". It's a little bit weirder for someone from the modern world with no background in meditation to suddenly teach himself how to use magic and strengthen his MP just by knowing it exists. It's even weirder for the method being "just use up your MP", and weirder still that no one but the protagonist has been able to figure that out in the history of the setting. It should be common practice to get your children to use up their MP in those cases, especially since they fall asleep after doing that and what parent wouldn't want a surefire method to get their children to sleep? I bet an item or magic that drains mana from children would be every parent's best friend in that setting. Of course, commoners might not have that, but usually it's a noble family reincarnation anyway. Reincarnation itself is not a problem IMO, but it is a warning signal predicting that the setting will have a lot of inconsistencies, just like a fast-developing harem is a good sign that character development will be weak, just like a "system" is a good sign that the author is bad at descriptions.
nice way to put it. That's true no matter how intelligent you are, you can't utilize that if your vessel for thinking is not up to par.
aye~ personally this cat think reincarnation on xuanhuan is ok cuz soul and stuff but... the stagnant of technology for thousands of years is down right weird~ is there nobody lazy enuf to wanna create thing to for more comfort stuff~
Actually, this could explain why reincarnated MCs keep turning into psychopaths almost all the time. They receive their past-life memories at an age when their brains could not properly handle the information. As a result, their baby brains go through extensive trauma that lasts all the way into adulthood. They could not properly comprehend their past-life memories and become ruthless and cruel when they grow up later on.
That might be more to do with the types stories you read, and their intended audience, as most of the reincarnation stories I read do not have psychopathic MC's.
It's not an asspull to do the standard reincarnation with past memories trope. It's just normal magic thingies, really.
Yeah, an actual asspull would be more like the author not mentioning that the character have past memories until partway through the story and then suddenly the character always had the memories so they can get out of a bad situation.