site banner
self_made_human  amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi  9mo ago (ussri.substack.com)   5842 thread views

Pokémon for Unrepentant Sociopaths: A Review of Reverend Insanity

ussri.substack.com

Well, this is just about exactly what it says on the tin. I've finally mustered up the energy to write a full-length review of what's a plausible contender for my Favourite Novel Ever, Reverend Insanity. I'd reproduce it here too, but it's a better reading experience on Substack (let's ignore the shameless self-promotion, and the fact that I can't be arsed to re-do the markdown tags)

13
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I have to appreciate just how well-handcrafted the brutal math of the setting is. Particularly the shift from Gu Masters to Gu Immortals. I'll spoiler it because the mechanics are not revealed immediately in the story.

Why do so seemingly many stay at the peak of rank 5? It's not just that upgrading to rank 6, the first Gu Immortal rank, is unusually precarious, requiring a great feat of concentration just to survive the process. The "running as fast as you can just to stay in place" aspect comes in full force for Gu Immortals, who are assaulted by unpredictable, personal natural disasters scaled to their power, and constantly scaling further, as often as every year. Growth is now required not just to compete with others, but to survive the next calamity. This neatly explains why rank sixes and above are nearly unheard of in the 'mortal' world, even as they manipulate their clans from behind the scenes. One Gu Immortal could crush countless rank fives, but the irony is that it's not worth it anymore. Instead, they have to start from the bottom in the new hierarchy, without contrived mechanisms (that I've heard of) in other xianxia where advancing to the next rank group ascends you to another dimension entirely.

Amazing Cultivation Simulator but for Reverend Insanity setting cannot come fast enough.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats