Re: SJ Reviews: The Novels (spoilers!)

You do raise some good points. I agree with much of what you said. I think 
the whole idea of making the good guys look bad and the bad guys look good 
has really been overdone in some fantasy and sci-fi.  Sometimes I'd just 
like to read a good "bad guys always wear black" story.

And I apologize for some of my tone and for not stating that I would be 
posting spoilers. (Bad Blackmaer, Bad!)

I would still like to respond to some issues, but WARNING- I will give 
spoilers. 

>A swanship can land, which a Man-O-War cannot.  A swanship is a good
>medium-sized vessel, and it seemed appropriate to the mission, to my mind.
>Men-O-War are needed for the direct war effort, after all. :)

How could this mission be any less important, from the veiw point of the 
elves?  The elves beleive that having the Spelljammer could win the war, 
and that if the scro had the cloak, the IEN would be destroyed.  I could 
see sending the swan ship if the elves were trying to "downplay" the 
importance of the mission, but if I were in charge of the Imperial Fleet, 
I would have sent at least a half a dozen cloaked Man-O-war to guard the 
Trumpeter.

>I thought it was interesting that the Man-O-War, which many consider _the_
>iconic Spelljammer vessel, was never used by the portagonists in any
>Cloakmaster Saga novel.  A pity, actually.

I totally agree.

>Valuss Leafbower thought making Teldin the swanship's 'captain' would
>convince him that the elves were on his side.  He states catagorically tht
>the position was unique to the ship, and was not a position within the IEN
>itself.

OK, I'll buy the reason for the "promotion," but I think an experienced 
Imperial Fleet officer like Vallus may have tried to pull rank more often 
than he did.  In the book, he was kind of a pansy. (Not that most elves 
aren't pansies anyhow, at least in the eyes of the dwarves, but that's 
besides the point.)  :)

>Rozloom was rescued along with the dracons, Teldin, and Hectate Kir from 
>the illithid man-o-war. After that the ship never sets down anywhere that 
>he could be removed from the ship.

That still doesn't explain why no one suspected him until the very end.  I 
fingered him as a bad guy right away.

>Who is 'they'?  I think the Trumpeter's crew did so, as best they could.

I could be wrong here, but it seemed to me that the crew of the Trumpeter 
didn't even try to rescue the elves.  Unless I'm wrong, which has been 
known to happen (quite frequently, actually) I don't think that they 
rescued a single elf from that ship, only Teldin, the dracons, Hectate, 
Estriss, and Rozloom.

>I thought the destruction of that third Man-O-War was gratuitous and 
>unnecassary, and it clearly established her as evil. <snip> She paid for 
>her evil, issue closed.

That would be a pretty harsh thing to say to an elf who just lost family 
on that third Man-O-War.  I found her actions in that situation very 
disturbing, considering there was still orc ships that she could have been 
attacking instead.

As I said before, I think she captured a good "feel," but there are just 
too many sticking points that I can't ignore.

--Blackmaer, with apologies if I unintentionally come off as a 
"black hole."