Downtown Khazan: Ice Cold Utopia

[Sharpandpointies]

I would equally settle for just "Go away Houken," full stop.

Like if he just never showed up again, that would be perfectly fine by me. I wouldn't even question it.

He's kind of irksome, yes.

I enjoyed the footwork lesson, and liked Gaoh acknowledged that different styles might think of footwork differently than his style and they might well be valid too. However, one would think boxing of all disciplines would have ingrained in Koga the value of using footwork to get into the best position. Koga is still more martial artist than brawler.

You would think. Boxing does use a lot of footwork. It is, however, very...erm, how to put this. Tight? Compact? Short-ranged? <-- this is not a bad thing in a real-world fight!

Gaoh seems to be taking it a tad further, in to 'manga' levels of 'get into the best position' (probably like 'behind the other guy'). With some 'extreme manga training' thrown in. ^_^ But he's basically making the point that positioning/distancing/ranging is super-important...which is 100% true.

[Siriel]

I actually disagree with the notion that Houken should just not be in the manga, much as I agree that despite liking him some of his scenes are the worst written in the story because the author made him too strong.

That's because Houken as a character represents untamed wildness and the innate desire for conflict; his entire life and nature is centered around seeking strong people, which puts him into conflict with those that try to unify China not because he has any ideological opposition to their goal, but simply because they're strong. The reason why so much emphasis is placed on Houken barely a person, describing him as a crystallization of martial skill and a war god, is because in the story he's the manifestation of the part of human nature that has to be overcome for unification to be possible, the wild and individualistic feelings that reject peace.

So he actually serves an important role thematically and has to be there.

Now if we could get a better excuse for him being beaten than "spirit", that'd be great.

[The Chou Lives]

: Cue happy time music, found communities that will play his material while working on table top stuff.:

: The Sun is bright, spring comes forth into life, All is good.:

[bruceleegreyhulk]

[Lord Falcon]

He's kind of irksome, yes.



You would think. Boxing does use a lot of footwork. It is, however, very...erm, how to put this. Tight? Compact? Short-ranged? <-- this is not a bad thing in a real-world fight!

Gaoh seems to be taking it a tad further, in to 'manga' levels of 'get into the best position' (probably like 'behind the other guy'). With some 'extreme manga training' thrown in. ^_^ But he's basically making the point that positioning/distancing/ranging is super-important...which is 100% true.

Which fits right into Koga wasting his talents! He's failing to dictate the pace, and as a result can't dictate the terms of engagement. Super-mobility would help with that.

Tight, compact short-ranged. Is this why we don't see boxers delivering a flying, leaping, triple-spin haymaker? XD

[Nik Hasta]

I actually disagree with the notion that Houken should just not be in the manga, much as I agree that despite liking him some of his scenes are the worst written in the story because the author made him too strong.

That's because Houken as a character represents untamed wildness and the innate desire for conflict; his entire life and nature is centered around seeking strong people, which puts him into conflict with those that try to unify China not because he has any ideological opposition to their goal, but simply because they're strong. The reason why so much emphasis is placed on Houken barely a person, describing him as a crystallization of martial skill and a war god, is because in the story he's the manifestation of the part of human nature that has to be overcome for unification to be possible, the wild and individualistic feelings that reject peace.

So he actually serves an important role thematically and has to be there.

Now if we could get a better excuse for him being beaten than "spirit", that'd be great.

I agree that he has a thematic purpose. I think the thing for me is that you could have a character who represented that strength for strengths sake ideology without making them apparently magic.

Like, it's exciting when Houken rocks up to murder a bunch of mobs and maybe a secondary character or two but it's also a moment when the rules of Kingdom, as they existed nominally, get bent a lot. Houken can't be beaten by armies, can't be beaten with strategy and can kill basically anyone apart from a suitably jizzed up Shin.

I think the more engaging move would be to have the ideology contextualized in an actual general. Ignoring how magic he is, he's just one guy who doesn't use strategy, kills his own men and doesn't inspire loyalty or spread his ideology in a meaningful way. He is frustratingly limited as a character and the applications you can apply to him. A more conventional general, who actually can do all of those things, is a much scarier concept because it's something that can become more than just one man. Houken isn't playing the same game as everyone else so the overall threat of him is actually lacking.

Like, you could keep him going on raids by himself or whatnot because it's a cool setpiece but because he refuses to engage with the narrative in a meaningful way it's like we bring everything to a halt momentarily to let Houken happen for a bit and that impacts my interest in the story.

[Sharpandpointies]

Which fits right into Koga wasting his talents! He's failing to dictate the pace, and as a result can't dictate the terms of engagement. Super-mobility would help with that.

Which, in fiction, is perfectly reasonable. Magical martial arts and all of that. ^_^

Tight, compact short-ranged. Is this why we don't see boxers delivering a flying, leaping, triple-spin haymaker? XD

Other than the fact that those techniques suck... ^_^ There's a lot of good to keeping things tight (not the body, but the distancing), short-ranged, etc.

But boxing is a limited-venue fight. It has specific ways of moving and operating that have come about due to the rules of boxing and that venue. It's all short-ranged stuff because there's no need for anything else - they don't need to deal with anything but hand-strikes at waist-level and above, and there's no grappling. Which doesn't mean it sucks in the real world -- a solid boxer has tons of experience in fighting their fight, which is closer to the reality of fighting than doing forms or 'just' resistance training.

Boxing does what boxing does because it tries to be as effective as possible within its venue; everything that happens in boxing happens in punching distance (no grappling, no kicks, no weapons, etc), and thus boxing only concerns itself with that distance.

[Sharpandpointies]

*reads current Misfile*

*gales of laughter* I've been more interested in seeing how Emily deals with her side of the Misfile than how Ash does. I think the writer nailed it.

[FistofIron]

I’m getting caught up on The Wild Storm which is a reboot of the original Wildstorm universe. It’s pretty cool so far. There’s a lot of reimagining going on and it really works.

[Tami]

Hi guys! Just wanted to open the door and look inside to see what everyone was doing.

[FistofIron]

Hi guys! Just wanted to open the door and look inside to see what everyone was doing.

Hey what's up? I'm doing a bit of homework at the moment.

[Jcogginsa]

Which, in fiction, is perfectly reasonable. Magical martial arts and all of that. ^_^



Other than the fact that those techniques suck... ^_^ There's a lot of good to keeping things tight (not the body, but the distancing), short-ranged, etc.

But boxing is a limited-venue fight. It has specific ways of moving and operating that have come about due to the rules of boxing and that venue. It's all short-ranged stuff because there's no need for anything else - they don't need to deal with anything but hand-strikes at waist-level and above, and there's no grappling. Which doesn't mean it sucks in the real world -- a solid boxer has tons of experience in fighting their fight, which is closer to the reality of fighting than doing forms or 'just' resistance training.

Boxing does what boxing does because it tries to be as effective as possible within its venue; everything that happens in boxing happens in punching distance (no grappling, no kicks, no weapons, etc), and thus boxing only concerns itself with that distance.

For my Book, I'm gonna try to do something where someone starts as a relatively normal (If unrealistically skilled for age) Martial Artist who slwoly gets introduced to the crazy shonen style of Martial arts

[Guy1]

Hi guys! Just wanted to open the door and look inside to see what everyone was doing.

'Sup Tami! How you doing?

[bruceleegreyhulk]

[Gryphon]