CHRONOMANCER: WotC's new meta-setting?

gyor said:

What do you think they will call that metasetting?

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They could call the book "Manual of the Planes" and I'd be cool.

Sunseeker said:

Ugh, time travel. It's like, the 2nd worst plot device for anything except Doctor Who.

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What's the 1st worst? (My vote is for "prophecy" as the worst plot device for anything except Greek tragedies and Harry Potter.) (And the Greek tragedies only get a pass because they were doing it before it was cliché.)

77IM said:

What's the 1st worst? (My vote is for "prophecy" as the worst plot device for anything except Greek tragedies and Harry Potter.) (And the Greek tragedies only get a pass because they were doing it before it was cliché.)

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Nope. Prophecy is too much of a mixed bag. There are some that do it wonderfully, especially if its subtle and the "Chosen One" doesn't find out they're such until later on and then has to go on a journey of self-discovery because they now feel like their entire life is a lie and nothing they accomplished was actually of their own making.

The number one bad plot device is: BABIES! (and by extension, young children)

It's more common in television than it is in writing. But it almost universally a way to: "kiddie-fy" a series that has taken a dark turn, as a way to take a prominent strong female lead and place her into a more traditional "feminine" role, and it almost always gets stupid because the baby is never in any real danger, usually being bounced between murderous kidnappers who often have histories of murdering children and selling others into slavery but NOPE not this baby!

FWIW, I prefer “Chosen Ones” who find out they misunderstood the prophesy.

77IM said:

What's the 1st worst? (My vote is for "prophecy" as the worst plot device for anything except Greek tragedies and Harry Potter.) (And the Greek tragedies only get a pass because they were doing it before it was cliché.)

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Nope. Harry Potter doesn't get an exception here. It would have, if the chosen one had turned out to have been Neville Longbottom all along, but Rowling wimped out in the end.

But for my money, the 1st worst plot device is chosen ones in general. Note how the quality of a Star Wars movie is correlates strongly and inversely with the chosen-ness of the protagonist:

Luke-as-random-farmboy: good.
Luke-still-as-random-farmboy: still good.
Luke-as-Vader's-son: kinda chosen-y, therefore somewhat worse.
Virgin-born Anakin: awful.
Virgin-born Anakin again: awful again.
"YOU WERE THE CHOSEN ONE": awful, but slightly less because of past tense.
Rey-as-ambiguous-Mary-Sue: opinions differ.
Rey-revealed-to-be-nobody: amazing, but she's still kinda Sueish, so inconsistent.
Total unknowns versus the Death Star: totally excellent.
Young Han Solo: not a chosen one in-universe, but definitely a chosen one to the audience, therefore fun but fanservicey.