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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 8086858" data-attributes="member: 6801228">Okay, let us assume I am wrong (though this is a definition I have come across mutltiple times online, not one I made up), where then do we have a cut off point?The Hobbit is the story of a single man, most of the other characters are not explored. It has a huge army fight, but it is something that is skipped.The Hobbit therefore isn't epic, and it isn't sword and Sorcerery right? Would we take a story with three main characters, like Netflix's Castlevania and call it Epic? We have three main characters, the main villain, and at least five fleshed out minor villains. That is nine characters, fairly close to what we have with The Lord of the Rings, since the Fellowship is Nine individuals, and we don't really have a lot of screen time most of the time for other characters. I'd say roughly each book has about a dozen characters it cares about. But I don't think that works. I think simply counting the number of characters cannot tell you is a story is epic or not. Heck, the Odyssey is the counter-part to the Illiad as one of the two best known epics, and it is the story of one man. While it has other characters, most of them aren't actually that important. Sure, they have names, but is that actually a good measure of their impact on the story? I don't think so.I have to reject that thesis, because you cannot define a genre of literature by putting forth that the action is not driven by the main characters. All good stories are character driven. Take Hussar's example of The Illiad as being an Epic Fantasy. It starts with Paris kidnapping Helen of Troy, the plot is driven by the men who want to fight, or do not want to fight, by the actions of the Greek Gods (who are all characters). At no point is there a "morality of the world" that comes into play to force people to come to terms with some absolute.</blockquote>

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