The Contestants |
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The Breakdown |
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Advantages
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Advantages
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Disadvantages
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Disadvantages
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Kills
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Kills
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How we think the fight will go
Perrin stood in a clearing, wondering how he managed to find himself in a fight with this tiny old man; a childishly petite fellow clad in bright blue breeches and a fur vest over a homespun tunic flamboyant enough to shame a Tinker. His little head was crowned by an absurdly large Sheinaran top-knot, though he looked much too frail to be a Borderlander. The massive grin splitting his face from pointy ear to pointy ear only added to Perrin’s mounting confusion. As did the stranger’s unblinking stare. In his right hand the undersized man held a long wooden staff with a sling at its forked end. In his left hand was the object of Perrin’s anguish.
Perrin’s bafflement spiked as the wind changed, carrying an intensely sharp scent of curiosity to his preternaturally sensitive nose. The scent of inquisitiveness was rolling off the tiny man in overpowering waves.
And in a flash Perrin’s patience evaporated. “Give me back my map!” he bellowed, for the third and final time, taking long heavy strides toward the imp.
In reply, Tasslehoff shifted his hoopak from right hand to left, and the map he’d been holding vanished into thin air. Impossibly, Tas’ smile widened, as Perrin’s jaw dropped and eyes bugged in shock.
“What map?” Tas asked with an innocent nonchalance perfected by a lifetime of practice. “You’ll have to be more specific; a person as well-traveled and beloved as me has acquired many maps over the years. Why, twenty-two summers ago my cousin’s niece’s best friend’s great-uncle, Anklebiter Rumppain, borrowed this–”
Tas ducked into a lunging roll as the bear-like man suddenly thrust a massive hand forward trying to grab him. He bounded to his feet and took two big leaping steps back, with agility that belied his age and appearance. Then he paused to study the deliciously odd stranger.
Tas marveled at him. His heavily muscled build, his shaggy hair and curly beard framing a wide face with inhuman, blazing-golden eyes. The enormous war hammer, taller than Tas himself, was held in a white knuckled grip with ease. Who, or what was he? With characteristic impulsive self-indulgence, Tas made up his mind. By The Abyss! After sitting alone in this clearing for days, bored spitless, there’s no way I’m letting this one out of my sight – he looks much too fun!
“As I was saying—before being so discourteously interrupted by your brutish advances—my cousin’s niece’s best friend’s great-uncle found a treasure trove of maps just lying there in a pouch under the head of a sleeping stranger at the Pig Licker Inn right outside of Palanthas. One of those maps would be the beginning of a legendary campaign, of which you’ve surely heard, undertaken by myself and The Compani—”
Tasslehoff was rudely silenced once more as Perrin shouted “Shut your thieving mouth and give me back my map! My friends need me now! MY WIFE!” The war hammer became a humming blur, finding only air as Tas spun back, whipping his hoopak in a wide arc to clip Perrin’s ear hard and knock him off balance. Light but the little son of a motherless goat was fast! Perrin barely completed his thought as Tas followed up with a dagger that flashed from his hand and found a home in Perrin’s right shoulder with a sickening thud.
Perrin dropped to one knee.
Tas sauntered up to him, careful to stay just outside of the incredible hammer’s reach. “That should teach you some manners you jaundice-eyed lout,” the half-man quipped, never letting that infuriating grin slip for a second.
That was just about enough, Perrin decided. It was time he was on his way. While the child-sized fighter lectured him about whom he was dealing with, blathering on about minotaurs and mages—and chaos and gods and time-traveling—Perrin fixed his gaze on the distant forest, casting out with his mind in search of his four-legged brethren. He quickly found a small pack some distance off to the southwest, and another half a league to the north. Hastily, he sent them flashes of images explaining Young Bull needs help. Come quickly.
Minutes later Tas showed no signs of winding down, Perrin was still on one knee, and the wolves were gathering, encircling the clearing in the edges of the surrounding forest. He could feel their tense excitement in anticipation of the hunt.
As well as hints of amusement from the younger wolves that mighty Young Bull would need help against this cub of an opponent.
Tas finally noticed the wolves creeping out of the woods converging on them from all sides. To Perrin’s renewed shock, he didn’t detect a hint of the pungent hysteria even a lone wolf would normally instilled in a sane man—much less a pack this size. No, instead Perrin smelled more curious wonderment wafting from the little madman, and strangely…glee?
“Wow,” Tas gushed, “I’ve never seen so many wolves! Are they your friends? They must be, since you’re not afraid. When… how did you call them? I didn’t hear you chant an incantation or anything. And why are they running with an unwashed barbarian like you?” Tas turned from Perrin and bound gaily to the nearest wolf— noting as he approached that they stood very nearly eye to eye!
“Hey mister wolf, how’s about—”
CRUNCH!
The words died in his throat—most of which was now being ground to pulp in the wolf’s snapping jaws. His eyes widened as he crumpled to the ground with a gurgling cough. The other wolves were on him in seconds in a frenzy of crushing, snapping, ripping jaws.
Blessed silence, Perrin thought. He paused to say a rueful prayer for the odd fellow before bending down to retrieve what was left of his torn and bloody map. He angrily shoved the shredded parchment into his tunic and loped off into the woods hoping he wasn’t too late.
Predicted Winner: Perrin Aybara
NOTE: THIS MATCH ENDS ON SUNDAY, MARCH 13TH, 2011, AT 5 PM, ET
Tasslehoff Burrfoot is a character from the Dragonlance series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, courtesy of Wizards of the Coast; Perrin Aybara is a character from the Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
Tasslehoff Burrfoot image courtesy of Larry Elmore. Perrin image courtesy of John Seamas Gallagher.
Ndi Sampson contributed to this Cage Match
i kind of agree that it was dumb that he needed a pack of wolves to defeat the little bugger… he could have easily done it without the help of the wolves.
@Yresh
I can appreciate that you like the book the way it is… different strokes and all that… And I’m fine with it if you think Nynaeve is great… I’m sure plenty of submissives out there love her ;p… But drama and suspense are not “agree / disagree” concepts when discussing a known outcome… You may love your christmas/birthday gift to death, but if you knew what it was before you opened it, then there is no drama/suspense to the occasion… you may have thought the lightsaber duel between Obi-Wan and Anakin in episode 3 was awesome, but because you KNOW that Obi-Wan wins (and that they both survive) it removes the sense of danger and suspense from the scenario that they were trying to build with all the crumbling structures and lava explosions. In Jordan’s WoT books, you KNOW that Jordan’s main characters are going to survive, and that removes the suspense from the threat that they may be facing at any given time… that’s not an ‘agreeable’ point, it’s simply a fact.
@Archon. I see what you’re saying. I’d like to point out, however, that it isn’t the end result of any particular battle that keeps us on edge, ready for the next WoT book. It is HOW things happen, which villains are involved with which plot, how the Light side is going to prepare for a battle which they no nothing of how is actually going to be fought, and so much more; not even counting the ever mysterious final scene that began it all in RJ’s mind. Even though we know that none of the main characters are going to die before the Last Battle, there are plenty of things that keep this world intriguing and full of drama and suspense.
@archon
Death of main characters is not required to make series good or interesting…as far as I remember ..Main characters hardly die in any series …
except aSoIaF which doesn’t have a concept of a Main Character….
in LotR the entire fellowship(except Boromir) survives the battle…
In Narnia main Characters don’t die…
In Harry Potter only supporting characters die…
In Sword of Truth main Characters lives throughout the series…
In Inheritance Cycle No main Character dies…and Brom was an supporting character…
u can take many examples… Dresden Files, His Dark materials , Kingkiller chronicles, Temeraire, King Solomon Mines , the Alchmest, Ink Saga…so on.
The point I m trying to make is that these are fantasy novels (stories) u r reading not Some Bloody Live Journal or history record…..
And story becomes a story only if the character its about completes his quest and not dies in between….
Suppose that there is a story about character A who is supposed to rescues a Princess by fighting a dragon,,,,,it becomes only when he competes his quest….. And Not when he dies fighting the Dragon.
In WoT every Characters has his own quest,……..and Pattern wouldn’t let them die unless they complete it.
@Shadow’sBane
Well said!
@Shadow’s Bane,
That’s all well and good… and if I had said that killing a main character was necessary to make a series interesting or good, then your post to me would have some point to it… however, since (stop me if this quote sound familiar, like, I may have used it in my previous post) I can appreciate that you like the book the way it is… different strokes and all of that… Your post to me is devoid of point.
It doesn’t make the book bad and / or uninteresting if the outcome is already determined, it simply takes away the suspense that is built from the aprehension of the possibility of defeat/death of the hero(s). Although this is not my particular cup of tea, I am quite aware that a great many people are perfectly fine witout such apprehension… Steven Segal wouldn’t have been able to make so many of his movies if there weren’t plenty of people who didn’t care that the outcome was preordained.
@Niki,
See above paragraph… and previous post of mine… While a story can certainly be interesting and entertaining with a preordained outcome, there simply is no suspense when you already know what’s going to happen… you’re confusing suspense with enjoyment I believe.
Okay Archon, I think you’ve summed it up well enough with the different strokes idea.
I don’t know how much of the series you read before getting turned off, but there are ample plot lines leaving suspense- many of which are subtle and take a while to evolve. Although my enjoyment is a reality, the suspense certainly is too. If not the actual outcomes (which some are despite your beliefs), the sheer amount of characters and nations (their intentions and deceptions) keep things lively and interesting. Like I said before, I can see your point. I am just requesting that you see mine. Suspense doesn’t come exclusively from one aspect of a story line. Some of us enjoy the subtle mysteries that are ample throughout this series.
In my eyes it’s also some kind of taste, what do you expect from a story, what do you like and what do you dispise. I mean I think WOT or ASOIAF are pretty easy to like fantasy books with a great story, great characters and more then enough suspense but on the other hand are they quite simple, not that many layers and not really complex. If you compare them with the Dune series or Steven Erikson’s malazan empire. they are way more complex and in my eyes intresting( but that’s my taste, I like my stories complex and also the fact that every body can die and then live on apeals to me) I hope that we will have a suprising winner and not a character of WOT or ASOIAF.
In what world does Giant wolf-man with an axe vs obnoxious midget with a mouth like a runny nose= fair fight?
I have to admit that I found this write-up to be the best in all of the Cage Fights so far. It had just the right humor and you got the personalities down pact. Good job!