Knight's & Magic

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MythSearcher
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Re: Knight's & Magic

I'm actually surprised they can screw up the story so much in K&M.
Considering the script writer is pretty experienced(Patlabour, Ranma 1/2, You're Under Arrest, Cowboy Bebop, to name a few) this is just unexpected.
I must admit that the original story isn't really good for fitting into a single season, I actually tried to guess which part they wanted to use when the news was out, but all seemed pretty impossible to do so. Unless they are willing to make a robot anime without the main hero's robot, or significantly change the plot, there is no way they can cut at a good plot point.
If you want more character development, you likely cannot cut out the school arc, but from there the behemoth arc will only get you to about 7~8 eps at most. It'd be stupid to have the S.knight development arc as the 9~13 eps, You don't really have an enemy befitting as a last boss, but having behemoth as the last boss will mean a long drag or fillers, AND you don't get a lot of S.knights to sell as merchandise. The current cut off is the most reasonable as a model commercial, but obviously having too much plot. So it is really hard to blame them for cutting off a lot of plot, the execution is just really bad though. Some people like how it is, because it resembles more of the old style robot anime which focuses on robots instead of humans(Yes, I have friends and saw forums with people who kept telling me the series is good because of that), but I think who can like a series like this is kinda childish. Almost all forums with people more experienced in anime basically hated the show.

They should have been more bold and dramatically change the plot.

That being said, the original novel won't help the shallow characters problem.

Well, it is a series to appeal hardcore mecha otakus, and probably at least half the staff producing the series are.

And if you can't accept the nigh invincible, over powered main character, too bad, that is about every other light novel that gets popular nowadays. Especially the isekai ones.
You basically get 2 types of hero in these stories:
1) They understand they have the power to cheat, fully utilize what they can use and are usually show offs. Ernesti falls into this type. The cheat can be either a power/skill they obtained during reincarnation/transfer, or knowledge from our technologically advanced world to a relatively primitive world, or in Ernesti case, both. Other examples are the Word Master(Golden word master), the Slime(reincarnated as a slime), the Goblin(Re: Monster), the traveler(Death Marching to the Parallel World Rhapsody)
2) They either don't know they are cheating, or just want to lead a *ahem* NORMAL life, and *ahem* TRIED to hide their talents, but failed miserably with spectacular results. Examples are the book lover(Ascendance of a Bookworm, which shifts to type one after Part 3 of the story once she obtained influential political power), the monster tamer(Rare Class Change), the witch(Killed slime for 300 years and reached max level at an unknown time), the herbalist(The mana of the female Saint is all mighty).

The interesting part of the novel isn't about the characters, because the novel is more like "History of S.Knights".
You will see pages of description, tactics, development concepts about how S.Knights are developed like a history book. The battles and wars are just the "Why" they have such design concepts other than the obvious reason(the robot fanboy) There are actually concepts not developed by Ernesti, which is completely ignored in the anime, and Ernesti didn't hate the levitate ships using S.Knights as turrets. (He actually kinda liked the idea and upgraded it in his own ship)

The overall concept is pretty cool, I think most mecha fans more or less thought of different types of mecha, and like categorizing them into groups. A fictional development history without all the difficult to understand obstructing Science in the way that tells you everything isn't efficient and useful sounds cool enough, and trying to build the real robot genre around a fantasy world is fun(if you are into technobabble) This is probably what captured at least some readers of the novel, which is completely dumped in the anime.

Also, as a person who liked warships(especially airships and space warships) more than humanoids, I really hated the last ep.
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Deathzealot
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Re: Knight's & Magic

MythSearcher wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 10:50 am Also, as a person who liked warships(especially airships and space warships) more than humanoids, I really hated the last ep.
/Raised Eyebrow/ Oh? I kind of liked that part. If they do the Second Season I want this Age of Airships to be the center of it.
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Knight's & Magic

Deathzealot wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 11:07 am/Raised Eyebrow/ Oh? I kind of liked that part. If they do the Second Season I want this Age of Airships to be the center of it.
I think MS's attitude has more to do with the Vyver (which was basically a battleship in dragon form) getting destroyed than the whole "Age of Airships" thing from the ending, since that was mostly a postscript.

And yeah, Isekai stories have already well and truly been beaten to death, not at all helped by the fact that too many authors fall into the Mary Sue traps of projecting themselves onto the main character and wanting that character to be the strongest, smartest, bravest, and most loved person in the story because they don't like the idea of their avatar losing at anything. Honestly, the only two I don't mind are KonoSuba (because it's a parody of the whole thing) and Dog Days (because it's mostly light-hearted and cute, plus the hero was chosen specifically because of his talents).
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

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MythSearcher
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Re: Knight's & Magic

Deathzealot wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 11:07 am /Raised Eyebrow/ Oh? I kind of liked that part. If they do the Second Season I want this Age of Airships to be the center of it.
I don't have a problem with the future, but the part where Ernesti denied the existence of warships.

The original and published novel didn't have him utter words about destroying Vvyer to stop the world from entering an era of giant battleships and large cannons, but instead says something much more reasonable: "I see, giant weapons certainly have great power. However, moving by itself is a bit defenseless. ... Seeking for destructive power is common in weapons. However, it is useless to to do so by simply enlarging it unnecessarily. I'd dare say that is just, vulgar ... After all, it should be humanoid. The enlargement of humanoid is the optimized shape. Since this world already has this great answer from the beginning, ignoring that isn't a good thing to do. Thank you for teaching me this lesson...Please fall like what you are now."

Which actually makes sense sans the humanoid part. IRL the almighty battleship was made obsolete by planes, mobile weapons are able to attack an unprotected warship even if it is armed with a lot of AA defense (unless you have guided AA missiles, but then planes have longer ranged anti-ship missiles as well.) Aircraft carriers will be the next capital ship type, but in robot anime, you usually get Battle carriers/Cruiser carriers as the mothership, and that is pretty much what you get in the novel in the next arc. They developed the flying type S. Knight and fully utilize the mana on the ships to equip them with the chained javelins as guided missiles. Ernesti also didn't care much about having S. Knights equipped on the ships as both a power source and turrets, and the ships would have a lot of trouble without them in the forest arc anyway.

BTW, the princess from the enemy country which is the least evil stereo-type committed suicide in the anime, but survived in the published novel and her conversation with the queen showed a pretty good character development. (Nonexistent in the web novel)

Also, Kid jumping in to take the final blow, originally like that in the web novel, but done so to protect the ship, not the queen.(Different ship, not the drill bit ship but the one captured from the prince, makes more sense since they shouldn't have the time to build a new levitate ship from scratch.)
Henyo
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Re: Knight's & Magic

AmuroNT1 wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 5:28 pm
Deathzealot wrote: Mon Sep 25, 2017 11:07 am/Raised Eyebrow/ Oh? I kind of liked that part. If they do the Second Season I want this Age of Airships to be the center of it.
And yeah, Isekai stories have already well and truly been beaten to death, not at all helped by the fact that too many authors fall into the Mary Sue traps of projecting themselves onto the main character and wanting that character to be the strongest, smartest, bravest, and most loved person in the story because they don't like the idea of their avatar losing at anything. Honestly, the only two I don't mind are KonoSuba (because it's a parody of the whole thing) and Dog Days (because it's mostly light-hearted and cute, plus the hero was chosen specifically because of his talents).
i think there's still a glimmer of hope. a very small glimmer of hope, but hope nonetheless. AFAIK, no one has tried to go the Magic Knight Rayearth Route. in that its girls who are taken to another world, and that they're the chosen ones. and lets not forget the ending to the first season.

and Fuu is even the gamer type who lampshades things.

From what I've gathered and read on the net, many like this mecha show. the ANN episode is one source. but i do hope with all my might that they don't think this is how you should do Mecha anime.

Robot is a man's romance? not much romance if you can pretty much One Hit Kill all oppositions. just my 2 centavos. :D
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Deathzealot
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Re: Knight's & Magic

MythSearcher wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:37 am I don't have a problem with the future, but the part where Ernesti denied the existence of warships.

The original and published novel didn't have him utter words about destroying Vvyer to stop the world from entering an era of giant battleships and large cannons, but instead says something much more reasonable: "I see, giant weapons certainly have great power. However, moving by itself is a bit defenseless. ... Seeking for destructive power is common in weapons. However, it is useless to to do so by simply enlarging it unnecessarily. I'd dare say that is just, vulgar ... After all, it should be humanoid. The enlargement of humanoid is the optimized shape. Since this world already has this great answer from the beginning, ignoring that isn't a good thing to do. Thank you for teaching me this lesson...Please fall like what you are now."

Which actually makes sense sans the humanoid part. IRL the almighty battleship was made obsolete by planes, mobile weapons are able to attack an unprotected warship even if it is armed with a lot of AA defense (unless you have guided AA missiles, but then planes have longer ranged anti-ship missiles as well.) Aircraft carriers will be the next capital ship type, but in robot anime, you usually get Battle carriers/Cruiser carriers as the mothership, and that is pretty much what you get in the novel in the next arc. They developed the flying type S. Knight and fully utilize the mana on the ships to equip them with the chained javelins as guided missiles. Ernesti also didn't care much about having S. Knights equipped on the ships as both a power source and turrets, and the ships would have a lot of trouble without them in the forest arc anyway.
Interesting. So there is more material in the Light Novels then? So we can have a second season for the anime in the future?

That said, one of my most major complaints with this series is that Ernesti has too much Mecha Otakuness that it makes him seem like what you mentioned. He is to much into Mecha to look at airships. If Ernesti was me I would have loved both though I admit I would lean more towards Airships because that was one of my childhood dreams, mecha came later when I got into anime.
MythSearcher wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:37 amBTW, the princess from the enemy country which is the least evil stereo-type committed suicide in the anime, but survived in the published novel and her conversation with the queen showed a pretty good character development. (Nonexistent in the web novel)
Did she actually committ sucide? I thought she just recieved the news of the failure of that army which saw her dropping the cup she was drinking out of and looked outside. She didn't look dead in that scene.
MythSearcher wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:37 amAlso, Kid jumping in to take the final blow, originally like that in the web novel, but done so to protect the ship, not the queen.(Different ship, not the drill bit ship but the one captured from the prince, makes more sense since they shouldn't have the time to build a new levitate ship from scratch.)
Heh. I agree it seemed like a cop-out with them coming up with their own leviate ship so fast. However, I do quite like the new ship they came up with. It is far better then the enemy leviate ship. Also, it wasn't really finished anyways since it didn't have a powersource yet and had to rely on the Twin's Centaurs for power.

Anyways. My own two cents about this.
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Knight's & Magic

Henyo: I'm mostly okay with Isekai stories where the character grows and adapts to the new setting (as long as it doesn't get too absurd). The main issue is when a character appears in a new world and somehow has the exact skill set and powers needed to become a god among men. This is especially jarring when the character in question is 100% mundane and orthodox, or even a little below-average like an out-of-shape gamer geek, but arriving in a fantasy world turns them into Aragorn. Especially because it comes off like nothing but a shallow and cynical attempt to draw in readers with power fantasies.

Regarding the villain side's princess, I definitely got the impression that she committed suicide by poisoning her own wine.

Also, a random thought...the crazy sword guy getting the prince's mech and renaming it "Deadman's Sword" felt kind of disrespectful to me. Anyone else?
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

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yazi88
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Re: Knight's & Magic

The princess and the mercenery eye-patch woman both survived in the novels, but the princess killed herself in the anime while eye-patch lady got killed in that failed hijacking, she escaped in the novel.
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MythSearcher
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Re: Knight's & Magic

Deathzealot wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 10:17 am Interesting. So there is more material in the Light Novels then? So we can have a second season for the anime in the future?

That said, one of my most major complaints with this series is that Ernesti has too much Mecha Otakuness that it makes him seem like what you mentioned. He is to much into Mecha to look at airships. If Ernesti was me I would have loved both though I admit I would lean more towards Airships because that was one of my childhood dreams, mecha came later when I got into anime.
Well, an easier way is using the book version.
Vol 1~5 is this season, it has 7 published volumes now.
It would be reasonable to say that a good cut off length is 3 volumes(They cannot do that in season 1 because it would be strange to cut off after they developed the new robots without using them)
So you can expect season 2, if any, will take at least half to a year. (The web is around the start of vol. 9, just finished an arc and starting a new one)

The age of airships is the arc of the newest web version, so even if you have a new season, all of the airships you will get to see will be the ones build and used by Ernesti's knights.
Spoiler
developing new S.Knights, flying ones, mermaid appearance, going into the great forest as the 2nd expedition;
encountered acid breathing flying bug monsters as natural enemy of S.Knights;
Ernesti declaring he will hunt down every last one of them but Ikaruga got heavily damaged by acid fog(BTW, the jet engine destroying tech idea appeared originally at this point) while buying time for the fleet to [stroke]flee[/stroke], ahem, retreat;
Ardy saved Ernesti and both of their S.knights crashed in the forest, and they met some multi-eyed giants;
Ernesti fought the brave three-eyed and got them into a small clan, found out the largest clan had humans they called goblins who are survivers of the 1st forest expedition as underlings and try to conquer all giants;
they fought, Ernesti and Ardy found a small village of the goblins and had them helped build his temp. S.Knight the Kasasagi with wood and bones of monsters, and also build hand cannons for their giants;
regroup with the Silver Pheonix Order which came back to save them;
Ikaruga rebuilt with spare parts but since Kasasagi needed the behemoth heart to operate and can carry the, ahem, *little* (sarcasm) 4-eyed mage of the giants around as a messenger, Ikaruga is replaced with a normal reactor(WEB version didn't have the Queen's coronet, so Ikaruga at this point has 2 normal reactors) and Ardy used it in a limited power mode;
the goblin king Oberon, actually an elf, trying to get his father and mother back to civilization controlled the overlord, a giant acid breathing flying bug monster basically made the mess and they fought;
Ikaruga temp. upgrade by fusing with Kasasagi and Ikaruga as Magatsuikaruga, and killed off the overlord by entering it;
saves the day and brought back some volunteered giants for further action.
So no, you don't see airship battling each other.

Did she actually committ sucide? I thought she just recieved the news of the failure of that army which saw her dropping the cup she was drinking out of and looked outside. She didn't look dead in that scene.
I think that is what implies in that scene. Poisoned wine is an etiquette way for royal to die without spilling blood(Another is by hanging, thought that one leaves a rather bad corpse position), also committing suicide prevents the royal being humiliated by the enemy.

Pretty common culture in the East and I can actually name a few ACG stories that used it as a plot so also quite common in anime, I assume.
Heh. I agree it seemed like a cop-out with them coming up with their own leviate ship so fast. However, I do quite like the new ship they came up with. It is far better then the enemy leviate ship. Also, it wasn't really finished anyways since it didn't have a powersource yet and had to rely on the Twin's Centaurs for power.

Anyways. My own two cents about this.
I don't like the drill bit like front. It lacks the elegance of what a warship should have.
If you want a ram, Excellion of Gunbuster; N.Nautilus of Secret of Blue Water; Most ships in Ginga Sengoku Gun'yūden Rai; Baikal class in Gundam 00 are all pretty cool looking ships that look like they can be good rammers.
(All except the Baikal class had actually rammed something in their own respective series.)
(Oh yeah, extra info, I hated the Space Noah class in SRW OG, all of them, the Hyryu Kai looks much better.)
AmuroNT1 wrote: Tue Sep 26, 2017 5:24 pm Also, a random thought...the crazy sword guy getting the prince's mech and renaming it "Deadman's Sword" felt kind of disrespectful to me. Anyone else?
Well, in the web version, it is just the prototype, and Deadman's sword is actually a name referring to the weapons it is using are from his dead comrades, to avenge them, as opposed to remaining as just a crazy sword guy.(Much better character development, eh?) so it never came to my mind.
BTW, it is the princess's unit in the anime.(Each royal bloodline had his/her own unit)

Oh, and since they had much more time in the web version, deadman's sword fought both D and Edgar instead of Edgar and Idiot prince.
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