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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Lit The 181st Imperial Discussion Group: headquarters thread

Discussion in 'Literature' started by Havac , Apr 3, 2008.

  1. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

    Registered:
    Nov 21, 2000
    So, Ruins Of Dantooine meets strong opposition... Fatal Alliance would also tie in nicely with the game start, but isn't it a bit fresh? Also, who actually has that book?

    Everything points at Hard Contact, but I'll keep the discussion going for a bit.

    YJK is fine, we'll keep that in mind. Maybe over the course of three months, with a break after the Diversity Alliance arc?

    Episode 1... I guess the adventures are pretty hard to come by these days, I myself only have two of the journals (while I don't follow the TCW rumours closely, I guess the Maul journal would be a nice throwback these days... especially since we'd read it between the Ep1 re-release and Darth Plagueis).

    What about Jedi Apprentice as another Ep1 connection, maybe just the first book, or the first two to remember how prequel EU started to get fleshed out?

    What about the NJO "just the hardcovers" idea, anyone up for that later in 2012?
     
  2. Sniper_Wolf

    Sniper_Wolf Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Nov 26, 2002
    Since FOTJ is coming to an end in March has their been any consideration of hitting the DN/LOTF/FOTJ arc? I've been rereading them lately so they're fresh in my mind right now, but I'd be interested in any of the NJO as well.
     
  3. Abalore

    Abalore Jedi Grand Master star 2

    Registered:
    Oct 19, 2001
    I'd like to second this.
     
  4. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    OK, seeing how we'll have decided on a january book in feburary if we keep this pace up, let's discuss this schedule:

    jan - Traitor or Fatal Alliance
    feb - The Phantom Menace or Journals (e.g. Darth Maul) or Adventures or Jedi Apprentice (1/2)
    mar - YJK 2.1
    apr - YJK 2.2
    may - Hard Contact
    jun -
    jul - YJK 3
    aug-dec - NJO hardcovers

    Other suggestions are always welcome. We might stretch Jedi Apprentice over feb and mar (doing a few more books) and push the others back to fill the jun gap.

    As for january - I just ordered Fatal Alliance and I guess I could only give us some good discussion hints well into the month, definitely not on the first. I'd like to have a TOR tie-in discussion (therefore my Ruins of Dantooine suggestion as the "original" MMO tie-in), but I still think the book might be a bit too new. With Traitor, I know that there's been lots of discussion, but I think it's gotten really focused as of late - "is LOTF valid or isn't it?" And originally, discussion mostly circled round "there is no dark side", which we might ignore as well to get to some new perspectives. I've got some ideas where to take this discussion, for example we had a few nice thoughts back in the Dark Journey discussion that dealt with the "twin" connection these books should have had. So, everyone take a vote, and by thursday or something like that we should know what to read.

    Hard Contact should be done when we're fully armed for all tangential discussions that might come with that book, and I'm not really feeling prepared right now. But we'll do that, should be interesting.

    Not on my watch. :p But seriously, there's lots of stuff to do before those if you ask me. But as you can see above I'm a big fan of taking a fresh look at the NJO, something we just took for granted for the last few years as "that 19 book series that was so dark and they killed people but it was so much better than LOTF". So we'll reevaluate that, and by the time I'm no longer around ;) the forum will have a nice distance to the Denning-verse, allowing for a new perspective on those books, as well.
     
  5. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    Okay, based on the feedback for my suggestions, I'd say we start with:

    Traitor

    in January. Hope to see you in the discussion thread!
     
  6. Jeff_Ferguson

    Jeff_Ferguson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 15, 2006
    Those ideas look pretty solid. Fatal Alliance is still too new, though, IMO. The discussion thread still seems pretty fresh and didn't even get a lot of discussion upon release.

    I always love more NJO discussion. :D And doing The Phantom Menace's novelization in February would be a cool tie-in to the 3D release. Is the plan for Young Jedi Knights to do three at a time, as was done with the first six?
     
  7. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    Yeah, YJK 2.1 means the first three, then 2.2 the other two of that arc; and then the third arc in one sitting.

    I think we'll take it easy with Traitor; haven't had much time between the holidays, work, being stuck in Darth Bane 3 (apparently a bad choice for my christmas read as I'm still stuck in it one week later), starting the KOTOR marathon, and being generally busy on Tython. Oh, did I mention that I have a private life, too? ;)

    We'll start Traitor tomorrow alright, but we'll take it easy, see what happens.
     
  8. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
  9. Robimus

    Robimus Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jul 6, 2007
    I know I flutter in and out of these discussions, mostly because I don't always have time to revisit a novel and can't do a lot by memory, but I think this might be getting a bit off target at this point.

    One of the first series suggested, and oldest EU, the Jedi Academy Trilogy is apparently not going to be able to be fit in until 2013, while we are frankly looking swamped with YJK's and NJO stuff, both of which have already had some(to a lot) coverage here.

    Splinter of the Minds Eye? The Lando novels? Even the OT novelizations would be excellent choices. The only issue might be with people not having these novels in their collections, but given a little time these books are really not that difficult to find in todays e-world.

    Even some fo the short stories anthologies would be interesting, as they contain works by Zahn, Stackpole and more.

    The way its currently mapped out we'd see 9 months worth of YJK's & NJO this year.
     
  10. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    All your suggestions are valid, and I'm not opposed to include any of those into the schedule. It's just that they come up now for the first time.

    Jedi Academy baffles me the most, I have to admit, as I read that a few years ago and was fairly sure that it had been in here; thinking about it (and looking at our list), I realize that this wasn't the case.

    I don't agree with the complaints, though. The NJO is old. YJK even more so. YJK doesn't get much discussion beyond the books we already did in here, and not going further in that series is like not doing the complete X-Wing series. NJO gets a bit of a shorthand because it's newer than Bantam, and everyone thinks of it as those 19 books that belong together so we seldom look at the books as standalones.

    If we did Jedi Academy and Lando, we'd be swamped with Jedi Academy and Lando this year. Last year, we were swamped with Zahn and X-Wing. There's just so many months in a year.

    As I explained above, the five NJO months (Traitor being a total exception as my self-indulgent pleasure) are meant as a thematic experience - what do we get out of just the "main novels"? We could split that up into the next year, but I'd really like to keep it focused. Will there be people who don't want to read that? Probably, as with everything. Others might decide to skip Jedi Academy as we all know that's bad. Or Lando, as they don't want to get the books. Put both together and you get six months somebody's not willing to participate.

    And we don't want to abandon the old stuff. It's just that there's so much of it. Plus, seeing how we already did 2006's Outbound Flight in here and two votes were favouring 2009's Fatal Alliance, we're not doing so bad. The most recent book the schedule suggests is 2004's Hard Contact, and I didn't even make up the interest in a discussion about that, it could already have happened last year.

    All in all, this isn't really a dictatorship. Make suggestions, voice your opinions, and we'll see about what most people want to do.
     
  11. Robimus

    Robimus Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jul 6, 2007
    My suggestion rises from the fact that the first two trilogies of YJK's have already been covered in prior years. I'm not against covering them, yes they are old, but I just don't get what the rush is. I felt the same way about block of X-wing novels in the past years.

    Also this isn't the first time suggestions like JAT have come up, but it is the first time recently. If you go back to the start of the thread you will see all sorts of suggestions. A series like JAT set the stage for a lot of the EU, introduced prominate characters(one of which has had a huge role in the more recent series).

    When it comes to Hard Contact, I feel like that was a choice being given. As in What would you rather see, Hard Contact, Traitor or Ruins of Dantooine?. I wasn't thinking about other titles at that time.

    Just for the record I'm not really gung ho about Hard Contact either.:p

    Of course your not going to be able to make everyone happy all the time, but I stand by the idea that 6 months worth of NJO might be a bit much. If yourself and others want to go that route by all means do so, I'll still take part as much as I can.

     
  12. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    Well, Hard Contact was suggested before my january offer, and as there was some interest in that, I think it's a good choice for discussion in here.

    Regarding YJK - only the first six books have been done in here; that leaves 5 + 3 = 8 books (dividable into three months of discussion) for that series. And there has been demand for that, but seeing how far in the past the first arc has been discussed, we might do one arc this year and the final one later on.

    The basic question about the 5 NJO hardcovers is, do we want to do those back to back? Because if we want (and I certainly do), dividing them at year's end would only make it seem as if we didn't do a lot of NJO in one year, because it would only be the calendar year.

    Finally, I want to have February done. Everybody fine with the Episode 1 novelization by Brooks that's been suggested?
     
  13. Plaristes

    Plaristes Jedi Master star 3

    Registered:
    Jul 2, 2007
    The novelization makes sense to me, especially since it's being re-released later this month with a new short story.
     
  14. Jeff_Ferguson

    Jeff_Ferguson Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    May 15, 2006
    TPM novelization next month, do it up!

    I don't think that the NJO hardcovers need to be done back to back. Vector Prime and maybe one other would be cool to do, but I agree with Robimus in that it might be nice to mix it up.
     
  15. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    New month, new discussion - later today, that is. You can all congratulate me on having a nice new apartment, and you can all pity me for all the work that the move meant. Now I'm all moved, but the Internet is not, so I'm writing this from work.

    I'll put up the Episode 1: The Phantom Menace discussion later today from a friend's computer, so please bear with me.
     
  16. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
  17. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    Discussion is up. You know the drill.

    I'd also like to ask again for what you'd like to read from May onwards. Just to see which ideas survive, and what books we should consider to include in the schedule.
     
  18. JediAlly

    JediAlly Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Oct 31, 2000
    How will the upcoming move affect this month's and next month's discussions?
     
  19. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    As said in the other thread, we should be open to finish this month's discussion in mid-april, and also start the two-book discussion of the remaining books in mid-april as well.

    As of now, Hard Contact is still our book for May. We can talk about this and choose something else entirely again.

    I'll definitely be on the temp board as well, so we might have additional discussion there, especially regarding our schedule.
     
  20. Robimus

    Robimus Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Jul 6, 2007
    At this point I'd say to keep Hard Contact on the schedule.

    Most of my concern comes from the idea that folks are going to prove uninterested in actually talking about Hard Contact itself, but be very interested in revisiting every other subject related to Karen Traviss.
     
  21. Grey1

    Grey1 Host: 181st Imperial Discussion Group star 4 VIP

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    Nov 21, 2000
    I know what you mean, and I'd really love to enforce some order in that particular discussion. I think we should be able to discuss this one in quiet and then go home to our side of the fence and interpret all we learned in the biased way we're thinking. I'm quite open about not liking anything past HC, so I'm very keen in revisiting it, finding out whether the book stands the test of time and controversy for me, because back in 2004, I really enjoyed it.
     
  22. RC-1991

    RC-1991 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Dec 2, 2009
    So, should I copy-and-paste my Dark Forces: Soldier for the Empire reaction from the temp boards, or will the thread be migrated?
     
  23. Zeta1127

    Zeta1127 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 2, 2012
    Yeah, we just started discussing Dark Forces, then we get back to the old boards, well the new boards to me.
     
  24. RC-1991

    RC-1991 Jedi Grand Master star 4

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    Dec 2, 2009
    Were you never a member on the old boards?
     
  25. Zeta1127

    Zeta1127 Jedi Grand Master star 5

    Registered:
    Sep 2, 2012
    Yes, the temp boards were the first time I visited JCF.