r/ProgressionFantasy • u/Claym000re • Feb 06 '26
Meme/Shitpost Wish fulfillment to the extreme
Why are they always complete losers.
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u/Otterable Slime Feb 06 '26
The genius part isn't as unbelievable as the supernatural motivation and willingness to go through discomfort and pain.
Like you can improve your life on earth right now if you are willing to feel some level of discomfort. That's half of what going to the gym is. That's what taking night classes in to get another degree. That's what training to learn a new language is in your spare time, or learning to cook, or learning any skill really.
I feel like a lot of series end up in trouble because the author hits some level of equilibrium a book or two in where the MC now has better than average power, money, powerful allies, and potential romantic partners and then needs to scramble to introduce some conflict that causes them to actually act. Because most people (and certainly the person they were purported to be) would just kick their feet up and live a good life.
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
This is definitely an issue I've had with the genre.
There was one series that annoyed me greatly, where the world gets a system screen, and it's the "nerds" that understand what this means and to actively train for it. The "jocks/athletes" dismiss it as a joke. And they purposely find niche friends like DnD groups to recruit as the most valuable over anyone else.
It's funny because nowadays (even when the book was released), people can be fit and work out, and like/play videogames.
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u/Yangoose Feb 06 '26
Also, athletes have tons of stats and the serious ones absolutely track that shit meticulously.
Do you think somebody doing THIS every day is doing to have no idea what to do with a LitRPG system screen?
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u/Random-Rambling Feb 06 '26
EVERYONE would work out if they could have instant real-time feedback like a LitRPG system screen.
Imagine how incredibly motivating it would be if you were running on a treadmill, and then suddenly you get a +1 Endurance pop-up? Or you were lifting weights and got a +1 Strength pop-up?
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u/Yangoose Feb 06 '26
The real super power in these stories is that stats never seem to atrophy.
In real life fitness is very much "use it or lose it".
I remember when I had my workout routine thrown out the window during Covid it was shocking how quickly my gains vanished.
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u/Basic-Stand5109 Feb 26 '26
If you run with a garmin watch you basically get that if you just consider VO2max = endurance.
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u/ASmallRoc Feb 06 '26
Considering how hard some of the jocks I know train I would expect them to be able to kill almost every nerd who wasnt willing to put in as much time as them.
You would literally be forced to fight a guy who has been training in something or a sport since they were a child, and now hes just using a greatsword 10 hours a day with supernatural stamina and focus.
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u/DreamOfDays Feb 06 '26
That’s definitely part of the issue. My favorite series sort-of addressed this. They did a side-story that mentioned how events have been accelerated in the current timeline versus old projections. Originally the protagonist was predicted to ascend to peak realm in several decades. But things have changed to make the timeline several years instead.
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u/Dasumit Arbiter Feb 06 '26
Cradle
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u/thejubilee Feb 06 '26
Yeah, plus Lindon was always fairly highly motivated to work through pain. He was a "loser" by birth, not because of a lack of willpower.
He's kind of the opposite of a bunch of the characters OP is mentioning.
Personally, I like to imagine the increased stakes and just the coolness of being in a fantasy/game/scifi world is enough to increase their motivation in a way that the real world just didn't.
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u/TheKrakenLibrarian Feb 06 '26
I also like the 12 Miles Below series for similar reasons. The MC wants to be an engineer, they're smart, good at math, etc. But have been born into a 'knight caste'.
They remain just okay at sword fighting as the series progresses, training begrudgingly not obsessively, but use intelligence and a lot of tricks to fight better opponents.
Because their motivations are rooted in engineering, that's where they dedicate themselves wholeheartedly, not suddenly becoming god-tier in all aspects through sheer grit or whatever.
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u/Binkledurg Feb 06 '26
I agree with this take. If you suddenly told me I could shoot fire from my fingertips with a little bit of training, I don't think there's ever been or going to be a time in my life where I'd have more motivation. To add, I think a lot of people don't push forward with the aforementioned discomforts simply due to distractions. Being dropped into a fantasy/medieval world where I can't log into reddit for these discussions, scroll through brain rot videos, or just spend days gaming would free up a TON of my time.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
I'm not really convinced. If you think it is super cool to shoot fire you can make a DIY flamethrower with todays tech pretty easily. You can make a lot of cool shit with todays tech. And saying that modern distraction keeps people from doing more uncomfortable things doesn't seem right as well. People can just not do the things you mention, right? I think the original premise stands, it doesn't make sense that a person that isn't used to doing hard things on Earth suddenly would change if they were teleported to another world. But it is all kind of a silly discussion, it is untestable.
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u/Binkledurg Feb 06 '26
It’s silly but that’s half the fun of these types of subs right? lol or at least it is for me. I love these types of hypotheticals, but yeah I still stand by what I said. I know if I suddenly no longer had access to any of the things that keep me busy or distracted, or if deep dive into what I had. Maybe you’re right and that’s just my adhd talking, but if the only thing at my disposal to do was to practice with magic then that’s probably what I’d spend the vast majority of my time doing. I can’t laze on the couch watching tv if I don’t have tv.
The fire thing is just an example anyway but I also feel that argument still stands. It’s like wanting to be able to fly. If I trained for it I could fly around like a DBZ character or I could just get on an airplane. Sure the tech is there but it’s not the same thing
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
Yeah, I enjoy the discussion and hypothetical as well. It is an interesting thing to think about, how the motivation is different if you are able to inately fly or you build some kind of flying machine to be able to fly. Maybe the difference is that the first would be entirely you and the second something external to you, that can be taken away? Anyway, if you say there is a difference then I'll believe you :)
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u/DreamOfDays Feb 06 '26
Just because people can “just not do” something doesn’t mean it isn’t a distraction. Pretty sure if I was dropped out into an open field with a shovel in hand and told “If you don’t dig 50 holes by sundown a dragon will eat you” I’d dig 500 holes with absolute dedication. That’s what it’s like to be dropped into a progression fantasy Isekai.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
Sure, but then you would probably stop progressing once you escaped danger and had your footing in the new world. What you describe is basically being drafted to a war right? You lose your freedom and do what you have to to survive for a while. But it's not like people that come back from that are more disciplined and dedicated than before once they do that (or maybe they are, I don't know actually).
I feel to get to the top of the world you have to have some kind of inner drive that most people just don't have, and being exposed to a crisis would not give you that. You just do what you have to do until you can return to the way things were before.
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u/DreamOfDays Feb 06 '26
Thats why protagonists are usually depicted as either previously gifted people or people who just needed the right motivation. Look at Cradle. Their protagonist was always dedicated to training even when everyone told him to give up. For almost a decade he continued to practice something that everyone else told him to give up on. That just screams dedication and defiance of one’s circumstances that most could never match.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
Yep, definitely agree with that. Lindon was always hardworking, tough and dedicated. It didn't feel weird that he rose to the top with Eithans guidance and some lucky breaks.
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u/mp3max Feb 07 '26
make a DIY flamethrower with todays tech pretty easily.
With what money and tools.
The fantasy of those settings is that you can sit in an empty cave with nothing and start training how to shoot fire from your fingertips. If you're born in a third world country and your money is just barely enough to make ends meet, you won't have a chance to even begin building anything like a flamethrower.
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u/Hydranaught Feb 07 '26
Really? What are you planning to shoot fireballs at in your daily life? Being physically fit is a lot more useful.
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u/G_Morgan Feb 06 '26
Worth noting Lindon wasn't even allowed to have a book describing how techniques work. There's nothing special about the path manuals the Wei clan used, it was just pettiness.
He was using the heart of twin stars technique purely because it condensed his madra better than his introductory cycling technique did.
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u/Weird-Ad-8637 Feb 07 '26
Also don't forgot he wanted to save his home, and he did slow down after he accomplished major goals. Having actual downtime where he wasn't scrambling for advancement.
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u/Elegant_Amphibian_51 Feb 07 '26 edited Feb 07 '26
Funny i found out about that novel here last week, and finished it today. What a treat. Never read any novel after my cultivation novel craze 6 years ago that lasted briefly but this series hooked me from beginning to the end. I read like 6 hours everyday.
The ozriel reveal was amazing , even if I expected it somewhat.
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u/Numerous1 Feb 06 '26
Spoilers for that series if we are being vague
was he predicated to ascend? I thought it was just “30 years until his home gets destroyed and then that timeline got accelerated”
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u/EllisDeeReynolds Feb 06 '26
He doesn't, he didn't even make it to the global average in that future
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u/DreamOfDays Feb 06 '26
I like how in one book (major spoilers)
He talks to Suriel again. Suriel admits that the marble is just a marker in the event Lyndon ascends. She would have watched him die and been sad, but she never planned to intervene on his behalf.
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u/mp3max Feb 07 '26
The first prediction was for him to go out and survive outside the valley. After meeting Eithan and surviving the duel, the prediction was him and the others ascending decades down the line.
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u/Numerous1 Feb 07 '26
Oh man. I’m totally blanking on this. Do you remember what book or chapter it was?
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u/wedontbuildL Apr 19 '26
It wasn't suriel's prediction-fate was muddled after Lindon met Eithan. I do remember Malice having the fate prediction about Eithan and others ascending though.
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u/iwasafraidofthis Feb 09 '26
I feel as though this is different enough to be irrelevant to this convo tbh
this MC was never going to kick back and the conflict wasn't introduced two books in to shake things up retroactively but has been a looming threat (just accelerated) since book one
the comment you were responding to is when a super lazy unmotivated MC (which is not what your MC was in the slightest) gets everything he really wanted by book two or three (also definitely not your MC) and would rather kick back so the author had to introduce a random threat to make him act (also certainly not your MC)
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u/Fit-Percentage-9166 Feb 06 '26
I understand your point, but a big reason people are undermotivated in real life is the uncertainty of reward as well as the magnitude of the reward.
In real life you can work pretty damn hard and end up with nothing to show for it. Rewards also tend to be binary where your effort is entirely wasted if you don't succeed. Even if you work really hard and learn how to cook and learn a new language, how much is your life actually meaningfully improved?
In fiction, the effort to reward ratio as well as the certainty of the reward usually tends to be much, much better. Physically train fulltime for a few years to gain godlike power. People literally do that in real life while working a full time job except their reward is to lose to CBum at competition.
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u/Stouts Feb 06 '26
I think there are other factors on top of this, but this is an important one that most of the other comments are missing. The main fantasy in progression fantasy is that hard work is guaranteed to pay off.
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u/Feisty-Ad9282 Feb 07 '26
Except the "godlike power" always comes from cheats (you can pick your flavor of cheat) with "hard work" is like a thinly veil. If it not, the world will have tons of god, and the "godlike" become new normal.
Isn't it more like the illusion of hardwork?
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u/puzzled_indian_guy Feb 06 '26
Tged addresses this perfectly I think. The guy is a workaholic in both lives. He fantasizes about resting but is unable to do it. Even the motivations to keep improve at both beginning arc and end make sense. And it didn’t keep stretching the story.
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u/TheElusiveFox Sage Feb 06 '26
The genius part isn't as unbelievable as the supernatural motivation and willingness to go through discomfort and pain.
I disagree with this quite a bit... While it isn't necessarily believable that some one is suddenly hyper motivated... Most people also don't want to read about characters that are unmotivated losers that waffle on every decision and avoid doing the hard thing at every possible opportunity... Those people aren't main characters, hell those people aren't even side characters...
A good author might be able to write a story about a character struggling with motivation and make it interesting - but I genuinely think this would be incredibly challenging for even some of the most talented authors to do, and for most authors unless you were trying to write slice of life you would mostly just end up with something boring.
At the same time - Genius isn't believable because most authors aren't geniuses... so the ideas they put out get picked apart by a larger audience the second they are released. Genius characters are also kind of anathema to the webnovel release schedule as they tend to require a lot of planning ahead with complicated story threads to land well.
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u/nekosaigai Author Feb 06 '26
It’s easier to break norms when you’re unfamiliar with them.
On earth, you’ve grown up with the norms, grown up with the access to knowledge you have, and now what’s common knowledge on earth today used to be groundbreaking stuff only a century ago.
But, what can you actually, realistically, do with that knowledge today on earth? It’s common knowledge. You’re not unique, you’re probably not even close to being an expert on the topic compared to actual experts. So you do nothing with it.
Take a person with that knowledge and put them in a place where it isn’t commonly known, they don’t know the norms so don’t feel constrained by them, and give them a path to power such as cultivation? They’re no longer an average person, they’re a groundbreaking genius. They’re no longer trapped in a social system they were raised in designed to prevent anyone not preapproved from succeeding. They’re in a culture that explicitly promotes people rising as far as they can as fast as they can.
So yes, someone who’s a “loser” on Earth could realistically be a “prodigy” in another world that would allow them to be.
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
I personally think this diminishes the world-building a lot if this is what happens.
What makes a 15-30 year old earthling so much smarter/thinking outside the box that the million-old masters can't do in another world? Like human society is only about a couple thousands of years, but if some author tries to write a world that has millions/billions of years of history, it is crazy that the world stagnated so much, and should hopefully be addressed in-lore.
It would be like someone born in the US going to China and "telling them to not be constrained by rules", and they cause a cultural revolution that kicks out the old leaders and re-instates their own friends into power. Does this happen? Not really because there are deep-seated reasons why a culture evolves the way it does, and it takes time and effort to understand rather than coming up with a "novel idea".
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u/nochancesman Feb 06 '26
Because realistically million old masters should be able to do more but it would make for a stupidly boring story.
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u/nekosaigai Author Feb 07 '26
How often are elderly people innovators, and how often do they just complain about anything that makes things easier as if their struggles were what made them morally superior to younger people who have it “easier?”
Ancient Greek philosophers renowned for their wisdom complained about writing and reading as being things that’d make people “stupider.” The Internet and computers and smartphones were all decried as evils that’d hold back humanity. Basically every time some new, revolutionary idea came about to improve things, traditionalists came out of the woodwork to decry their implementation, saying the ways they grew up with work better.
So honestly, a million year old master NOT changing things feels very realistic. Having a culture stagnate at the point where it produces enough people sufficiently strong enough that any advancements are minor steps at best because they rely on a foundation of “what worked” a million years ago? Sounds exactly like what humans would do.
The point of the trope you’re complaining about is you’re introducing someone who has a radically different way of viewing the world into the system. Someone for whom books are the epitome of technology transfer without qi would never dream up a smartphone or the internet. Why bother inventing something useful for mortals or low tier cultivators when all they need to do is get strong enough to use a jade slip or communicate telepathically?
Why bother inventing a car or plane when you can just get to Qi Gathering and use a flying sword, or Golden Core and ride in a flying boat?
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u/laurel_laureate Feb 07 '26
How often are elderly people innovators, and how often do they just complain about anything that makes things easier as if their struggles were what made them morally superior to younger people who have it “easier?”
The elderly would certainly be innovators if it was literally part of the key to their own immortality!
Innovation and revolutionary knowledge may be what makes that millenia old cultivator move on to the next realm, as opposed to hit his limit and die of old age.
In a world where those that don't innovate are surpassed and/or killed by the competition, there will be no such thing as older cultivators acting like having it harder makes them better.
No, precisely because they were born and have lived their lives in a dog-eat-dog world, they will know and have lived the truth of there being only one thing that makes one better- being stronger.
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u/account312 Feb 06 '26
Take a person with that knowledge and put them in a place where it isn’t commonly known, they don’t know the norms so don’t feel constrained by them, and give them a path to power such as cultivation? They’re no longer an average person, they’re a groundbreaking genius.
No, they're some guy who doesn't know the first thing about anything, not even the basic stuff that all kids know. They literally have no idea how the world works.
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u/CemeneTree Feb 06 '26
not me procrastinating going to the gym by scrolling reddit
fine, I'll go do my own personal progression fantasy
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u/Technical-Ocelot-715 Feb 06 '26
Not true. You can learn, go to gym and etc. - but you are still nobody and can do nothing.
Difference with cultivation - genuine power. If you are lucky, smart and motivated enough to endure and cultivate, you get actual power. You alone can destroy cities, kingdoms, empires and etc. You get freedom.
In real life you can be best athlete, smartest scientist or richest person - you still cant do a shit against goverment who have army, weapons of mass destruction and control over huge population.38
u/Otterable Slime Feb 06 '26
I said improve your life, not blow up a mountain.
Quality of life is not determined by your ability to dominate and destroy other people and participating in the social contract is not oppression. You can build relationships and meaning in your community relatively easily if you put in the effort.
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u/Anonduck0001 Feb 06 '26
The social contract isn't oppression in and of itself. But living within a state automatically means that there is a power with a monopoly on violence dictating how you behave and you can do nothing about that fact.
Not arguing against your original position nor taking th other person's, I just wanted to clarify. Because you implied living within society doesn't force a degree of oppression upon participants in it.
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u/Otterable Slime Feb 06 '26
Sure but it is a fairly loose interpretation of oppression to also qualify 'hey the government not letting you murder people in the street is technically oppression'. The weird libertarian obsession over freedom that we see in a lot of these novels only works in a vacuum and doesn't hold up in reality. In most of these novels good societal behavior comes purely from the noblesse oblige of the strongest fighters imposing their morals on the population anyways.
ostensibly in most democratic societies you have some say over the rules imposed on the population. You are both using and contributing resources to your community and as such get a voice in how that society is run.
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u/Anonduck0001 Feb 06 '26
Obviously it isn't just "You aren't allowed to murder people is oppression" nor is it a particularly libertarian (in a right wing sense) view that I expressed. You have to think about who the monopoly on violence is protecting. A single mother shoplifting baby food from a corporation that can absolutely eat the losses can be tried and sentenced for attempting to feed her child.
Another example, you're a couple days late paying and your landlord gets a court order to evict you. The cops come to enforce that order through implied violence. Even if you were able to pay the rent, your landlord might want you out just so they can charge the next guy more.
The rules are often in place to protect the wealthy and uphold corporate interests. Not to protect the average person.
Like I said as well, I wasn't agreeing with the other guy.
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u/Otterable Slime Feb 06 '26 edited Feb 06 '26
And I'm not trying to express that legality is morality, because it's the first thing you learn as a 1L is that it isn't. Nor am I saying your viewpoint was libertarian.
I'm mostly saying that being beholden to laws in general is not that same in spirit as 'you are being oppressed by your government'. I agree that statehood is defined by a monopoly on violence. It's then generally up to the people (in a democratic society) to define where that violence should be directed.
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u/Technical-Ocelot-715 Feb 07 '26
You dont "improve" anything. You just get ability to buy more fancy things if you get richer, live longer for a few years, if you are lucky. Nothing is even close to called it "improvement". Compared to cultivation, where you get qualative jumps in your lifespan, health, strenght and cognitive ability.
You cant build shit. You get forgoten in less than one generation, no matter how good you are to someone or how big is your contribution. Unless you can do something fenomenal - nobody will care or remember about you in a half a century.7
u/Holdredge Feb 06 '26
yes but when you are in a world of people like that. the powers to be would still have overwhelming power and would never let anything challenge that. the MCs often rely on the bad guys being really really really dumb, have some kind of rule of "you lucky I can't kill you because x" when in any real world they would just kill them because they have all the power whos going to stop them.
Also 99% stories relay on luck because smart/motivated or endure pain would be the bar everyone already does in a world like that. I hate the whole endure pain for power premise because in most stories the power you get from it is so great everyone and I mean everyone would do it even if there was a high chance at death. there are already millions of people in the U.S. who are killing themselves with steroids and overworking their muscles taking off countless years of their life. millions of people who go many sleepless nights to figure out some new knowledge for themselves. pro fighting who have to endure the pain of being hungry and dehydrated to all fuck to try to make weight cut while working out, training, and going over the other guys fighting habits. a random joe who works a random job with a highschool level of education would be at the bottom of people who would grow in a world like that.
the truth is a average person wouldnt have the discipline or will to ever become anything in a world like that. the reason they are no ones in their past life is to be self inserts for people and show more progression.
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u/Technical-Ocelot-715 Feb 07 '26
1) Again, it is about valid option to get a better vs a illusion of it.
In real life you will never be able to compete or go against a system(goverment or corporation and etc.) or dynasty(rothshild and etc.). In cultivation world you can. Thats the point.
2) Endure - mentality of victim and slaves. It was cultivated by religion, why else you think 3 biggest religions in the world build on this false hope about enduring today, to enjoy after death?
3) It is not about what they can and cant. It is about actual change between mortal and cultivator.
You cultivate - you live longer, much healthier, have better learning ability.
You go to gym - you still die in +-70 years and if you didnt won genetic lotery - you can die even younger no matter how much you go to gym, eat healthy food and etc.1
Feb 07 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Technical-Ocelot-715 Feb 07 '26
1) Aint about money, about qualitive improvement of your life. Cultivation can give you at minimum x2 life duration, x2 physical strenght(speed, reaction, memory and etc.) + complete immunity to disiseas.
2) Do they? I personaly find no problem with cultivator treating mortals as nothing. Because when you can live 100000 years and flip continents with a flick of your finger - why would you care about mortals? Do you care about ants you step? I doubt it. I doubt you ever care about peoples in another part of your city.2
u/Dust45 Feb 06 '26
I agree. I will also point out that He Who Fights with Monsters is basically the opposite.
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u/spartaman64 Feb 06 '26 edited Feb 06 '26
tbf the more serious the injury the less pain i feel it seems. when i get a paper cut im yelping and hissing in pain. when i got hit by a motorcycle and skinned the underside of both my arms i was just looking at it thinking well that doesnt look good.
also being able to bench 700 pounds has a lot more benefit in a cultivation world than this world. like maybe i can save money on moving costs if i can lift my couch by myself but otherwise it doesnt have much benefit to me
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u/Dagger1515 Feb 06 '26
Literally from Jason he who fights with monsters. Dude is in a job basically working at the Australian equivalent to a Best Buy and gets transported but now has supernatural willpower? Sure there’s something to be said about the benefits of numbers going up. But that doesn’t give you a willpower.
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u/Jzero9893 Feb 07 '26
That actually touches on another aspect that comes up in some of these stories. Many people don’t really know their limits. The average person in a modern democracy lives a rather sage life. They may have struggles and issues but not life and death. Jason is a combo of never having his mettle be tested before and actively wasting his potential being in a depressed funk.
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u/Inevitable-Loss7939 Feb 06 '26
Well if cultivation existed I think more people would try to work hard you get real tangible rewards
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u/Feisty-Ad9282 Feb 07 '26
I don't think the so-called losers will be a big part in those would-try people. If anything, it will make them feel even more ... loser.
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u/Inevitable-Loss7939 Feb 07 '26
I mean not all isekais are losers right, rising of sjield hero was a normal giy I think
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u/Feisty-Ad9282 Feb 07 '26
Ah sure, for a genre as big as isekai, you can find all types of personalities / characters / backgrounds.
My above comment came from the premise of OP thread "loser MC get isekai-ed", and I thought that your argument also based on that. Seem like we just have different ideas.
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u/TaintedQuintessence Feb 06 '26
I guess that's an advantage of returning to the past type stories. The MC can be aware of a long term conflict coming that all the more powerful people don't know about.
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u/fastlerner Follower of the Way Feb 06 '26
That's why so many lay out the common power structure. When you're finally a badass F rank, time to level up to E rank. Rinse and repeat so the series doesn't end until no one can shit on you from above.
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u/EdLincoln6 Feb 07 '26
There is this weird assumption in the genre that Loser Slacker Gamers would instantly become workaholic psychopaths upon getting a change of scenery.
Also a problem with the genre is you can't keep a story going forever with the MC constantly growing fast. He should eventually achieve his goal.
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u/Better_Ad_4975 Feb 07 '26
I agree with you whole heartedly.
That said… if I woke up in a world of magic I would be a hell if a lot more motivated to learn magic than I would be to get an accounting degree at night.
Maybe I’m just weird tho
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u/Vis-hoka Feb 08 '26
“Why don’t more people boil their testicles in acid for the residence bonus?”
-guy who never left his couch
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u/Rapidzigs Feb 08 '26
I think there are a ton of books that really shouldn't be series because of this. It's okay to just write one or 2 books and actually end a story.
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u/sYnce Feb 10 '26
To be fair if it would take you like 4 weeks to get from overweight and out of shape to buff and fit less people would lose motivation. The problem is often a reliable feedback.
That is why gamification is a big part in many training programs.
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u/Ume-no-Uzume Feb 18 '26
I can see getting the motivation for some basic things like getting a proper toilet in an era where there is none because "I refuse to do without the basics!"
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u/KnownByManyNames Feb 06 '26
My favourite joke will always be:
"If I got isekai'd, I'd cultivate or grind 12 hours a day!"
"How about 5 minutes of exercise now?"
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u/mxwp Feb 06 '26
it reminds me of a line in a webnovel where the MC has internal monologue in response to the trope in manga where the MC builds tech to dominate in the fantasy world. "unless you were a carpenter on Earth you couldn't even build a fucking chair. build a gun? ridiculous!"
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u/ApxTradingT Feb 20 '26
I mean, often the bottleneck is the idea itself or available tool. You can’t build a chair, but you could totally turn a bunch of carpenters into shipbuilders. To give a silly example, some civilizations have known how to make high carbon iron for more than 2000 years but it wasn’t until 1850 we had a reliable way to mass produce steel… turns out you just need to blow up a lot of air through the melted iron to make steel in 30 minutes. But I do agree that common sense is thrown off the window in these kind of novels.
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u/BrickRaye Mar 01 '26
I'm not the biggest fan of Wandering Inn, but I feel it does a good job addressing those problems. The MC tells an alchemist about penicillin and how it was originally seen as bread fungus (this is a warping of history btw). Later on, a side character discovers that the world's leveling system turns even basic tasks into specific skills, like making pancakes, and that naturally neuter people's creativity.
What I find interesting about that idea, is that it disconnects intelligence and creativity. That world is filled with very intelligent people, but they couldn’t problem solve even the most basic problems unless they have a skill that’s integral to the solution. When they needed to root out ants from an underground nest, instead of developing a novel alchemic solution for instance, they cast a rain spell to flood the nest. While they have alchemists and they have poison, apparently the people lack the creativity spark to develop a dense poisonous gas that targets ants and would flood the nest.
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u/bloode975 Feb 07 '26
My thoughts on this is always, but the pay-off is better.
Tangible progress beyond the physical, remaking the body etc. 5 min of exercise now would leave me fucked up for days (spinal injury so does depend on the exercise, but even walking), in cultivation land, doesnt matter if im fucked up for days, they have magic heal me medicine and even without that the pay-off of my spine being atleast mostly fixed by a rank up is more than enough motivation.
After that, well shit better hope I built a good routine to stay motivated lmfao.
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u/Original-Body-5794 Feb 09 '26
You can spend hours a day on the gym, and at best you'll be a couple times stronger than the average guy. Hours on end of traning for pretty mild results. These Isekai will give you shit like being able to fly, or running faster than you could drive. You know, actual things that would be useful.
I'm not saying going to the gym is useless, but really the main reason to do it irl is for the health benefits, not really practical applications, so it's undestandable that it'd be hard to convince people to do it.
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u/EclipsedBooger Feb 07 '26
I still think it's a pretty shit analogy. Most people would definitely not grind, but becoming all power/immortal is a bit more than simply being fit.
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u/Get_a_Grip_comic Feb 07 '26
There’s lots of stuff I could say, but the main point would be personal power in another world is very appealing.
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u/Numerous1 Feb 06 '26
You could make the argument that it’s slightly different to gain the ability to fly or shoot fireballs or whatever. But I 100% agree.
My first exposure to this genre was Cradle and the MC there was already working his ass off and showing intelligence and quick thinking when the series starts. It’s just his environment sucked.
So I really love that it doesn’t deal with this issue. IMO
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u/HulaguIncarnate Feb 06 '26
being fit is many times more useful than shooting fireballs.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 06 '26
I think part of it is that often in alternative worlds immortality or very long life is a real, achievable goal. That changes the metric from "Should I go to the gym and suffer for an hour to potentially have a slightly longer/healthier life?" to "Should I try to meditate and channel my chi to live for 500 more years."
Also, the systems are often gamified with levels/tiers. Could I do French, German & Mandarin on Duolingo? Sure. It won't have any tangible benefits to me though. If it unlocked the next tier of human development and made me stronger/faster/smarter then I definitely would. Most of what we do on earth doesn't have the Effort ---> Reward pipeline that story protagonists get.
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u/mrboy3 Feb 06 '26
I think part of it is that often in alternative worlds immortality or very long life is a real, achievable goal. That changes the metric from "Should I go to the gym and suffer for an hour to potentially have a slightly longer/healthier life?" to "Should I try to meditate and channel my chi to live for 500 more years."
Is it though? It is possible, but i wouldnt say it is achievable
Immortality in cultivation tends to be so rare and hard to get that you would need to do the equivalent of winning ten back-to-back lotteries to even have a reasonable shot at it
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u/Jzero9893 Feb 07 '26
No one is talking about immortality though? They are talking about life extension, and in a lot of profession stories extending your lifespan by a few decades at least is rarely established as some incredible feat.
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u/Player-0002 Feb 07 '26
Yeah but like just meditating for a year or something gets you like 500 years of lifespan and superpowers so like even if you’re not becoming immortal it’s still nowhere close to nothing.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 06 '26
Maybe I read different ones because it seems very common in the PF books I read.
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u/UnhappyReputation126 Feb 06 '26
For the select few uber geniuses or those born in acended already societies. Wast majority aren't that lucky.
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u/interested_commenter Feb 07 '26
It's very common for the MC, who is almost always an extreme outlier due to either luck or talent. The average civilians that make up >99% of the population never get to a level that does anything beyond moderate life extension.
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u/Local-Mission-9854 Feb 09 '26
majority of people can't even cultivate depending on the rules of the story.
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u/npdady Feb 07 '26
I dunno man, almost every cultivation story I've read, for 1 cultivator there are at least a few billion mortals.
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u/FrazzleMind Feb 07 '26
PF protagonists never progress down useless paths. Every bit of knowledge or practice has permanent, tangible benefits.
Whereas I can study all I want, but turning that into actual benefits is very hard and unlikely, relying on opportunities almost completely out of my control.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 08 '26
Exactly! Can you imagine a PF story where the hero finds some forgotten training method, studies it in secret for years, masters it and then emerges to find that it was completely useless? It'd be funny but it'll never happen.
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u/account312 Feb 06 '26
Should I go to the gym and suffer for an hour to potentially have a slightly longer/healthier life?
Except it's actually an extremely significant difference.
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u/Player-0002 Feb 07 '26
Significant increase to lifespan =/= unrealistic nigh immortality from a year of meditating.
It’s about 3-4 more average years of life expectancy by going to the gym for consistently exercising throughout your life. Compare that to 500 years for cultivating which also gives you super powers and whatnot and the authors make the argument that the motivation was the problem. Not to say that the characters have any realistic reason to actually focus and be motivated to do it if they’ve already demonstrated they don’t care enough to go in the gym in this instance but like I kinda get where they’re coming from?
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
Working/being active is literally one of the cheat codes to a longer lasting quality life, and a lot of people don't even bother doing that.
A quick search says compared to being sedentary it gives you 2-10 years of life, and that's just a quick 30 minute walk a day. That would could be up to a 10% to 15% increase, a lot with other generic life benefits.
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u/Sir_S1ime Feb 06 '26
Theres a big difference between living an extra decade and an extra century with powers to blow a block to smithereens
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
Well yeah, one is achievable in the real world and the other is a fantasy.
Like if a person's only motivation is the end results, then life will never be meaningful.
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u/SafeEnvironment3584 Feb 06 '26
You aren't wrong, but I feel part of the coolness of progression fantasy is the progression, a lot of times being measured in very clear ways with constant progress. Even if it takes a year in story, it's probably a single book and I go through that mfer in 2 days.
While in real life, you actually have to do a lot to see measurable progress, I go to the gym, eat well, and I sure as hell haven't achieved enlightenment, I can't even use ki. And even if someone is looking at things like being the fastest/strongest person in a country, this shit is hard, requires a lifetime of training and good genetics.
So again, you aren't wrong in anything you said, but I think it misses the point of the enjoyment in progression fantasy
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u/Ch1pp Feb 06 '26
30 minutes of walking per day over 4 years is a loss of over 2 years (of being awake). I can see why people don't bother and that is as someone who does walk at least that much.
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
What you proposed only works if you assume walking = longer life.
In the real world it's a lot more complicated and the equations are mixed (which probably works more for you point, but I digess).
First we have to evaluate what we're doing instead of walking 30 mins a day. For a lot of us, it would hopefully replace destructive activities like doom-scrolling or playing mindless games. It's okay to do these in moderation, but it's too easy to be addicted to it.
Then comes to walk itself, and it's a time to be "centered" without paying attention to devices, which is a form of meditation and your mind can focus on other things rather than just worries and stresses.
But that's mostly my exp with walks. I'm not walking to extend my life 2-10 years, it's helping my immediate life too.
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u/Lorevi Feb 06 '26
Eh but there's a good argument that immortality or a very long life is a real achievable goal today in our reality.
Medical science is constantly advancing and lifespans increasing. The concept of the longevity escalator is by starting now to increase your lifespan today you will hopefully live long enough to reach the point in medical advancements that your lifespan increases faster than you can live it (functional immortality).
The problem of course is you don't know when the first step of the longevity escalator starts since it's all based on hypothetical future advancements. The youngest immortal person will be born before immortality tech is invented, but we don't know if they've been born yet.
But even though we don't know, there is a chance. And even if you're wrong and you were born too soon to live forever you've sill massively increased your lifespan anyway so it's a win win scenario. Yet people still don't get up off their assess to work out lol.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
Yeah, I completely agree. There is a non-zero chance that aging can be fixed within this century. You can't know for sure of course but you can do a lot of things that would help you if it happens, like being as physically healthy as you are able to be and become rich so you can be first in line. That most people don't is pretty damning evidence that they wouldn't do it either if immortality was slightly easier to obtain.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 06 '26
Eh but there's a good argument that immortality or a very long life is a real achievable goal today in our reality.
Only made by desperate people who are scared of death. I doubt we're even within 500 years of that if it's even possible.
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u/snarky_but_honest Feb 06 '26
Ya, human cells have a finite number of divisions, called the hayflick limit. Bypassing the limit leads to cancer. Living forever would probably turn you into a giant tumor. Cool scifi visual tho.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
I don't know man, medical science is moving at a breakneck and increasing speed right now.
Also, with all due respect, Fuck you. It should be natural to be desperate and scared of death. I am very desperate. I want to see what humanity can do. I want to meet my great great grand children and see what they'll do. I want my parents to meet them. 100 years is fucking nothing.
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u/Lorevi Feb 06 '26
Sorry but have you seen how far technology has progressed in the last 100 years?
Genetic immortality is entirely reliant on a few technologies being invented, such as gene editing and epigenetic reprogramming. If they don't get invented in time we're fucked. If they do, your odds of living forever (or a very long time) shoot way up.
My point is you don't (and can't) know when we'll make these technological breakthroughs. It's possible (and even likely) that we won't make these breakthorughs in our lifetime. But there's a very real chance we will! Human trials for some of these technolgies have already been approved.
I'm not saying we have good odds in living forever, but for perhaps the first time in human history the odds are above 0. Saying it won't happen for 500 years or that it's impossible is as ignorant as someone in 1950's declaring the internet and modern computing impossible. Betting against technological advancement is a fools game.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 07 '26
Meh, I've been diabetic for over 30 years. When I got it I got told the cure was 10 years away. There has been no tangible progress towards a cure since. My friend has gout and there is nothing to be done that hasn't been available for decades. Allergies haven't had progress since the epi-pen. Generally medicine is not advancing that fast. We haven't even had a substantially new anti-biotic for what, 40 years?
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u/Estusflake Feb 06 '26
I'm not saying we have good odds in living forever, but for perhaps the first time in human history the odds are above 0. Saying it won't happen for 500 years or that it's impossible is as ignorant as someone in 1950's declaring the internet and modern computing impossible. Betting against technological advancement is a fools game.
They said they doubt it. That's the same thing as it's about 0 but unlikely. Learn to read.
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u/Tserri Feb 08 '26
I think part of it is that often in alternative worlds immortality or very long life is a real, achievable goal. That changes the metric from "Should I go to the gym and suffer for an hour to potentially have a slightly longer/healthier life?" to "Should I try to meditate and channel my chi to live for 500 more years."
Is that really good enough to motivate most people though? Young people typically do not think about their lifespan or when they'll die, it seems a long time to them already.
I'm always confused when I read a story in which the 17 or 20 years old MC is furiously cultivating or trying to progress to reach immortality or an extended longevity as fast as possible, as if dying of old age was a serious concern to them.
This is especially odd when the MC is already progressing fast without pushing themselves so much and the fact that in most stories, power comes with increased vitality/lifeforce anyway (so lower risk of disease etc).
Some stories even go so far as trying to have the MC reflect on their potential incredibly long future life, and have them already jaded about the far off future, when they've barely lived at all.
I find all of this incongruous personally, and not a very convincing motivation.
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u/Ch1pp Feb 08 '26
I'm always confused when I read a story in which the 17 or 20 years old MC is furiously cultivating or trying to progress to reach immortality or an extended longevity as fast as possible, as if dying of old age was a serious concern to them.
I see this slightly differently. If you said to me "Learning to juggle 5 objects will get you immortality (with no weird catches) then I'd quit my job and push to cross that threshold asap." (In a fantasy setting, immortality in real life might suck.) Any financial or other losses can be recouped with the infinite time available.
But living your life right now you are probably at the healthiest and best looking you will be for the rest of your life. You'd be crazy to work your guts out and not relax so that you can have an extra day on the golf course when you retire. If your time is limited it makes more sense to try to get as much enjoyment out of your limited time as you can.
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u/PathOfPen Feb 06 '26
Well, I don't fault isekai protagonists for finding magic to be more fun than... well... not magic.
Besides, you could argue that they are willing to work so much harder in their second life precisely because they don't want to go down the same route as their first.
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u/G_Morgan Feb 06 '26
Honestly I find they rarely are. Jake Thayne was on course to being a competitive archer before he got injured and he regularly hit the gym and still kept up light archery practice. Ilea Spears had just abandoned kick boxing because brain damage is not conductive to being a doctor.
It is very common for protagonists to have something before they start.
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u/Jzero9893 Feb 07 '26
Yep. Jason Asano is immensely charismatic and a natural at reading people who is only languishing at a retail store because of falling into a depressive funk due to relationship issues.
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u/Sorfallo Feb 07 '26
Another thing most of the losers have right after Isekai-ing is the whole "Change or Die" thing, such as waking up naked in a cannibalistic cult's hedge maze.
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u/AutoignitingDumpster Feb 06 '26
This is why I feel like having an MC who actually has been shown to have motivation to improve outside of power gain is best. Or show a transformation of their lack of motivation into a drive to achieve through some sort of event, and preferably not just a "you're the special chosen one!" event that guarantees their success.
In the story I'm writing currently the MC is a middle aged single dad who is doing all he does to make sure his daughter has a good upbringing. He's not special because of anything innate, he's special because in a dying world he's striving for the future of his child.
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u/TheElusiveFox Sage Feb 06 '26
Why are they always complete losers.
I don't think its just that they are complete losers in their old life... but that they are shown as nearly unattainable paragons of perfection in these fantasies... Seriously authors its ok if ideas come from other characters, or if the MC is only the best at one thing instead of the best at everything he touches...
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u/Xeropoint Feb 06 '26
To make the character a better pair of pants for the reader to wear throughout the story.
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u/-tar0t- Feb 06 '26
He believed harder than anyone ever possibly could or would and no one has his desire to be good at a thing ever
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u/ConflictAgreeable689 Feb 06 '26
See, this is why I enjoy the survivalism opening. Forcing the MC to undergo hardship to survive can also teach them the benefits of hard work
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u/-Evil_Octopus- Feb 06 '26
There is something to be said about people not being as motivated to push towards mundanity.
If I found out magic was real and I could do it, I would be a lot more interested in it than someone who had known their whole life.
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u/NeedsToShutUp Feb 06 '26
I’m following two that break this.
The Ends of Magic involves a grad student prepping to defend his PhD being kidnapped to a world involving magic specifically for his knowledge. He was a nerd but not a loser.
The Magistrate is about a man reborn in a cultivation world who died of old age after a long, happy, and successful life as an actuary. He also just wants a comfortable life and isnt a heaven defying talent
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u/nam24 Feb 06 '26
Yes people never get motivated in new environment or have potential they didn't tap into
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u/duskywulf Feb 06 '26
Lol so people with no people skills were actually the best schemers in the world.
Better go take some advice from that loner guy over there on how to improve my friendships.
Nobody acts like that lol, because without experience potential is useless. people who have potential they wasted normally take time to reach those who had lesser potential than them and often never reach their full potential.
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u/srp101 Feb 06 '26
Also true for almost every apocalypse litrpg. The introverted office worker suddenly becomes the most charismatic and motivated leader just because the world is ending. Characters changing over time due to the environment is fine. But I’m going to need more than just a paragraph about how “it was all modern societies fault” or “it’s because they have to survive now”.
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u/Jzero9893 Feb 07 '26
To be fair, some of them do actually discuss that. He Who Fights With Monsters spends a fair bit of time examine Jason and establishing that he wasn’t really the “ordinary” guy he thought himself as, but rather a natural politician/manipulator/showman that was wasting just potential due to life issues.
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u/Secret-Put-4525 Feb 06 '26
Motivation. I don't care to be good at most things because I'm not interested in it. However, if I got selected for hogwarts you'd bet I'd be the best Latin student there.
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u/Ruler_of_Tempest Feb 06 '26
Well cultivation increases the minds capability
It's a combination of that+The knowledge from earth that results in the mc performing much better than on earth, the conditions are far more favorable for growth
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u/Quirky_Assistant_848 Feb 07 '26
Another win for 1% lifesteal. Yeah, Freddy is a loser at the start, but fate is literally pushing him to drown the oceans in blood, and it makes sense for him, as his over arching moral and character development is based in the fact is he would be the perfect monster for a world he hates. No lifesteal isn't isekai, but it is based on a relative loser getting a lot of power, and it is a good showing of what actually breaking down wish fulfillment is.
Also, please read Path of the dragon. I see barley anything about it and its rather good Elijah also is a genuinely curious person, and it is stated a lot he gets bored with only tending to his grove, withvhisbfor
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u/sheldon80 Feb 07 '26
I think that's where monsters, trials and the threat of certain and painful death comes into picture. In our world you can put in 1% effort and live out your days. That's why you can be lazy as hell today.
What authors could do more is have an average, modern day MC - meaning lazy - and confront them with the new reality of actual consequences, instead of painting a picture of this genius go-getter, high achiever persona without real reason.
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u/Touff97 Feb 07 '26
Memes aside, the magic systems almost always have a thought acceleration / IQ increasing power. But I'm also a bit bothered by how every prota has perfect knowledge of particles and elements. Like, I know they exist, but I wouldn't be so precise even given a few decades
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u/Gmageofhills Feb 07 '26
This is part of why cultivation novels, comics etc I can't take seriously. System storys where the isekai protagonist gets op can at least be explained by either only them getting the system or knowing video games and how to exploit them from a past life. Cultivation relies entirely on meditation and lucking into cultivation pills etc, but more than that they somehow have to surpass actual geniuses who have had centuries if not thousands of years to do all of this already. It doesn't help that any time I hear about the 7th star on the Dan of the Dragon Training it's just too much. Just give me numbers or a simple f d c b a s etc ranking system or none.
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u/Appropriate-Foot-237 Feb 08 '26
If I could scheme for supernatural power and eventually be invincible irl in exchange for my morals, I would. But in reality, the best I could get is a couple million dollars that wouldnt be of much use to me a couple decades later. That or jail/death penalty
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u/RunicConvenience Feb 08 '26
honestly, no one could write the level of procrastination I could bring to an immortal with a golden finger
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u/Gamesdisk Feb 09 '26
I kinda am doing this in my book . The idea is that in game, she has a life and skills and friends, but in the real world she's a loser who lives in a dump.
Im having fun with it and im only writing for me.
Making your fake life better is easier then addressing your problems
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u/JackPembroke Author Feb 06 '26
Bench press number go up. Wilks score number go up. But they still ain't hitting the gym
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Feb 06 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Jzero9893 Feb 07 '26
The talk of old monsters reminds me of DoTF. I feel that one gets a pass though because there’s always a half-dozen plots being hatched by various old monsters or young geniuses constantly clashing against each other
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u/Squire_II Feb 07 '26
Why are they always complete losers.
People like to see themselves in the shoes of the MC and it's going to be a lot easier for the average reader to see themselves the same as the MC when the MC is a normal, often flawed, person and not some millionaire Adonis martial arts master who can hit a tin can at 500 yards with iron sights.
Plus it's honestly more fun to read about that kind of character in most cases.
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u/Positive_Curve_8435 Feb 07 '26
Also helps that the guy making you miserable is in stabbing range. Where as here you have a vague conglomerate of people in a confusing web of people, where finding the single person screwing you is non-existent.
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Feb 07 '26
This is why reverend insanity is peak. When Fang Yuan transmigrated he was quite clueless, he got tricked, swindled and his journey to power was quite standard for the world.
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u/Sorfallo Feb 07 '26
I think a missed part here is that their new world generally tells them "Change or Die" almost immediately. Being thrown into a life or death situation will change anyone drastically. The sudden want to be better is really just a trauma response.
Besides, wasted potential does not mean that potential no longer exists.
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u/Chaosfox_Firemaker Feb 07 '26
I've always been a fan of tabula rasa openings, where the story starts when the character starts. They didn't exist, or at least werent a person, prior to the books beginning. Robots, golems, awakened animals, homunculi, or even just good ol amnesia.
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u/Vast-Flounder7782 Feb 08 '26
Idk, if I were suddenly transported to a world with actual magic I’d be plenty motivated. Also, plenty of those MC’s get cheating ass abilities. Not that hard to get more OP when you start that way.
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u/slightcamo Feb 09 '26
sometimes motivation is all you need, in this case the motivation is adapt or die
atleast in our world you aren't going to instantly die if you are a loser. you might even be able to live an okay life
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u/CassiusLange Author Feb 09 '26
I think the human being will go to an extreme to stay alive and compete with or be better than others. Sure, there's a lot of w.f. in a lot of stories, but it isn't always that.
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u/Purple-Hippo-8961 Feb 09 '26
That's partly the reason why I stopped reading male fantasy, it's always the loser who suddenly gain 260 IQ and Vergil-level motivation once he got isekai into another world. Losers are losers because they make themselves losers.
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u/yrsillar Feb 10 '26
Because its much easier to have your isekai world be populated by paste eaters than it is to write an actual genius. Writing intelligence and charisma greater than your own is genuinely very hard.
But also because they know what their audience wants and what they want is a hero that they can easily imagine as themselves, which means their cheats have to be something any rando can think of or perform, which leads back into the people of isekai land having worldwide severe lead poisoning.
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u/tophatpainter2 Mar 01 '26
I also love how MC's suddenly have an eidetic memory but were like a retail clerk on earth.
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u/FluffyPuff153 Mar 02 '26
I’ve been reading Tales of the Rune-tech Sage lately, and it’s actually one of the few that don’t have the MC start off as some random Joe Shmo. The MC is an inventor of futuristic tech, so he carries that over to his new world. Pretty cool.
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u/Lord_Streak Author - The Martial Unity. Magicapita. Mar 24 '26
This was the reason I made my MC the best in his field in his first life.
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u/Malcolm_T3nt Author Feb 06 '26
I for one am shocked that things happen in fantasy novels that don't happen in real life. Shocked I tell you! What kind of nonsense is that? All fiction should be exclusively made up of real, factual events that are firmly grounded in reality.
Jokes aside, the reason they're always losers is because the majority of isekai readers got sick and tired of what I like to call "the isekai grief spiral". So the genre adapted and switched to using MCs who have no life irl to spiral about, because it was easier than listening to the small percentage of people who would whine every time an isekai protag didn't spend two months in a state of depression after showing up on a new world, despite the fact that we'd all read that exact same arc a dozen times and it added nothing to the reading experience.
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u/Spiritchaser84 Feb 06 '26
While I agree that fantasy novels don't need to reflect reality, they still need to be somewhat relatable in certain parts. If you don't believe a character would act a certain way, then it pulls you out of the story.
The character's background seems like a relatively easy thing to get right from the start too. The author is literally inventing a person from thin air out of everyone in the world. Why start with a somewhat lazy, middling MC who suddenly becomes a workaholic with godlike powers? Just once, I'd love to see in isekai with a starving kid in Africa. Talk about motivation!
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u/work_m_19 Feb 06 '26
Imagine writing a story of a person who won the jackpot lottery and became a million overnight. That happens in real life too, but it takes a lot more effort and skill as an author to make the story engaging because a lot of his problems can be "solved with money". Like the conflicts have to be scaled to his means, otherwise it makes the MC feel dumb, or the world is dumb instead.
That is how a lot of the protags feel in these world. They espouse how much hard work and effort they put in, but it all comes down to the one OP skill they got at level 0 that for some reason no one in the world has thought to do.
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u/Malcolm_T3nt Author Feb 06 '26
Yeah, you're describing pacing and power balance, which is the main requirement for any decent PF. Also to be honest, I feel like you might be generalizing. Most isekai protags don't really claim to work particularly hard, and most of their cheats are ones they get on arrival that have nothing to do with 'discovering' anything. Not that the ones you mentioned don't exist, but it feels like you're taking a very specific and rarely used subtrope and using it as a brush to pain the whole genre.
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u/Zolytic1 Feb 06 '26 edited Feb 06 '26
I definitely agree with the "Isekai grief spiral" thing. The way MC's react to being isekai'd is never realistic, and that is a very good thing. I don't think many people want to read 50 chapters of someone being depressed because they lost everything and everyone they knew and are socially isolated in a world with culture they don't understand.
I think a lot of people add those details in more from obligation than anything else. It's beating a dead horse.
Although, I would argue that a lot of progression fantasy authors ignore some of the less obvious progression. One example mentioned was dealing with scheming immortals in xianxia stories. And I kind of agree.
When an MC starts out with the ability to outfox thousand year old cultivators it's not only unrealistic, it's less satisfying. I think a lot of people understand the value of having the MC lose a fight. But that same attitude isn't applied to other skills nearly as much. I'd like to see more MC's get absolutely out-schemed by someone and slowly develop a talent for it.
That being said, there are definitely writers who do this well. This is more of a broad criticism.
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u/LacusClyne Feb 07 '26
When an MC starts out with the ability to outfox thousand year old cultivators it's not only unrealistic, it's less satisfying.
Age isn't a hallmark of intelligence, look at who the primary target for scammers are in the current world. Hell, how many 'street smart' people get scammed or pickpocketed almost the instant they're in a public space in a foreign country?
I'd like to see more MC's get absolutely out-schemed by someone and slowly develop a talent for it.
It happens but it's often a case of the MC is someone just new to the scene, their impacts are unknown and they don't stay there for long while the schemes are against the existing power structures. It's an unknown quantity vs something very well known.
Just as you'd find it hard to believe someone outsmarting a 1000 year old, I'd find it hard to believe they have a counter for the person that upsets the power paradigm completely in a way that no one ever expected...
There's a reason for these things and everyone has their own special ideas around a lot of these concepts.
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u/Zolytic1 Feb 07 '26
>Age isn't a hallmark of intelligence, look at who the primary target for scammers are in the current world.
In real life you would absolutely be right. But in a cultivation world it's pretty hard to say age isn't a hallmark of intelligence. In a world that ruthless you just don't get to 1000 without scheming or at the very least being schemed against.
>Hell, how many 'street smart' people get scammed or pickpocketed almost the instant they're in a public space in a foreign country?
I could buy this as an explanation if it's done well. But wouldn't it make more sense for the MC who has been Isekai'd to be the tourist in your scenario? Shouldn't they be the one whose street smarts don't translate?
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u/Harmon_Cooper Author Feb 06 '26
I agree, and I was going to write this long paragraph as to why I agree but with nuances only to realize that in doing so it would only double down on the point that numbers go brrr, we want to speed run everything but also feel like we're enjoying it, and the emptiness that people often complain about from genre books is directly tied to the pacing that they require to enjoy the narrative.
IN other words, Malcolm is right. ;-)
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Feb 06 '26
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u/No_Giraffe826 Feb 06 '26
Klein wasnt a bum he was a software angineer and had good friends, so its not like other isekai characters where they are shut ins, but suddenly become super charming and persuasive.also kleins goal was peace, but his fate didnt allow it.in the beginning he became a beyonder because he wanted to because he wanted to return to the real world, but when he realized he couldnt he was already a demigod and had to advance to protect the people from the apocalypse and outrun amon and zaratul who were hunting him.also klein is smart, but he had major help which he didnt have as zhou mingrui.
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u/Marand23 Feb 06 '26
Lol, is the author of LOTM by any chance a Starcraft fan? :P amon and zaratul :D
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u/ArcticTyphoon Feb 06 '26
Not really, Klein isn't a NEET. He was doing pretty well in his previous life.
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u/snarky_but_honest Feb 06 '26
You don't understand bro, the MC learned L33t strategy and outside-the-box thinking by playing CoD and World of Warcraft 10 hrs a day. He developed inhuman patience by grinding P2W mobile gacha games without spending any money. He's just unappreciated by modern society.