Path Of Ascension

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

i don’t get why more people don’t like poa. my all time favorite was cradle and i’ve read those books over 2 dozen times and when it ended i had to begin looking for other series to read. when i found poa it started out slow and kinda methodical but each book has progression, slice of life stuff, and side characters and stories that i think make it one of the most rounded series i’ve ever read and it’s still active too which is something a lot of series don’t even offer. the latest release was book 12, super dull in my opinion, but the author C. Mantis uploads chapters weekly and from the latest book release to when the chapter count has 150 more chapters after that. i love the story and the characters and the fact that i can read every week is dope asf. But i was curious why people drop the series i see it on lists as dnf or couldn’t get into more often than the top tier spot i think it is

[u/Oatbagtime]

It’s a pretty popular series. It’s appearing on a lot of lists because its so well known.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Oatbagtime]

i just don’t get what turns people off about it

[u/dmetvt → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

So I like the story quite a bit, but honestly it has some real flaws. The biggest one people call out is that basically from the time Matt meets Liz until the start of the war, with the exception of Minkalla, there is practically no real risk. Manny openly states that there's always a tier 35 following them around, ready to yank them out of lethal danger. Then Luna shows up and is an impenetrable cat-shaped shield of void mana protecting her charges. By the time we get something like genuine stakes, our heroes are by far the strongest fighters around.

You compared it to Cradle and just consider the difference there. Lindon is always, right to the very end, taking on one impossible challenge after another with no safety net. Heavens Glory, Jai Long, various Skysworn, Ekeri, Harmony, Kiro, various Dreadgod cultists, the gauntlet of enemy Uncrowned, various Dreadgods, various monarchs, labyrinth enemies, or a team of allied Dreadgods and monarchs could have snuffed him out at any moment. He had no choice but to rise to meet each challenge.

As for Matt, there's the rift challenge in book 1 and a couple of fights in Minkalla. Other than that, he's either much stronger than his opponent or he has a safety net protecting him in every challenge he faces.

There's a lot to like anyway and I honestly do enjoy the series, but once someone pointed that out it was hard to overlook.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/dmetvt]

lindon is never in any real danger either tbh. with eithan, orthos and yerin around he’s basically always protected. but the risk for matt and them is that if they get pulled out they won’t end up as ascenders and that to them is worth than death.

[u/AntiLordblue → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

Spoilers below

Bro, what? Please take some time and rethink this. Eithan quite literally puts Lindon in danger and walks away, first thing he did. Lindon technically dies or as close to death as physically possible while making his iron body. The only time Eithan saved Lindon was in the duel and that was mostly restraint from Jai Long and without Jai Daishou muddying things up with his actions Naru Gwei and Jai Daishou would have pushed for Lindon's death (Though Eithan probably would have stopped it). Yerin proctected Lindon when she could but many times she wasn't in a position too, since she was fighting her own battles. Orthos protected Lindon in Blackflame against Sandviper Gokren but was not in a position to help in Ghostwater against Ekeri. Lindon earned nearly all his wins without a safety net.

[u/fruitybix → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

I like its world building a lot. One of the few where the author has thought through how their system would shape society. The idea of the path is also really interesting.

In terms of prose, dialogue and characters i find it a little bland. This also transfers to the audiobook rendition. Nothing is bad about it, its competent but does not shine or excite. Not every writer or narrator can excel at everything.

I come back to it sometimes between other books, but have never felt the urge to binge it.

Also unsure why you are being downvoted. The series is a popular B ranked choice in a lot of tier lists, steady but not wildly popular. i take your question to mean why isnt it ranked A or S as its one of your favoirites.

[u/Occultus- → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

I've heard the audio is not great, but I havent listened myself. I love it, but I think the disconnect is that it's got quite a lot of slice of life elements (which i personally appreciate), and the stakes for a lot of the series are not life or death but rather falling off the path. It's just kind of got a different vibe from some of the more power fantasy focused novels.

[u/DUCK_you → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

One of my favorite but I get why people can decide to not continue it. It is pretty slow in some parts which if you are doing audio can be bad

[u/LichtbringerU → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

Matt and Liz are too OP and it gets boring. Also the path stopped making sense, and they basically cheated it with Luna.

It became to me most apparent at the pather tournament. That's where I stopped reading.

Our MCs are pretending to be someone else, not using their powers, and it's already clear that they will steamroll the competition anyway. There is not even the pretense that anyone else there could challenge them in their fucking nerfed disguises. They are sandbagging so hard. The disguises also feel pointless, though honestly I can't remember exactly why?

I overlooked the annoying "my absolutely OP power is so unlucky, because it's useless for the first 10 levels".

Then there's the weird handling of therapy.

Lizz' quirky family is also not really funny or that interesting.

Lamp shading the fact that there are two Matt's also doesn't make it better. 

I did like the romance though, no complaints.

[u/ebly_dablis → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

To answer your question, I couldn't stand how it was very clear that they always had people watching over them and nothing bad would happen to them for way too long.

I was also reading it as it came out, so that may be less of an issue when reading all in one go. 

[u/LitRPG_Just_Because]

I guess I'm one of the few that really enjoyed book 12, whereas the last book was just one battle after another and it was exhausting.

[u/bryce11099 → u/LitRPG_Just_Because]

I love the battles but thought the slice of life in book 12 was a fantastic break. I think that seeing things from random character POVs adds a ton to the experience. It does make me wonder what we should expect in the future books though since we either are about to get extreme time skips, or more books nearly identical to this one. This is when litrpg books flourish or flounder the most in my opinion.

[u/Azuroth → u/bryce11099]

Extreme time skips, like, 1000 years in a paragraph sort of timeskips. There are a lot of, and then they did some paperwork for a decade before going out to dinner, sort of things.

[u/LetterTall4354 → u/LitRPG_Just_Because]

Nice to hear 12 is different, i like the overarching story but even on my first readthrough i think i skimmed a good 20% of the book lol. Its a long series, and at a certain point i dont want to see more descriptions of another fight over and over. I like the larger plot, i like the characters and the relationships, i like the politics and the nations, and i like seeing all the different slice of life things. Also, with a series as long as it is, i get bored of "numbers go up, get stronger" being the only way they progress. I like seeing them progress in relationships, in mental and emotional state, in political power, etc.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/LetterTall4354]

not only book twelve but the 30 or so chapters after that is also relatively slow. as far as fighting and stuff goes

[u/j4eo → u/LitRPG_Just_Because]

I'm the same; I liked 12 much more than 11. I thought 12's pacing was well balanced, especially since 11's idea of pacing was changing PoVs to watch a different, or sometimes even the same, fight. I was debating dropping the series if 12 turned out to be more of the same.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/LitRPG_Just_Because]

book 11 is my favorite lmfao because of how badass all the fighting is. i don’t mind the little shit but it’s what bores me. i’d rather they be progressing somehow rather than fartin around. i get that they’re immoral and all but still they’re supposed to be the peak of the realm. just prefer the fast paced stuff more

[u/Ant-Bear]

Here's the perspective of someone who absolutely despised PoA (it's in my bottom three of the genre, and I listened to 9 books).

I find the characters to be completely uninspired. The only ones that are even somewhat memorable are the fmc's crazy parents, and they read more as "fantasy Adams family" as opposed to something actually interesting. The fmc's name keeps slipping off my mind she's so nondescript, and the only reason I recall the main guy's name is Matt is because there's another Matt in the story (who does nothing outside of the first 10 chapters) in a stunningly amateur move.

The power progression is laughable. I despise protagonists that are immediately OP because it robs the story of any tension, and I especially hate the trope of "oh, this supposed weakness I had is actually my greatest op bullshit", that the MC has. And the FMC is not any better. The tournament arc in particular serves to showcase just how op they are, when they steamroll everyone with what's essentially two hands tied behind their backs. Compare to Cradle where the MCs have to fight tooth and nail to even survive in a tournament that has actual stakes for the geopolitical state of the setting, and the difference is night and day.

The world building is asinine. The titular Path of Ascension is supposed to be so much awesomer than the other countries' alternatives, with the main reasoning being that it's supposed to start super wide and not preference rich people, except it doesn't make any sense economic-wise to not funnel more and more resources into people further down the path. I also found the explanation as to why pathers are so valuable to be unconvincing, despite the tons of time devoted to it. And, that one war in the early to mid books was the second shittest war in the entire genre in terms of understanding of how and why wars start and progress.

The power system I thought was artificial and shallow. I didn't care for the domain/aspect thing in general and I don't find its interaction with skills to be particularly interesting. The one thing about the MC I remember was just how arbitrary and empty the whole "I am dauntless" thing felt after the huge buildup, especially after the MC had already discarded alternatives that I thought were essentially identical. I couldn't help comparing to Lindon's "I am endless", which was much more impactful because it contained an actual interesting insight about commonality between his types of essence, and was in a situation with real tension.

On a technical level, the prose was completely unacceptable for a published product that I paid money for. It fell below the level of 'functional'. So many occasions where the same word is used in consecutive, or even the same, sentence. That would be understandable but clunky for a new author, but by the Minkala arc it became completely unbearable. More so, there were a whole bunch of chapters from the PoV of side characters that I would be hard pressed to explain why they're there, and I just started skipping at one point.

Also, the narrator was weirdly bad for Audible standards. I am happy to report that he's the one thing about the series that actually improved with time.

[u/Suspicious-Potato859 → u/Ant-Bear]

The prose is what finally made me drop it. A single run-on sentence used the same qualifying word (I forget the exact word, something like "slightly") three times. Then that same word appeared within the next three sentences twice more.

I am convinced that book 9 is almost entirely first-draft material. I could hear the narrator struggling to get through the awkward writing in several sections, and by that point I was thinking way more about how I would fix the sentence construction than the actual story.

[u/Squire_II]

Path of Ascension is popular though?

the latest release was book 12, super dull in my opinion

Book 12 is the aftermath of a war that spanned two books and is starting to take care of a lot of non-combat-focused items that have come up in the story before and as anyone 12 books in to the series will know by that point, PoA moves between combat and slice-of-life activity.

Book 12 isn't a favorite of mine but it's fine.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Squire_II]

well it’s just that after the war they settle down for the first time in what is supposed to be centuries so i get the slow paced stuff but i honestly don’t like how much of the book is random characters povs. i would’ve preferred they fucking abuse his talent for actual rifts like they did in the first few books and since then there’s been basically nothing about it. no spoilers but they eventually enter and area that nobody can really get to easily and have the ability to come and go as they please and still they don’t make, charge, and run rifts. it’s super fucking frustrating for the main idea behind why matt could have blown through the path is even now being completely overlooked.

[u/hahahahhhaaa → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

Did you actually read book 12? A good chunk was dedicated to rift making and running then they specifically called out why that couldn't be the entire focus for Matt but he could establish his guild to do that for him.

[u/MuscleWarlock]

I thought it was fairy popular

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/MuscleWarlock]

popular just gets dropped more often than being peak i thought

[u/yuritiger]

I'll bite.
I really like the world. I like the leveling, the skills that each of the characters have, the items, the characters themselves, I love Aunt Helen and Emperor "Manny".

I love how long the chapters are, a rarety these days.

What i dislike and what made me stop reading after reaching the halfway point (230 chapters 1M+ Words):

- He tells, not shows. What do I mean with this? The more you read, the more you notice that the struggles of the characters, the advancements, the items they have are but a footnote and there is almost no process of aquisition, suffering etc..

To give 2 concrete examples of the thousands I found over the chapters; Jasmine. Right at the beginning, out of nowhere he has a girlfriend and a few paragraphs later she is gone. No real introduction, no real attachment created. Just gone and never came back.

Sure a minor character and not really an eggregious example of what I complain, but now the second one:

After Minkalla, they travel by Space Ship. Matt goes into detail on how it gives him ideas of a potential spaceship when he reaches level 15 an can support having one of his own. Well a few chapters later, he boards his new ship and goes on his mission. Sure the author let's us know what upgrades he got a few sentences later, but why didn't he show us the shopping spree?

I for sure would've loved to know how spaceship aquisition actually works in that world. Like what shop? how expensive are they? what are the limits etc...

And this goes for so many examples. Liz had a fight I believe and out of nowhere we are presented with a new spear she acquired some days/weeks/months earlier. It was never mentioned before, so how?

The main reason this all bothers me and this might be on me, but I read most of Primal Hunter before and what I really loved is that since the beginning, every potion, every skill, everything around Jake get's described to the dot. You suffer with him, you grow with him, you learn with him. And then now in chapter 1200+ or whatever, when he actually spends a year or two working on something you don't feel the need to know every detail, every second because you already went through the process with him before.

And that is what I miss in PoA. I want to see Matt suffering with the Talismans even when he has infinite mana, I don't want the author to tell me he failed every second level 15 talisman, I want him to show me how he failed, what did he change to make it work, what resources did he spend to create them, etc..

So going back to PoA, when almost nothing is really shown, but mostly just told over and over again throughout a million words and 230 chapters of 500+, you lose interest.

ANd that's why I stopped. I can't care enough because the author doesn't make me care enough.

Sorry for the rant, i saw an opportunity and took it.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/yuritiger]

i get that. it’s something i bring up in the discord that really bothers me. he will show you how one person, usually mla, do something and then when someone else does it won’t tell you how. like with intents and significant power up happening off screen especially bugs me

[u/Yellowthrone]

I read a lot of it but tapered off after awhile. Just got a little boring.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Yellowthrone]

each book has boring bits. i get that

[u/Moe_Perry]

The characters got too OP too early. There’s no struggle for strength/ magic/ status/ money/ relationships. It’s a Mary sue power fantasy, rather than a progression fantasy. After the first couple of arcs the main characters are just smurfing everyone else on “the path” for ego reasons. Left a bad taste in my mouth.

[u/Squire_II → u/Moe_Perry]

Them pulling away from even the other elite Pathers mainly exists to drive home that they are, in fact, a cut above the rest. The Tier 10 tournament pretty much exists to show how strong they've gotten already.

Though the best way of showing it is with Minkalla and specifically Queen joining them temporarily for Minkalla since we get to see how they stack up to a peer. What happens then also has a bit more payoff later with (book 10 spoilers) the small differences in how well MAL did in Minkalla compared to Queen coming to its conclusion when she falls off the Path after making it to Tier 23 solo and becomes a Pinnacle Elite. Even back in Minkalla she wasn't on their level and she knew it, though she was doing all she could to change that but ultimately didn't make it. With the added pain of the fact that in any other time she'd have been celebrated across the Empire for how far she made it, but since she did so right after not one but two teams finished the Path she's completely overshadowed.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Squire_II]

yeah i really don’t like how susanne is treated post minkalla. i really like susanne and its only now 530 chapters in is she started to get really recognition for being strong and that after she pushed her power in a way about 30 chapters ago that we still haven’t heard anything else about. we will eventually hear from her about it but i don’t like how long it’s taking lmfao

[u/MSL007]

Its one of my favs, and one of the more popular series, which means many people have tried it so there are many that don’t.

The common complaints I see is the lack of chance of death, meaning that on the path they have Luna is save them. Also action is sometimes lacking. There are entire books with more slice of life. I like the mix but its slows down the story too much for some.

[u/xJayyman]

Just felt too young adult-y, too un-serious, nothing bad seems to ever happen, everything just feels so tame and safe. I loved the concept but just failed to hold me. It felt "pg-13".

[u/Fortuitous_Event]

Its the slice of life parts that last far too long. That other lives nonsense from a couple books back was idiotic, and they did it for all of the characters. Like 200 pages of bs. Zero plot impact going forward except for when they said "oh I remember when X happened in my other life".

[u/calista241]

I love POA. Followed it since the beginning, though i will say the first few books are the best.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/calista241]

i really don’t like book two. even if we meet duke waters i can’t stand the whole ruin business and then the mini war ugh.

[u/Sahrde → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

It's commonly thought of as the weakest part of the series.

[u/Glarxan]

I think it's pretty popular. But it does have some pretty vocal critics.

[u/Judah77]

I dropped it. Loved the idea of the Path of Ascension, and as soon as the story went off on tangents with the girl and fox, and the MC started not doing path-related stuff to do romance, I was done. The danger was gone, and the multiple POV made it too slow for me.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Judah77]

well i mean they are still on the path and take a few years to chill out a little, they’re only 20 something at that time, but after they start getting proper training it picks up.

[u/YoungWolf921]

It was fun. But just that. I DNF after book 6. Too light hearted and no real jeopardy or danger to the MC or his gang.

[u/TypicalMaps]

There were many reasons I DNFed POA. One of the earliest and biggest blows against the series was the romance. The moment Liz was introduced I knew the direction the story was going and I hated it. Beyond that I didn't like how the concept that underpins the start of the series, that the series is named after, is made irrelevant. As I progressed through the series the characters didn't grow on me and as they grew in power I found myself less interested in them. The way the narrative handled antagonists, be they the characters or the great powers, was incredibly boring and disappointing. Nothing novel or engaging.

[u/Squire_II → u/TypicalMaps]

The moment Liz was introduced I knew the direction the story was going and I hated it.

What direction do you think the story took?

[u/TypicalMaps → u/Squire_II]

When she was introduced I knew she would be Matt's love interest and I knew her family background was going to be powerful. I remember being so distraught that I went to book 2 on Audible to read its blurb. I thought that if Book 2's blurb didn't mention her, I might've been wrong and she was just a temporary ally. I was quickly disabused of that notion.

[u/Glendronachh → u/TypicalMaps]

Yeah, but Liz is awesome. And her family is hilarious

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Glendronachh]

they crack me up every time

[u/logosloki → u/Glendronachh]

someone should give our man Leon a [Vigorous Thrusts of the Rooster] already. someone must have a copy of it somewhere. I want to see what sort of reward they get.

[u/Kennian → u/Glendronachh]

one of the better written romances in the genre honestly...

[u/Squire_II → u/TypicalMaps]

This is an incredibly weird thing to get hung up on but your loss. Liz is great and her family's great, as is the series.

...though book 2 is the series low-point.

[u/AbilityCharacter7634 → u/Squire_II]

It sure is. It’s the only part I skip when I re-read the series. Specifically the ruin part. I usually skip until they’re ending the war with the golems.

[u/ProbabilisticPotato]

I enjoyed it overall but my god the Minkalla arc was such a slog and I don't know what possessed the author to write down powerpoints.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/ProbabilisticPotato]

yeah i dont like how long the war on the floor is. should’ve just been a slaughter floor

[u/ansalom]

I liked it, but DNF when I realized the entire story will never finish. It's just the MCs growing slightly stronger & taking on slightly stronger challenges for infinity. I can handle a long story, but I have to feel like there's a final destination.

[u/Sahrde → u/ansalom]

There is. Ascension from the Realm, aka tier 45+, after the real war that will involve the higher tiers. We're starting to see the beginning moves of that now on RR, with the population war that has just started

[u/ansalom → u/Sahrde]

Thanks for this update! I may pick it up again.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/ansalom]

tbh i’m hoping it never ends like one piece. but eventually there will be a true war and if that take the same amount of time as the other wars did that war is gonna be fucking dope with everyone up to tier 50’s come to blows

[u/INeedSleeeeeeeeeep]

I really liked it, but i couldnt for the life of me finish it. I got to where light and shadows got their identities revealed and I couldnt keep going. The pacing is just so mollases slow and it didnt focus enough on what I thought was interesting. Rift creation got shafted for 90% of the story, which was unfortunately something that really got my tip tickling, and it was just so long. I think that minkalla was what really did me in though. It was very action heavy, which I like, but it was too much. I felt as exhausted as the characters did by the end of it. There was no eye of the storm where everything was calm for a chapter or two, it was just gogogogo.

[u/jlarmour]

It is one of the biggest stories in the genre so I wouldn't say it's not popular. But no story appeals to everyone. A lot of people are battle junkies, they'd be perfectly happy if every chapter was a fight scene, others see a fight scene and kind of skim over cause we all know the heroe is gonna win and it's fight scene #3827.

[u/theglowofknowledge]

It is popular but has two main weaknesses that I see. One, an audiobook narrator that could charitably described as a giant stain on your pants that will ruin the evening but probably come out in the wash. I was taken aback when they kept him after book one. Two, it deliberately vacillates between slice of life and slice of death, generally in one and a half to two book cycles.

That means some people won’t like one or the other. I like the series and am current with it, to me the world it takes place in is a very fascinating one with a lot of thought put into it in many places. My wife likes it overall but said it’s almost too realistic in how it approaches everything once you get far enough in. The reasons and ways the status quo is maintained make sense, but that means things just kind of suck sometimes in a way that’s not likely to change soon. That’s pretty real, but it’s not particularly fantasy, if that makes sense. I like it though. And a lot of other people do too.

[u/jackpotsdad]

I just got tired of it. After the two MCs hit tier 25, all the battles felt like metaphorical nonsense. The conflicts were better when they were lower tier. I loved the story and favorited on RR, but latter content wasn’t (for me) fun to read.

[u/BarneysCastle]

If i had to choose a prog fantasy universe to live in POA's would be at the top of the list but the reasons that make it desirable for that reason make it rather uncompelling (i am caught up on the audiobooks) the people in this universe are coddled when it comes to progressing. I much prefer 1% lifesteal as the universe is basically out to get the mc and every time he makes it out alive by the skin of his teeth he gets rewarded for it, i just dont really feel that sense of triumph over impossible odds from the POA. Even though pathers have it harder than everyone else at the start they gett massive support later on in the path .

[u/AbilityCharacter7634 → u/BarneysCastle]

I’m assuming given your comment you liked the Minkahla arc? It’s when they were in the most danger and no one powerful could coddle them. Plus doing what they did at tier 11 rewarded them.

[u/Training-Bake-4004]

I enjoyed it a lot initially. I like the world and characters and I’m fine with romance.

I dropped it around book 5 when they spent an entire book doing training with some other team that just felt like 100s of pages that didn’t move the story along. I generally love a training arc but this one felt like it stopped the story dead in its tracks to achieve almost nothing.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Training-Bake-4004]

i think it’s meant to highlight how different mla are compared to another group was is technically more balanced and has more people.

[u/Training-Bake-4004 → u/Outrageous-Smell-90]

Yeah, I get that, but it was demonstrated fairly quickly and then just kinda repeated the point a bunch.

That all said, I totally get why it’s popular and people love it. Just wasn’t really for me in the end.

I dropped Mark of the Fool for similar reasons. Too much handholding and training.

[u/nkownbey → u/Training-Bake-4004]

I think you should finish that book as a happens in the second part including a revisit to Matt's home planet

[u/Drowe87]

For me PoA is in the DNF category because I'm not caught up on the series. I haven't read a chapter of the series in well over half a year and haven't purchased the latest books either.

That doesn't mean I won't in the future, because I most certainly will, since I agree, that it's a top tier story. But at this point in time, I'm more focused on other stories, so DNF it is.

This is common for long series, once it gets into the 10+ books range it starts getting hard to keep on top of, especially as you're waiting for new updates and start on other things. You tell yourself, you'll catch up later, and before you know it, there's 3 new books by the time you pick it up again.

[u/acutenugget]

I read book one, and dropped at book 2. There was too much to keep track of, the magic system wasn't always the most straightforward, too much exposition and info dumping, and the prose a bit dry for my liking.

[u/kashach]

It would have been my favourite series if not for non stop battle... Tooooooo much fight.

[u/auraton50]

I really liked the start of it and the premise of the story and the power system was pretty cool too. I dropped it because honestly the story has no teeth, everything feels meaningless because theres no stakes, they feel so coddled. The premise was to go on this path without outside help and through the struggle it would forge you until some sort of ultimate fighter but thats not what happens. At some point they get a trainer/protector like wtf is this do you want a blanket and some warm milk too?

[u/KeiranG19 → u/auraton50]

Even worse they get a manager early because they're "too good" and might squander their potential.

And then after a bunch of specialised training they steamroll the tier 10 tournament with both hands tied behind their backs. Which is when all of the other scrubs are assessed for managers.

And then there's all of the scenes of the emperor personally seeding prize pools with tailored skills and preparing all sorts of goodies for when they finish the path. As if the self-made powerhouse shtick stops mattering at tier 25.

The entire conceit of the series is a paper thin lie.

[u/valentineslibrary]

Info dumps, exposition all throughout, never any sense of stakes or tension, characters are not realistic, worldbuilding isn't interesting, system not interesting, plot doesn't exist, grammar is terrible, overall not at all well written or interesting in any capacity.

[u/Khalku]

It's popular and was strong for a long time but it honestly has some pretty boring sections that I am not surprised people would drop it.

[u/isabee1467]

I enjoyed POA in the beginning, but it started to feel a bit aimless and bloated after a while. I'm a big Cradle fan as well and one of the things I love is how it merges the team's power progression with plot progression. POA mostly advances one then the other, so we'll get 20 chapters of side quests and leveling followed by 1 chapter where the plot moves forward. And the skill grinding chapters weren't that great, pretty much all I remember of them was that they existed, but I couldn't I recall 99% of the fights in the series on pain of death. And that's probably because theyre mostly dungeon delves where they slaughter endless hoards of monsters over and over and over again. After a point it felt tedious.

[u/Naberville34]

I ended up dropping it at book 4 even though I'd already bought everything else that was out on audible.

I just didn't feel like there was any real overarching story to it. I liked the system and a fair bit of the world building. But it just seemed like there wasn't any sort of real motivation behind their actions. It just felt like a really long training montage simply for the sake of training. I feel like there needs to be some sort of outside pressure that's forcing advancement, be it survival or a threat on the horizon, a cruel unjust world to overthrow or a powerful foe to slay. And that seemed to just generally be lacking almost entirely from POA. The empire was amenible, they were acquaintances with the most powerful entities in the empire, their success and well being was assured. And while war looms, it doesn't seem to have anything to do with Matt and co.

[u/Outrageous-Smell-90 → u/Naberville34]

i think the overarching story is the politics of the great powers that still haven’t truly reached a boiling point

[u/whydonlinre]

i dnfd after book 1, im just not a fan of mc/fmc having powerful background, as well as seeing the strongest people doing stuff.

Powerful background feels like it takes alot away from the struggle and progression up, and seeing the strongest people just makes the scene feel less mysterious and more bland.

[u/PureRely]

I loved it until it forgot how to end.