@IkariSon no names cannon fodder die all the time in danmachi for warp effect. someone whose death will affect the readers in some way that will stay I meant. apologies for the confusion.

The only named ones that have died are line arshe and friends and my only complaint regarding that it is that I wished line and bete's relation was more explored before her death. It would have had a greater impact then. otherwise I am fine with that.

However, those cannon fodder of ganesha familiar who died against filvis were there to die. even oomori probably does not remember their names, and he created them. I meant the idiotic group who was fighting filvis. that was the biggest letdown because filvis could have and should have killed haruhime logically but did not because plot.

To be honest I think you are overestimating the importance of the battles at Folkvangr at the end of volume 17. They were basically short-lived confrontations that got interrupted with no conclusion. At the most I'd say that they might have been slight teasers into what to expect for volume 18, but anything might happen in volume 18, so maybe not even that.

I think at least a small portion of SO13 will take place during volume 17 even if the volume does for sure end up taking place during volume 19.

Too many unanswered questions or hints to SO13's plot during volume 17 to ignore addressing them. Like why did Riveria and Lefiya go so far into the dungeon without any of the other members of Loki's elites, and what happened in the dungeon with the Freya Familia reconnaissance team lead by Noga that was sent to keep an eye on them? Not to mention Noga was also in AR1, so it's pretty obvious he/she will be in SO13.

That tweet was made a long time ago as well, Oomori could have possibly changed his mind like he did with vol.12 of the main series and pushed what he originally planned for SO13's plot to SO14, but it might still be the same.

@ThatRabidPotato A lot of us had to wait awhile for SO volumes to come out. That gave us lots of time to think about what could, should, or might happen. SO12 had a lot riding on it. It was the culmination of the previous eleven volumes, so expectation really couldn't have been higher. And a number of fans were not happy with what we ended up getting.

SO is at the end of the day is about the Loki Familia in general and Ais in particular. To see them grow and over come their challenges, to develop and change as they live through events. What we ended up getting in volume 12 was nothing they had learned in the preceding volumes really making any difference. They get bailed out at the last moment by GBA(Grand Bell Argonaut) and the Freya Familia.

Having them be assisted if fine, but having help only show up at the in moments when Freya and Hestia Familias have just as much at stake takes away from the actual main cast and makes absolutely no practical sense. Freya Familia helping is fine but they should have been there from the start of the operation. The narrative need Loki Familia to win the day, maybe with some help, but certainly not with GBA dues ex machina.

Ais and Bell developing is would be nice, but all we got was Ais taking a nap next to Bell and her hearing GBA and magically overcoming her hatred. There was so much more that could have been done with that. Desperate was already breaking, having is shatter as a symbolic show of her hates self destructiveness and truly putting her in dire straits could have given that moment more weight. With Ais having to face that she was going to die thinking about her friends, then her parents, and finally a certain boy. Only to find Bell's knife in front of her that he lost in Knossos. Then using the very tactic she taught him to kill Revis with the Ushi-Wakamaru-Nishiki and her mother wind. And rather than the nap have Bell give her the knife.

Another major thing was getting Lefiya out of her funk. That should have been Ais not Loki. Ais has tried so hard to help her friends when they were having trouble only to have it blow up in her face each time. This was the perfect point to have that desire to be there for her friend finally have some payoff. Something as simple as asking Lefiya not to become like her, a product of her own destructive hatred.

There was just so much that could have been done with SO 12 and it felt like it was just used to show off how amazing Bell and his friends were at the end. Almost every part of this volume could have and probably should have been done better.

Now there nothing wrong with being satisfied with what you got and enjoying what is there. But some people are going to have different expectation and if those aren't met, along with something like the rampant abuse of plot armor in MS14 can be enough to cause a loss of faith in the author.

@Kisaki Tosane

How could SO13 take place during DM19 if SO13 and 14 will be released right after DM18? that would mean that SO would advance the timeline of DM.

I thought SO13 would take place during DM17 and show us the perspective of the Loki family charmed by Freya and Riveria and Lefiya's expedition and SO14 would take place during DM18 and we would see the performance of the Loki family during the war game.

But if SO overcomes DM's timeline, wouldn't this be a spoiler for the main series?

@Leinad91

SO13 and 14 could still be in the time line after or around MS 19 if the story is not going to be inside Orario. No one has bought this up but if you look pass Lefiya and Loki the back round city art does not look like anything we have seen of Orario. At less from any of the book art idk if its something we seen in the games.

So maybe this new ark of SO is going to be about the Loki Familia taking care of something big for the guild outside of the city. Like with certain magic city that keeps getting bought up both in early SO and in Familia chronicle Freya.

Just me thinking got nothing to go on but the back round art to go on for this but it could be use to keep Bell out of SO if well he is half a world away and can't just pop up out of the blue and take all the lime light away. Also on the flip side this would mean that nothing to much would need to be said about SO in the MS if most of Loki Familia is again on the other side of the world doing their own thing. Maybe just a well Loki Familia is being sent to do a mission for the guild.

The only problem would be Ais not being in the MS again but that could be fix if she and some of the others say in Orario to keep the city's fighting force up. Maybe working with Hestia Familia on a mission in the Dungeon or something.

@Leinad91

I have seen your comments complaining about the length of the volumes...

I literally told you that I was talking about DM18 but you still seemed to have missed or ignored that. My complaint about page count was that it felt like filler, but if the content justifies it then it's fine. You seem to think that character development = high page count but that's not necessarily the case, it's more about how you handle said character(s)

Comparing GOT with DanMachi makes no sense since one is written by a professional author while the other is written by an amateur author that was picked up by the publisher, not to mention they are completely different formats (also only one GOT volume is over 1000 pages)

however, that would generate unavoidable delays in the development of characters that, although they are not essential for the volume, are essential for the series...

That's literally the point, you're never going to have enough screentime for every character so you have to choose. The members of the Hestia Familia have already had their arcs (Lili 2, Welf 4, Mikoto 5, Haruhime 7, also 8 and 15), they can easily take a back seat in terms of development. Just because they get skipped in terms of development doesn't mean they stop existing or anything, you can have them appear and still develop other characters

Ais hasn't been "relevant" because the author doesn't seem to know how to develop her character outside of combat, not to mention the author is probably intentionally delaying development for her arc. To be fair this is also an issue that comes from how the story is set up. Relying on a spinoff just to flesh out Ais' character is just a crutch, like Kisaki said you can flesh out Ais by giving her a section to show her perspective of a scene. Adding the same exact scene to SO just to have Ais' perspective is what you'd call "page count filler"

I don't understand why you're bringing up Lefiya when she's pretty much a Sword Oratoria only character. We can debate "what if" but in that case the story would've been handled differently as well

that scene of Hogni fighting with Ais, Tiona and Tione has given rise to endless debates on this wiki

Like Kisaki says, people take this stuff way too seriously. It's one thing if this was an important battle, but the skirmishes in volume 17 were nothing more than confrontations, they aren't meant to be the "end all" in terms of power scaling or anything like that. Just because you think an author is "cutting out scenes of interest" doesn't mean they actually are

because a conflict has arisen over who will stay with Bell as a man...

What conflict? None of the other heroines have any chance of being an actual contender for Bell's romantic love and that hasn't changed in the Freya arc

As for the relationship itself you just come across as impatient, I'm sure Oomori will address it to some degree in volume 18. There doesn't have to be a major development every single volume and in my opinion we got to see what Ais felt in that situation. Yes, I've complained about the lack of progress in their relationship, but realistically it was never going to happen until Ais' arc based on the way Oomori's handling it

Sorry not SO related but I completely agree with Angelo on filler stuff. Like in AR2 the conversation between Ryu and Erebus when he told her to choose between saving the civilians or Asfi was around 150 pages long. I for the most part liked all the AR books, but there defintally was no reason for some scenes (like a single conversation) to be so long. AR1 was good and didn't have much filler, but AR2 and AR3 both had some unfortunately.

On the other hand though vol.17 of Danmachi was about the same length as all the AR volumes, but the scenes were short, to the point and full of exiciting content, so a long page length defintally isn't a bad thing. Its just a matter of how the author uses that page length that makes the quality of a book better or worse.

150ish pages? Wow, someone was overindulgent.

In my opinion I feel like a chunk of the SO hate does come from the fact that the anime, which many people might have the most experience with, is by far the weakest section of the series. I still enjoy it, but it does feel the most blatant of "here's the events of S1 again but with different characters."

But when I finally read the rest of the light novels, I gained a whole new appreciation of it. I liked how they started putting more of a focus on adding depth to the other characters, with Tione, Tiona, Bete, & Finn getting their own mini-arcs. I really liked how Vol. 10 took advantage of the dual perspectives to completely recontextualize the Xenos encounter. I absolutely loved Ais' story in Vol. 9 and making me really understand her as a character. And then I'm a sucker for "Avengers"-esque "EVERYONE IS HERE" final battles, so I'll love Vol. 12 for that alone, it feels like a big epic.

I really think people shouldn't put so much stock in the "Oomori intended for both books to be completely standalone things" because that was only said all the way back in the first volume, and obviously as time passes, things change and he'd want to make them interconnect more. I do feel plot wise you're not missing anything not reading SO, anything they add is just incidental, it's mainly on the character development side that things are lost in translation. Like I can understand not appreciating Ais' character without reading SO Vol. 9, but I also don't know where else that would fit in the MS unless you wait even longer for the eventual Ais arc, so just getting the book in general is satisfying enough for me.