Foul the Good Guy/Creator

[Variol Farseer]

Your pedantry is beginning to grate. I never said Foul is a fine and upstanding citizen of the universe. I know he omits, but he doesn't speak untruth.[/quote]

Lying by omission is still lying, and I don't much appreciate being called a pedant for pointing that out. If I wanted to be pedantic, I would have gone on to analyse things like Foul's mastery of the double-half-truth technique; but I did not. Count your blessings.

[CovenantJr]

I think I should apologise, Farseer. Though I still consider your comment pedantic, and I still disagree, it was rude of me to put it like that. I don't want to quarrel.

[Gadget nee Jemcheeta]

Excellent sentiments! Always good to see compromise and peace as opposed to worthless personal attacks and bickering going for pages and pages of a thread (and an interesting one too, potentially)

Although I would have been interested to hear the technical evaluation of the half truth and lying by omission.

[CovenantJr]

The point I was trying to make originally is this:

Yes, Foul deceives the Lords, Covenant, etc by omitting important truths. But why bother to do it that way, when he could just lie outright? Is he bound by conscience? I suspect not...

[Gofer]

Maybe....

Because he has built up a reputation for telling the truth (however twisted and veiled) and so, instead of people being able to dismiss what he says outright as potentially lies, they are forced to accept that there is truth in what he says.

As such, it gives them more to worry about and saps their confidence.

Or maybe not

[ur-bane]

The point I was trying to make originally is this:

Yes, Foul deceives the Lords, Covenant, etc by omitting important truths. But why bother to do it that way, when he could just lie outright? Is he bound by conscience? I suspect not...

I interpret it as confidence. He does not shy from the truth because he is confident that knowing the truth will not change the outcome. It is confidence to the point of failure. He is doomed to fail, because people like Covenant can see a different outcome to Foul's truth. He is so sure that what he sees is the way it will be, that he has no contingency plan.

Spoiler

Do something they don't expect may run deeper than retreiving the Staff. The 'they' may be 'he', meaning Foul, or 'they' meaning TC and Jeremiah that have miraculously ridden to Revelstone.

[Variol Farseer]

I think I should apologise, Farseer. Though I still consider your comment pedantic, and I still disagree, it was rude of me to put it like that. I don't want to quarrel.

Apology accepted; and while we're at it, I apologize for getting my back up.

I still believe I was making a nontrivial point, but on that we'll have to differ.

[Variol Farseer]

I interpret it as confidence. He does not shy from the truth because he is confident that knowing the truth will not change the outcome. It is confidence to the point of failure. He is doomed to fail, because people like Covenant can see a different outcome to Foul's truth. He is so sure that what he sees is the way it will be, that he has no contingency plan.

Actually, as SRD would tell you (for he has said it in several different ways in the GI), Foul is up to his insubstantial ears in contingency plans. Where his overconfidence comes in is that he thinks he has all possible contingencies covered. Which is why 'Do something they don't expect' is such good advice.

Consider Garry Kasparov, who recently retired after a long reign as world chess champion, and the string of computer opponents he was put up against. Sometimes he lost, sometimes he won; but the striking thing is how quickly he caught up with the state of chess programming. Dozens of programmers and technicians, and I don't know how many volunteer testers, debuggers, and chess analysts, contributed to systems like Deep Thought and Deep Blue; and each system incorporated all the accumulated knowledge of the system before. Yet Kasparov, all by himself, managed to keep up the pace. He is no programmer; he was never permitted to analyse the source code of any of his opponents; sometimes he wasn't even allowed to look at the transcripts of their past matches, a thing he would have done automatically for any human opponent.

So how did he win so often against such unequal odds? By 'doing what they don't expect'. After playing a few games against a new program, he had some idea of its style; and he would start making unnecessary moves in a violently different style, just to mix up the play and force the computer to deal with situations it had considered too improbable to merit detailed analysis. He intentionally destabilized the situation, then relied on his native cunning to deal with it. This is a common tactic that human chess players use against slightly inferior players: complicate the game until your opponent can't understand it anymore.

I see resemblances between Lord Foul's machinations and those computer chess programs. They both plan many moves in advance, and think they've got all the angles covered; but in fact they are planning based on probabilities. And the human mind has a truly wonderful ability to invent wildly improbable things to do, and then do them.

This, I think, is one reason why Foul tells people so much of the truth. He wants them to develop mental tunnel vision, to try to solve the problem according to his rules — to deal with the particular facts he chooses to present. In both the First and Second Chronicles, Covenant defeated Foul by 'thinking outside the box' — way outside. Hile Troy and Kevin both tried to win on their enemy's terms, 'inside the box', and both failed catastrophically.

[finn]

I'd guess that SRD is also familiar with this tactic as applied to writing storylines, keep them interested by doing the unexpected. This is why I speculate that Foul could play a different role, and there could be a badder bad guy!

[ur-bane]

Actually, as SRD would tell you (for he has said it in several different ways in the GI), Foul is up to his insubstantial ears in contingency plans. Where his overconfidence comes in is that he thinks he has all possible contingencies covered. Which is why 'Do something they don't expect' is such good advice.

I really need to read all of the GI.
I see exactly what you are saying. Although you stated it more clearly, we are in agreement.
All roads lead to Foul. Confidence that he has thought out every possible path to his end.

BTW....excellent analogy. Maybe Foul should play some chess.

[Usivius]

excellent analogy, Farseer

[drew]

BTW....excellent analogy. Maybe Foul should play some chess.

Fey, Bishop! Groveler, your very sight sickens me!!

[CovenantJr]

Because he has built up a reputation for telling the truth (however twisted and veiled) and so, instead of people being able to dismiss what he says outright as potentially lies, they are forced to accept that there is truth in what he says.

As such, it gives them more to worry about and saps their confidence.

To me, this fits quite well with my interpretation of Foul's character. The Council of Lords didn't doubt the message Covenant delivered in LFB, suggesting they 1) believed he is powerful enough to know, and 2) didn't expect him to lie about it. A terrifying prediction, delivered in honesty, is a mighty weapon.

Actually, as SRD would tell you (for he has said it in several different ways in the GI), Foul is up to his insubstantial ears in contingency plans.

Indeed. "It boots nothing to avoid his snares."

That post in its entirety was excellent, Farseer.

[Variol Farseer]

Thank you!

[Gadget nee Jemcheeta]

Yeah, I was about to comment about how much it 'boots' them to avoid snares and such. I love that. Boot.

[CovenantJr]

Actually, as SRD would tell you (for he has said it in several different ways in the GI), Foul is up to his insubstantial ears in contingency plans.

I found an example, by chance, in the GI topic in SRD Discussion. I've taken the relevant parts from an answer to a question about the Elohim, dated 19th March 2005:

This is another example of what I've been calling "open-ended plotting" on the part of the Elohim. Their true desire is that Linden should have and use Covenant's ring ... But *just in case* that doesn't happen, they know they need to be prepared for other eventualities as well ... So, very much like Lord Foul, they try to prepare for as many different scenarios as they can.

[Avatar]

He doesn't need to lie. His truths are terrible enough.

Good posts folks.

--A

[Borillar]

One way or the other, I think we're likely to find out what Foul's motivations are. In an interview with SRD, he had this to say about the Last Chronicles:

"In ‘The Last Chronicles' I will probably spend more time than any reader has ever expected on the motivation of the bad guy. When I wrote Lord Foul's Bane, Lord Foul the Despiser was explicitly archetypal, a sort of undying and unmotivated force for darkness. But now I believe that he too has reasons for what he does, and, more than ever before, I care about what those reasons might be. For example, I’m aware now, as I was not 20 years ago, that what this being feels is despair. He wants to hurt so many other people because he needs an outlet for his pain. He has a story, and he deserves dignity."

[variol son]

One way or the other, I think we're likely to find out what Foul's motivations are. In an interview with SRD, he had this to say about the Last Chronicles:

"In ‘The Last Chronicles' I will probably spend more time than any reader has ever expected on the motivation of the bad guy. When I wrote Lord Foul's Bane, Lord Foul the Despiser was explicitly archetypal, a sort of undying and unmotivated force for darkness. But now I believe that he too has reasons for what he does, and, more than ever before, I care about what those reasons might be. For example, I’m aware now, as I was not 20 years ago, that what this being feels is despair. He wants to hurt so many other people because he needs an outlet for his pain. He has a story, and he deserves dignity."

Wow! And I thought giving Findail dignity was hard. If SRD can give Foul dignity, I'll sign all my possessions over to him.NB - Possessions will not in actuality be signed over to said SRD

[Prover of Life]

I stumbled upon this statement while browsing Illearth War.

Lord Veremont is facing down Fleshharrower. Enclosing him in a penumbra of Illearth Stone might, Fleshharrower commands Veremont to say:

"I worship Lord Foul. He is the one word of truth."

What if Covenant saves or damns the earth with Foul? Could this happen?