Wanted to keep the title shenanigans going, but here is the long awaited Voss episode!
https://theletterspage.libsyn.com/episode-61-grand-warlord-voss
Also check out their Patreon if you havent already! https://www.patreon.com/theletterspage/overview
Omg, Christopher you are the most magnificent troll I've ever seen. I am simultaneously so satisfied and so salty about your answer (or lack thereof) to my question.
I’m still mid-episode, but I really like the Invictus character! I have some ideas for how some subtle differences in his upbringing would make him benevolent, instead of tyrannical, in case you were still workshopping that. I realize that your question was more of a framing device to ask about GWV’s home life, but still, I have ideas if you want to hear them.
Also, I am like 90% sure I’ve heard “Nyxian Scourge” somewhere before…
Well at the very least it's part of Voss's bio. They've also mentioned in response to a question at some point that the Scion Nixious the Chosen is unrelated to them despite the similar sounding name.
Ohontheyfoundme: I for one think they tried too hard to hide that there is indeed more for Voss. I think our theory still stands.
We we will know soon enough.
Yeah. That whole "Voss is just gone thing"... it seems somehow to be more untrue than all the rest of their lies. It's almost has if C&A have redacted information that they don't want us to know!
I liked figuring out the Thorathian naming conventions as the show progressed. (I also asked about it, but I'm okay with that one not getting read, because they read the other one! That I can't remember right now!)
I need to come up with a new question to ask, because I've figured out my Plantverse avatar. :V
I'll admit, I found myself wondering if there was any relation to Nixious the Chosen. But probably not…
Yeah, no more Grand Warlord Voss...
Now tell me about Voss the Scion of OblivAeon. >:|
I am really pleased with Adam's Pooh-bah voice. That was fantastic.
I’m mostly disappointed by the lack of any contact between Voss and Baron Blade. Especially since Baron Blade has had some interaction with Dawn and Omnitron from the core set.
The thing that caught my attention is Voss is “outside Time & Space’... As is the Enclave prior to Oblivæon. Gene-Bound Endlings, anyone?
For being a place that doesn't exist, an awful lot of stuff ends up outside time and space. <.<
I mean it exists in the area between seconds and the time between quarks and from what I understand there are a lot of those. SO it is probably quite big.
For reference, Invictus is one of my OCs for the RPG, and his backstory is actually pretty well developed by now. The only thing that really changed as a result of his question is that in Invictus' timeline, Rainek's mother was still alive, and between her and his father being a less harsh individual, it accounts for a lot of the differences in personality and morality. Glad you liked him!
I mean, the fact that they read my entire question, and then didn't actually answer any of it, instead just let me poke holes in the idea that Voss is gone for good and then just basically said "I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about" practically confirms that they have more in store for Voss. Like, if I was just completely off the mark, they either would have not answered my question at all, or would have carefully explained why I'm wrong. But instead, you can hear them trying and failing to keep a straight face.
They are playing so coy and I both love and hate them for it.
On ething I really appreciated in the episode was finally getting some details on Felicia Parsons/Newest Legacy.
I understand that there's probably not much that happens with her story pre-OblivAeon (which is why she hasn't had an episode), but I want to know whatever little there is. So it was an unexpected and pleasant surprise to hear the first story of her taking up the Legacy mantle.
Yup, it's nice to know that there's been more Young Legacy appearances other than in the event that starts the Iron Legacy timeline...
I mean, if he' s no longer "Grand Warlord" Voss, then there's nothing left for "Grand Warlord Voss" in either time, so, you know, they're not lying.
Besides their regular lying, of course.
I like the little bit of painting the difference in character between Nightmist and Argent Adept. Nightmist's all like "Well if he really wants to suicide to revenge against his greatest enemy I can respect that" and Argent's like "Hella nope if my friend's doing something stupid I'm going to drag him off by his collar before he gets hurt".
(I am far more Argent's attitude in the matter, though with more of a "now listen here young man, did I say you could go get yourself killed no I didn't say that" lecturing deal involved.)
Otherwise... I appreciate the irony that everyone got hyped up over an episode that ultimately didn't outright tell us a whole lot we didn't already know, though I agree with the thought that C&A are mega trolling towards some end.
Also as WalkingTarget so well shows in his summary, the Particle Yield Enhancing Wavelength device initializes to "P-YEW". Just pointing that out.
I think my question was about if Voss had an heir planned to take over the Thorathian state in the event of his demise/getting stranded outside reality. With everyone's conspiracy theories right now, I'm getting a tad suspicious about its omission...
I mean, given the state of utter chaos on Dok'thorath that we see in Voss' absence, I'm gonna guess the answer is no.
I kind of doubt Voss spent much time siring an heir
Touché, my friend. Touché.
And, Powerhound, I meant adopting one. Kings and warlords used to do that a lot.
Considering the Thorathians long life I doubt it was thought of. Would be an interesting story arc later on and certainly a good Editor’s Note question.
Well, we learned a whole lot about Voss himself, his background, how he built his empire, and we got some great battle blow-by-blows. We just didn’t get a big reveal that we, admittedly, worked ourselves up to anticipate.
Just as a Letters Page execution note, my letter was waaaaaaay longer than what they read - but I think all the questions were also asked, individually, by others, including a lot of new names. I’m glad C&A take a sharing spirit in how they chose their questions!
Of course, they didn’t read the question I sent in asking if the art stylings of Voss on Villainous Weapons were…cosmic!
Oh, and I second that Adam’s Poo-bah voice was fantabulous.
That was the only actual acronym, but there were so many ridiculously long phrases in this episode, I kept trying to weasel out the words they spelled.
FMULDC just doesn't roll off the tongue nohow, y'know? :B
Yeah this is more what I was trying to say, sorry about that. It was still a good episode, but it was pretty much not really different than any other LP episode we've had in terms of what we learned versus huge reveals, which I found morbidly ironic considering how hype everyone was.
Speaking of Voss' background, I feel sorry for Voss' bro, all things considered. No good deed goes unpunished it seems.
I thought Invictus was your Idea, Oho no they found me. I hope you get a chance to play with it.
I am Happy with this episode. It is sad to dead the last timeline show. But on to the Future
I admit to being a little surprised that there weren't any SHOCKING REVEALS this time around. I mean, it was definitely a fun episode, but...
I had always assumed that the reason the Tempest / Voss duology was being delayed was because of some major reveal that they were waiting on. But now it's come and gone, and it turns out, no? They could be lying to us directly, but (a) that seems like extremely poor form, and also (b) they've never straight-up lied before. They've said, "Ehn, there's a thing there, but we can't talk about it yet", and that's about it. And also (c) if they were going to straight-up lie, why bother delaying the episodes first?
Mostly, I guess I'm slightly confused now. But I do enjoy a good Voss.
I honestly wonder if it's as simple as where Sky-Scraper and Voss were the two people who most suffered from their previous disorder-ness on what issues happened when until they finally got to sit down and settle it all out, which then necessitated delaying Tempest because they usually put nemeses together on the schedule. So basically an entirely behind-the-scenes delay that we read into being something more major.
It all comes down to the fact that folks thought they were 'stalling' the Tempest/Voss episodes, expected that was because they had OblivAeon Spoilers, and thus got way too hyped for them and therefore got angry/annoyed/etc whenever they felt C&A were 'stalling'.
Well, it's possible that they were deliberately delaying the episodes so they could talk about said shocking reveal, in the hopes that Oblivaeon would be out by the time of Voss' episode. However, once it became clear that pretty much all the episodes would be done before Oblivaeon's release, lying to our faces basically became the only option if they want to maintain the surprise, because if they continued to delay the Voss episode for a few more months so as to wait until the release of Oblivaeon, it would be so obvious that there would have been no point in delaying to begin with.
That's my theory anyway.
That was my thoughts on that Ohnotheyfoundme. They've already said they're delaying the OblivAeon episodes until after we've had the actual game in hand for a few weeks so that they can get more better questions, cause we'll have time to look things over, so I imagine they're playing dumb with any big reveals until after that as well so that we all get that exciting "Whuaaaaa?!?" moment when we actually open our boxes of carboard crack.
As one of the aforementioned malcontents, I'm of mixed opinion here.
I'm glad to have finally gotten the Voss and Tempest episodes; as core-set characters (and with how often the Voss invasion has been referenced in episodes dating well back to the Legacy ep.), they have a pretty big impact on the multiverse. Ironically enough, Tempest was the very first Sentinels character I played... (during which my wife and I got pasted by Plague Rat).
I'm perfectly fine with the OblivAeon episodes being delayed until we've had a chance to pore over all those cards. That makes sense to me and C&A were very up front about saying, "We could do this in May/June as they're arriving, but you're not going to have context, and you're not going to be able to ask all the awesome questions you have been." We see precedent for that line of thinking with the Fort Adamant and Plavu'Col environment episode sections, which were significantly lacking questions.
I guess, in retrospect, I would have probably (and this is me personally; I'm not speaking for anyone else) tried to own up to/rectify the overall timeline earlier. Or, for that matter, at least say something about it. For us to arrive at Episode 50-some, only to find out, "Yeahhh, we messed up some of the things we've already told you..." only exacerbates the problem.
I'm still of the mind that Voss isn't gone, despite the "There is no future for Grand Warlord Voss." While this might technically be true if Voss is REDACTED and dies fighting the heroes during the OblivAeon crisis--the future sections deal with stuff post-OblivAeon, so it's technically "true-ish"--it's still properly misleading. This goes doubly, having listened to today's Editor's Note, wherein Christopher mentions at length how many times the heroes watched Voss die, "That mothership just blew up; nothing survived that!" While I really like the idea of Voss as a scion of OblivAeon, it does feel a little cheap to come back in May/June and say, "Oh, well we only said there's no future for Grand Warlord Voss. Rainek Kel-Voss, Scion of OblivAeon, is another story..." While my curiousity would have been piqued, I would have been perfectly satisfied with a future section that was simply, "You haven't seen the last of Rainek Kel-Voss."
Granted, that may not be the case--if I'm wrong about REDACTED, I'll be both shocked and intregued--but it feels a little extra disingenuous to have this podcast full of lies be piled with lies about the lies that we were lied to about.
Long story short: I liked it the ep. I wish it had come earlier, but understand that the actual SC timeline had some issues. I wish those issues were revealed/rectified earlier (as I'm sure C&A do as well). I still think REDACTED is Voss. I do wish there was at least a vague admission of plans with Voss in the future, regardless of what those plans are.
Besides the fact that everything they say is lies. 
Honestly? Sometimes, as a creator, you have to lie, if you don't want to spoil anything. Because "I'm not gonna tell you yet," can be as good as a confirmation, depending on the question.
I'm a big fan of the concept of an "information neutral response". The time-travel RPG Cºntinuum had a specific phrase that was agreed upon as a non-answer that was explicitly meant to be one that you were not intended to draw any inferences from: "Further information is not available here." I wish that everyday English (or whatever language you choose) had one, but in the days where "literally" now also means "figuratively" I figure it wouldn't last long in the wild.
I rather like that as a response…
Except that obviously means there is further information to be had. What could it be?
You really can't account for people's speculations. :B
The Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson fan communities use RAFO, which means Read And Find Out.
It’s been turned into a verb as well - if you ask a question and don’t get an answer you’ve been RAFOed
I agree with this theory. They were stalling becasue Voss is the final Scion.
Also, it was a good point that the future section is post Obliveon (Tactics and RPG), "There is no future for Grand Warlong Voss" could be 100% true. (Though seriously a super cool villian like Voss would be brought back in real life comics)
Edit: Grand Warlong Voss is in fact the offspring of Voss and Visionary
As a creator, I sort of double-disagree.
Firstly, I disagree because as a creator you can always say, "I'd rather not speculate about that right now." If you don't only do that with things that are coming up, it doesn't give anything away, and I get annoyed when people lie to me, so I'd rather not lie to people just to preserve a vague spoiler. You can, as noted above, do information-neutral responses.
Secondly, and kind of more importantly, the whole idea of this podcast is that it's talking about all the cool background and miscellaneous things in the Multiverse. If the information that we're given changes because they had a new idea, that's one thing, and that's fine. If information were just straight-up kept from us, that's different.
It's not like C&A have been reluctant to say "there may be more stuff with this character later, you'll see" in the past. Usually, this seems to be because they have a plan or an idea for the RPG. Saying, "you may or may not see Voss again" would have been fine if Voss were the last scion, or if Voss were the villain in Prime War, or if Voss was going to be ressurected by Ammut or whatever.
Which is a long-winded way of saying, "I really hope that C&A aren't lying to us, because that would be a crushing disappointment."