Taking The Fantasy Novelists Exam

So I found this Nifty Little Thing which sounds like fun, and thus I decided to take all the questions and answer them for the Arothasian stories. Settle down folks, this might take a while...

Does nothing happen in the first fifty pages?
Well, I don't have an exact count as the book isn't written yet, but I'm fairly sure Arothas meets Razonara in that timeframe.

Is your main character a young farmhand with mysterious parentage?
Arothas is a noble with a clearly-defined heritage stretching back 2700 years... Which in of itself would never happen in the real world, but then the real world doesn't have über-leet super Sorcerers, now, does it?

Is your main character the heir to the throne but doesn't know it?
Arothas is the heir to a throne, and knows it quite well. Of course, the Isalamar Empire collapsed 2400 years ago.

Is your story about a young character who comes of age, gains great power, and defeats the supreme badguy?
No. Arothas comes of age, ages, ages, stabs some people, gains great power, and decides to conquer/unify the world with blood and fire. Oh, wait, there's a character later who pretty much fits this role, but she... Well. Doesn't... 'quite'... Succeed. It's difficult to describe without spoiling everything.

Is your story about a quest for a magical artifact that will save the world?
No.

How about one that will destroy it?
No.

Does your story revolve around an ancient prophecy about "The One" who will save the world and everybody and all the forces of good?
NO!

Does your novel contain a character whose sole purpose is to show up at random plot points and dispense information?
Razonara fulfills this role from time to time, but his role is very much greater than that, especially later on.

Does your novel contain a character that is really a god in disguise?
Razonara is perfectly mortal... But more powerful than some gods. So... Maybe?

Is the evil supreme badguy secretly the father of your main character?
No. Wait! Arothas has a lot of kids, and some of these could later be called protagonists... So... Yes?

Is the king of your world a kindly king duped by an evil magician?
All rulers are Machiavellian; they trick the magicians, mostly.

Does "a forgetful wizard" describe any of the characters in your novel?
Razonara is not forgetful (oh no he sure is NOT, appearances aside), so no.

How about "a powerful but slow and kind-hearted warrior"?
Naah. Eneren comes close but no cigar.

How about "a wise, mystical sage who refuses to give away plot details for his own personal, mysterious reasons"?
No. Razonara is wise and mystical, sure, but when he doesn't give away plot, he usually doesn't know you're interested or need the information.

Do the female characters in your novel spend a lot of time worrying about how they look, especially when the male main character is around?
There are people like this in Real Life, but it's not a 'general' trait of women in the WoA. There are two who fit this description, though.

Do any of your female characters exist solely to be captured and rescued?
No. Arothas wouldn't care so there's no reason for it to happen because the female would just be killed or something.

Do any of your female characters exist solely to embody feminist ideals?
No.

Would "a clumsy cooking wench more comfortable with a frying pan than a sword" aptly describe any of your female characters?
No. A clumsy wench is a scalded wench.

Would "a fearless warrioress more comfortable with a sword than a frying pan" aptly describe any of your female characters?
Well... There's one woman who pretty much becomes just that, but... Well, I won't give spoilers.

Is any character in your novel best described as "a dour dwarf"?
There are dour humans. Thus, realistically, there are dour dwarves. Thus, yes, of course. The WoA is realistic.

How about "a half-elf torn between his human and elven heritage"?
... There are no elves, so no.

Did you make the elves and the dwarves great friends, just to be different?
There are no elves!

Does everybody under four feet tall exist solely for comic relief?
No.

Do you think that the only two uses for ships are fishing and piracy?
NO! There's transports and traders and ferries and stuff.

Do you not know when the hay baler was invented?
Erm... What's a hay baler? Sorry, but my knowledge of english fails me... *A wikipedia visit later* Well, I've no idea.

Did you draw a map for your novel which includes places named things like "The Blasted Lands" or "The Forest of Fear" or "The Desert of Desolation" or absolutely anything "of Doom"?
Arothas' tower in later stories has been called 'of Doom!' in a joking fashion, otherwise, no.

Does your novel contain a prologue that is impossible to understand until you've read the entire book, if even then?
No.

Is this the first book in a planned trilogy?
I'd have to cover at least... 20 years per book, so no.

How about a quintet or a decalogue?
Same argument as above...

Is your novel thicker than a New York City phone book?
I've never been to the U.S.

Did absolutely nothing happen in the previous book you wrote, yet you figure you're still many sequels away from finishing your "story"?
Not written yet, so I can't tell you.

Are you writing prequels to your as-yet-unfinished series of books?
No.

Is your name Robert Jordan and you lied like a dog to get this far?
**** YOU!

Is your novel based on the adventures of your role-playing group?
No.

Does your novel contain characters transported from the real world to a fantasy realm?
No... That's the realm of Narnia and fanfiction. The former is for kids, and the later is subject to that law of 90% is crap.

Do any of your main characters have apostrophes or dashes in their names?
Arothas used to be Árothas, but no, not any more.

Do any of your main characters have names longer than three syllables?
Many characters are still unnamed, but Arothas Itellon, Ilster Iteronora and Eneren Enora pretty much all have three syllables.

Do you see nothing wrong with having two characters from the same small isolated village being named "Tim Umber" and "Belthusalanthalus al'Grinsok"?
... No, that's wrong. That's just wrong. And stupid. Unless the parent is insane, in which case it could be okay.

Does your novel contain orcs, elves, dwarves, or halflings?
It has dwarves. As to the other things, no, but it has goblins. Both of these, however, are very much different from their archetypes in typical Fantasy literature.

How about "orken" or "dwerrows"?
No. And if I had such ripoffs it would be better disguised than that.

Do you have a race prefixed by "half-"?
No. I've studied biology, and even Dwarves and Humans couldn't reproduce together in this story.

At any point in your novel, do the main characters take a shortcut through ancient dwarven mines?
To do that the dwarven mines would have to be stretched through a whole mountain, and there's only one Dwarven mine of that size in existence, and the resident Dwarves are quite xenophobic... And most of the main characters are human. So no.

Do you write your battle scenes by playing them out in your favorite RPG?
No.

Have you done up game statistics for all of your main characters in your favorite RPG?
Razonara is too powerful to fit into D&D rules and Arothas is too versatile. No. (Well, I do play as Arothas most of the time, but it's basically a mere reflection of what he is in the stories; it's difficult to roleplay someone smarter than yourself, but not too difficult to write them (Conan Arthur Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame is the ultimate example).)

Are you writing a work-for-hire for Wizards of the Coast?
No.

Do inns in your book exist solely so your main characters can have brawls?
Arothas never brawls. He stabs people to death. Or burn them. People don't brawl with him, either. Ilster just keeps out of trouble and flirt with wenches. Eneren sits in a corner and drinks his beer and might talk with some local.

Do you think you know how feudalism worked but really don't?
I've studied it in history, so no, I know how it really works... Not that feudalism is the only system of government in place, so some other government type might've been done wrong.

Do your characters spend an inordinate amount of time journeying from place to place?
Well, Arothas doesn't have a horse for the first couple of books so it takes some time for him to travel.

Could one of your main characters tell the other characters something that would really help them in their quest but refuses to do so just so it won't break the plot?
No. Razonara knows a lot of things, but he doesn't know you want to know them, so he has totally different reasons.

Do any of the magic users in your novel cast spells easily identifiable as "fireball" or "lightning bolt"?
Well, yes, some of the Mages do that, but Arothas favors 'force' (telekinesis and wall of force and such) spells and Palpatine-ish lightning. Razonara, however, does both of these when he fights. Although he usually uses hellfire rather than fire when throwing balls. But Razonara casts a lot of spells, so whatever.

Do you ever use the term "mana" in your novel?
Magical Energy gets a bit boring to type after a while, so yes, for expediency and to avoid people mixing Magical and Mundane energy together (they're entirely different things and do not work in the same fashion at all), I do that.

Do you ever use the term "plate mail" in your novel?
... Of course? What kind of question is that? It's set in a roughly 1450-ish setting with less gunpowder (the Mages wouldn't be happy with gunpowder, otherwise I would have it in; cannons still exist, though they're rare). Edit: I get it now; I happened to notice an article on Wikipedia, and it appears that 'Plate Mail' is not a real term, basically invented by Gygax or someone who worked with him: the proper term is Plate Armor.

Heaven help you, do you ever use the term "hit points" in your novel?
... No...

Do you not realize how much gold actually weighs?
It's heavier than lead. Much heavier. So it's damn heavy. Which is why silvers and coppers is used all the time, and gold only in a rare few circumstances, even by the extraordinarily rich.

Do you think horses can gallop all day long without rest?
No. That would just be stupid. Or undead-and-powered-by-spirits-ish, but that doesn't count.

Does anybody in your novel fight for two hours straight in full plate armor, then ride a horse for four hours, then delicately make love to a willing barmaid all in the same day?
No. The first two are sometimes done in some order, but Full Plate is not a very common armor, cost issues aside, because, while more mobile than typically depicted, there are other armors more mobile. Minotaurs are fast, too, on a related note.

Does your main character have a magic axe, hammer, spear, or other weapon that returns to him when he throws it?
Well, Arothas can do telekinesis and he later forges a very, very powerful Sword which he sometimes throw around Yoda-style.

Does anybody in your novel ever stab anybody with a scimitar?
Well, I can imagine untrained idiots doing that (and there are a lot of those in the crapsack World of Arothas), so maybe.

Does anybody in your novel stab anybody straight through plate armor?
Pikes. Read up on them. Also, magical swords.

Do you think swords weigh ten pounds or more?
No. They don't. Except for Arothas' Darkblade. But then, Arothas is basically a human giant, so anything he makes for himself (weapons and robes - yes, he can tailor,) isn't quite ordinary.

Does your hero fall in love with an unattainable woman, whom he later attains?
No. That goes against the point of unattainable. Besides, the only woman in the stories I would consider unattainable is his daughter. *squick*

Does a large portion of the humor in your novel consist of puns?
No. Well... Maybe. There's not much fun to be had in the WoA, but Ilster throws out a couple of punches every now and then.

Is your hero able to withstand multiple blows from the fantasy equivalent of a ten pound sledge but is still threatened by a small woman with a dagger?
No. He snaps the woman in half. Which really pisses Razonara off... Arothas no baka... On a completely unrelated note; Rasputin.

Do you really think it frequently takes more than one arrow in the chest to kill a man?
No. Arothas is once hit by several arrows (and crossbow bolts) and survives, but then, he's by that time an Archmage armored in the equivalent of a Adamantine-Mithril alloy and the scene is still rather Boromir-ish.

Do you not realize it takes hours to make a good stew, making it a poor choice for an "on the road" meal?
Erm, dunno, I suppose it depends on the kind of stew. My mother used to make good stew in less than an hour. Still, Arothas generally eats soup and drinks water, instead. Ilster thinks he's a good cook, but is a total failure. Eneren just packs some easily warmed food with him.

Do you have nomadic barbarians living on the tundra and consuming barrels and barrels of mead?
How would they even get their hands on that? I mean, unless they traded cattle for mead or something. Also, Vikings don't live on a tundra, just so you know.

Do you think that "mead" is just a fancy name for "beer"?
Mead is something with fermented honey and spices. It's totally different.

Does your story involve a number of different races, each of which has exactly one country, one ruler, and one religion?
... Who does that kind of stupid stuff, other than for expediency in games? No. Dragons all share the same language, though.

Is the best organized and most numerous group of people in your world the thieves' guild?
No. Duh.

Does your main villain punish insignificant mistakes with death?
Arothas doesn't do that. So no. His brother can do that when sufficiently enraged, but it's rare, and Theorlen's not a main villain... If he could ever be called anything but an Anti-hero at all.

Is your story about a crack team of warriors that take along a bard who is useless in a fight, though he plays a mean lute?
No.

Is "common" the official language of your world?
No. Language functions rather realistically in this world. Vanari (a trade language) and Draconic (which is actually Latin because I'm lazy) are the most common languages, where the former is understood on the mainland of three continents by learned people. Still, there are two other giant continents around where that language is rarely spoken.

Is the countryside in your novel littered with tombs and gravesites filled with ancient magical loot that nobody thought to steal centuries before?
No. There are a few places like that, but they're realistically rare.

Is your book basically a rip-off of The Lord of the Rings?
... No.

Read that question again and answer truthfully.
The Lord of the Rings is a very idealistic story. This one is cynical and more stabby. No.