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Ive been rereading Magi'i of Cyador and Scion of Cyador.

Couple questions. There is no map of Cyador, Correct? Are there any explanations on the geographic locations of all the towns and Cyad and the Accursed Forest compared to the Current map of Candar? Im trying to compare whats written in the books to the current map of Candar, especially the battles.

With my limited knowledge of the characters in the Recluce Series, it seems to me the white mages, (Lorn and Cerryl) seem to take less wounds overall throughout the Series compared to the other characters (Black mages). Wounds as in they are hurt so badly that they need several days rest or they black out for several days. Lorn is almost unscathed throughout the entire book except for exhaustion and the headaches due to the overuse of Chaos. Is there a reason for this? Im sure im missing something about the forces of Chaos and Order. Or am I incorrect in my thoughts? I tend to read quickly and miss key events/points. Thank you!!

For example, Lorn seems to be able to overcome any task given him with apparent ease, and kill any who opposes him without too much damage inflicted upon him. He seems almost superhuman, excluding the Chaos mage part. All the other characters have learned things or gotten out of trouble or killed an opponent with repercussions. They learned and conquered through trial and error, yet Lorn has always acted first, thought later, and came out perfectly fine in the end. Lerris for example has aged like several decades at the end of his story if I am correct, maybe a little less, Im not sure of the exact amount.

Couple questions. There is no map of Cyador, Correct? Are there any explanations on the geographic locations of all the towns and Cyad and the Accursed Forest compared to the Current map of Candar? Im trying to compare whats written in the books to the current map of Candar, especially the battles.

That's actually not too hard. The three major cities of Cyador were Cyad, Fyrad and Summerdock. It was pretty clearly indicated in Wellspring of Chaos that Southport, the capital of Southwind, was built on or around the ruins of Cyad. Fyrad is described as being a port city downriver from the towns around the Accursed Forest. That's likely to be Diehl, the port city of Naclos. Summerdock is located in Delapra and the name is unchanged.

As for the battles, the earliest battles Lorn faced were in Isahl, fighting against Cerlynyi. This largely took place in and around the Hills of Endless Grass, which, as the terraforming of the Rationalists who founded Cyador began to slowly fail, (finally failing catastrophically when Nylan fully reawakened the Great Forest,) came to be known as the Stone Hills. On the map of Candar, these skirmishes took place on the southern side of the Stone Hills, roughly south or southwest of where the word "Cerlyn" is located.

After Isahl, Lorn was posted to Jakaafra, a town on the northern point of the square of the restrained Accursed Forest. That's going to be somewhere in the middle of what on the later map of Candar is the Great Forest. There aren't any exact indicators, although some of Lorn's mental narratives suggest that it's not too close to either the Grass/Stone Hills or the Westhorns.

Following Jakaafra, Lorn went to Biehl, which is seen on the Candar map in Delapra. While the map doesn't look like it, it's made clear that the terrain between Biehl and Jerans is nearly as rough as that of the Stone Hills, so we can likely assume the battle took place somewhere to the east/northeast of Biehl.

The next transfer sends Lorn to Inividra, which is another border town south of the Grass Hills. There, Lorn fought Jeranyi incursions. This is going to be farther west than Isahl, but not particularly close to Cyad or Biehl, I would guess somewhere near where the "D" in "Southwind" on the map is located.

When Lorn invades Jerans, he proceeds north, first to Berlitos, then on to Jerans, both of which are a part of Jerans on the map of Candar. His final battle before returning to Cyador would have been just north of the Grass Hills.

The final battle was of course in Cyad itself, which as noted previously is now Southport.

With my limited knowledge of the characters in the Recluce Series, it seems to me the white mages, (Lorn and Cerryl) seem to take less wounds overall throughout the Series compared to the other characters (Black mages). Wounds as in they are hurt so badly that they need several days rest or they black out for several days.

One thought on this is that it's not that the order-wielding protagonists take a lot of wounds so much as they end up having to use their order-based powers to create destruction, often on a massive scale, which created a conflict between order and chaos that played itself out partially within the bodies and minds of the mages themselves.

nperry:

I'll start with the easy part first .. your assessment of order-mages dealing with balance-feedback is exactly what I was going to respond.

As for the map locations -- wow -- I remember kind of looking at the map of Candar and trying to noodle it a bit .. but then I gave up.

I'm gonna have to make a copy of the map and mark it up and then go back and re-read Lorn's books again .. you've, obviously, spent some time on this.

Very nice.

This very question is what prompted me to consider making the recluce mapping project. That and a post by Codeblower pushed me over the edge into actually doing it.

nperry, i quoted your assumptions and placed it on the wiki page for MagiiOfCyador for the recluce mapping project. Might take me a while to get around to using it

If you or anyone else is bored and want to punch in coordinates please have at it! Unfortunately i didn't start the mapping project until after i had re-read magi/scion (I'm re-reading the complete series in chronological order right now) so it will be quite a while until i finish and re-read them again to update their maps

the Recluce Mapping Project is amazing keep up the good work. i can finally see where everything is and whats going on where.

nperry wrote: One thought on this is that it's not that the order-wielding protagonists take a lot of wounds so much as they end up having to use their order-based powers to create destruction, often on a massive scale, which created a conflict between order and chaos that played itself out partially within the bodies and minds of the mages themselves.

Building off this, you should understand that chaos mages are far more likely to use their power quicker, due to the above stated side effects for Ordermages.

As for Lorn, we also need to remember that not only is he gifted with a magical advantage, he is also usually in command of 40+ supporting troops, all of whom has such a massive technological advantage as to double or treble their effective punch. His "superhuman" bit is the fact that he's clearly the best swordsman in Cyador, in addition to obviously being one of the better horsemen as well.

But mainly, Lorn, and we can presume Cerryl because of their similar dispositions, is said to get by so well because he's so willing to act. He rarely gets hurt because he strikes quickly and often, i.e. when he goes after Flutak. Having almost perfect foreknowledge of events (because of the screeing glass), control of a highly powerful and destructive magic, and a willingness to strike first is a pretty unbeatable combo