Rob’s Comments (group member since Jul 06, 2012)

Rob’s comments from the The Sword and Laser group.

Goodreads just send out the following:

Hello Goodreads Member,

In the coming weeks, we will be making some updates to how messaging works on Goodreads.

What's Changing?
• Direct messages between individual members will no longer be available
• Images and external links will no longer be supported in messages

While direct messages between individual members are no longer available, you can still access your past messages from your inbox, Group moderators can still send broadcast messages to their group members, and you can still send group invitations to your Goodreads friends. All other public interactions, such as writing and responding to book reviews, remains unchanged.

-The Goodreads Team


In particular to this group, I make heavy use of external links in the monthly newsletter especially for the local meetups as most of those have moved to Discord's events after Goodreads removed their events.

I've tried very hard to keep information both here and on Discord the same, but this will make it harder.

What I might try doing is creating a new thread each month with the links in them and have the newsletter link to that thread instead. But that's more work for me and doing the newsletter each month is already a time consuming thing.

Are there people who use goodreads and relying on the newsletter for the monthly events? Or could I just remove that section?

I will also have to remove the external links from the useful links section. But that section hasn't changed in years and the links are in pinned threads in the group already.

I assume the most important part of the newsletter is the monthly book pick, but since goodreads stopped sending emails to users when they got a goodreads message, I'm not sure how useful the newsletter is to anyone at this point.

If you're someone who reads the newsletter here on goodreads each month, I'd love some feedback. Thanks

Our final pick of the year is The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence

Let us know what you think

Our November pick is Floating Hotel by Grace Curtis

Let us know what you think of the pick

Next month's pick will be Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice

Let us know what you think about the pick

Our September pick is The Hexologists by Josiah Bancroft

Our August pick is She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan

Let us know what you think about the pick.

Our July pick is The Devils by Joe Abercrombie

I finally got Veronica to pick Wesley Chu, only she threw me a curve ball and had a quick poll and went with his sci-fi series The Lives of Tao

Let us know what you think of the pick

Tom has decreed that March Madness runner up Mickey 7 by Edward Ashton will be our May pick.

Let us know what you think

Yeah. that's why I posted both. Each round is worth 8 points, so a perfect bracket is worth 32 points. So the value of a correct prediction goes up the deeper you go.

So messing up in later rounds is certainly more costly.

After 3,392 in 15 polls the winner of our 10th annual March Madness tournament is Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman

Here is a breakdown of this year's tournament.

Thanks to everyone who participated!

This year we had 47 bracket predictions (https://challonge.com/swordandlaser20...)

Final prediction bracket results:

1) DCC FTW by oclipa - 30 points (14/15 picks correct)
2) Oh no, Ronbo! by OhNoRonbo - 29 points (13/15 picks correct)
3) 3 way tie between Dammit Roberator! by thranduel, Bracket Crawler Carl by anonymous, Professor Oz’s patent cures by IainBertram - 28 Points (12/15 picks correct)

Oclipa got a near perfect bracket and led every round of the tournament. Congratulations to them!

After 3,392 in 15 polls the winner of our 10th annual March Madness tournament is Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman

Here is a breakdown of this year's tournament.

Thanks to everyone who participated!

This year we had 47 bracket predictions (https://challonge.com/swordandlaser20...)

Final prediction bracket results:

1) DCC FTW by oclipa - 30 points (14/15 picks correct)
2) Oh no, Ronbo! by OhNoRonbo - 29 points (13/15 picks correct)
3) 3 way tie between Dammit Roberator! by thranduel, Bracket Crawler Carl by anonymous, Professor Oz’s patent cures by IainBertram - 28 Points (12/15 picks correct)

Oclipa got a near perfect bracket and led every round of the tournament. Congratulations to them!

Final Results:

View the full bracket: https://challonge.com/swordandlaser2025/

Tournament Statistics
Total Votes Cast: 3,392
Average Votes Cast: 233
Book With Most Votes: Mickey 7 - (169 Votes) (Round 3)
Match-up With Most Votes: Dungeon Crawler Carl vs. Mickey 7 - (276 Votes) (Finals)
Largest Win: Mickey 7 - (88 Votes)Smallest Win: Embers of War - (2 Votes) (Round 2)
Average Win: 46 votes


(1) Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman - 158 Votes

vs.

(6) Mickey 7 by Edward Ashton - 118 Votes

Winner: Dungeon Crawler Carl
Total Votes: 276
Margin of Victory: 40

Steve wrote: "I (oclipa) am voting for Dungeon Crawler Carl because I haven't won anything since a school raffle in 1st grade, when I won a bottle of whisky.

BTW, what do I get this time?"


Gloating rights?

John (Taloni) wrote: "Did some posts disappear? Presumably for some Mod-determined reason. I could have sworn there were two more including one from me. I ask because I may filk and wouldn't want to overstep."

You posted on the poll itself. Maybe a bit of confusion because normally I link to the thread, but this time I just linked to the poll. I still made a thread for the finals but as there was just 1 poll it was simpler to link just to that.

The finals have begun!

Vote here: https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/3...

Finals thread: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Voting ends March 22nd 11:59PM ET, so get your votes in!

Round 3 results: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...


This year we had 47 bracket predictions (https://challonge.com/swordandlaser20...)

After 3 rounds we have pretty much no changes to the leaderboard

DCC FTW by oclipa

Remains on top with 22 (out of 24) points, predicting Dungeon Crawler Carl to win it all. They still have a maximum score of 30.

There are 3 brackets tied for 2nd with 21 points each. They can max out at 29 points.


Robert Pattinson is prettier than Carl by anonymous
Read the book before we see the movie. by CableMonkey
Oh no, Ronbo! by OhNoRonbo

If Carl wins it all, so does Oclipa who has led all tournament. If Mickey wins, Cablemonkey and the anonymous user who predicted Mickey will take it.

Round 3 has concluded and we're now down to 1 Sword and 1 Laser book for the finals!

Bracket: https://challonge.com/swordandlaser2025


Voting will be March 16th - 22nd 11:59PM ET


(1) Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman

vs.

(6) Mickey 7 by Edward Ashton

Vote Here

This year we had 47 bracket predictions (https://challonge.com/swordandlaser20...)

After 3 rounds we have pretty much no changes to the leaderboard

DCC FTW by oclipa

Remains on top with 22 (out of 24) points, predicting Dungeon Crawler Carl to win it all. They still have a maximum score of 30.

There are 3 brackets tied for 2nd with 21 points each. They can max out at 29 points.


Robert Pattinson is prettier than Carl by anonymous
Read the book before we see the movie. by CableMonkey
Oh no, Ronbo! by OhNoRonbo

If Carl wins it all, so does Oclipa who has led all tournament. If Mickey wins, Cablemonkey and the anonymous user who predicted Mickey will take it.

Results from Round 3:

View the full bracket: https://challonge.com/swordandlaser2025/

Tournament Statistics
Total Votes Cast: 3,116
Average Votes Cast: 233
Book With Most Votes: Mickey 7 - (169 Votes) (Round 3)
Match-up With Most Votes: Dungeon Crawler Carl vs. The Art of Prophecy- (258 Votes) (Round 3)
Largest Win: Mickey 7 - (88 Votes)Smallest Win: Embers of War - (2 Votes) (Round 2)
Average Win: 36 votes

Round 2 Statistics
Total Votes Cast: 508
Average Votes Cast: 254
Book With Most Votes: book:Mickey 7|62030429] - (169 Votes)
Match-up With Most Votes: Dungeon Crawler Carl vs. The Art of Prophecy- (258 Votes)
Largest Win: Mickey 7 - (88 Votes)
Smallest Win: Dungeon Crawler Carl - (46 Votes)
Average Win: 67 votes



Sword Bracket
---------------------------------

Match 1:


(1) Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman - 152 Votes

vs.

(5) The Art of Prophecy by Wesley Chu - 106 Votes

Winner: Dungeon Crawler Carl
Total Votes: 258
Margin of Victory: 46


---------------------------------

Laser Bracket
---------------------------------

Match 2:

(6) Mickey 7 by Edward Ashton - 169 Votes

vs.

(10) Embers of War by Gareth L. Powell - 81 Votes

Winner: Mickey 7
Total Votes: 250
Margin of Victory: 88