King's Dark Tidings discussion

Edited to add:

Jennifer Wilson on the Amazon KDT Forum has made a list of THE RULES!!!

She says:
This is what I have collected so far, please update if you find any that I missed.

1: protect and honor your friends (king)
2: kill with (out) conscience
3: reveal nothing

5: Master your fear
6: don't get injured
8: know your surroundings
9: never underestimate your opponent
10: do not leave evidence
12: do not make a sound

14: do not revel in success
17: never complain
19: Plan with logic and without vengeance or favor

24: always be on guard
37: separate from one's emotions

43: fight fatigue
47: have the necessary skills for the task
57: remain in the shadows when possible

96: always be prepared
104: meet uncertainty with silence

117: don't be captured alive
123: don't seek praise or acknowledgment

149: Map your body
156: do not die

176: finish your tasks
188: do not engage in combat unless you must
233: I am the weapon

245: retreat when you cannot win

257: Be one and be alone
258: obey your masters

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Rules 1 and 2 are important, probably most important (the garbled version as well as what was probably meant to be told to Rez). But do you think that the rest are in order of importance or just random? They seemed a bit random to me!

Were the Rules maybe chronological? Just given to Rez as he could learn them?

Are the Rules something that have been used in the past, say for other King's Assassins? Or is it a new way of training just Rezkin? I don't think we've come across anyone else who was trained that way or had any inkling of The Rules...

Do you think Rules 1 and 2 were changed by one of the Masters on orders of the evil king so Rez would just be the King's Assassin? Or did Bordran (sp, sorry! I was last listening to audio!), mean for Rez to be a loyal Assassin, too? But hoped to judge Rez for suitability to the crown?

What other questions/comments do you have about The Rules?

I was thinking of going through and listing all of the rules given and then coming up with as many others as I could based on what I know about other martial cultures. It would be an interesting exercise.

besides rule 1 and 2, i see the rest as a plot device to justify Rez's actions. If someone compiles a list, it would certainly put pressure on the author to keep his rules straight.

It does seem like the author could just pull out a rule as needed, since there are so many of them! And they really seemed to be fairly random rules as far as the numbering went...

I might do a read through now that I'm done with the audio books... I really was all sad again after the end of those. We'll see if I get to it before Book 3 appears! If so, I'll try and note down the Rules as I go along...

I imagine a much deeper explanation of the rules at some point .. or even a novelette on his youth and training .... ? But for now ... I will fester over the release of book 3. I kid I kid

Heh. Yeah, it's tough waiting. Although, I have to say it helps going through Books 1 and 2 and discussing stuff like the Rules, here, and the Characters (starting with Frisha). That discussion is currently going pretty crazy--also talking about what might be happening next in Book 3. It's nicely diverting!

Also--I really need to re-read the books and see if the Rules List is complete so far... But so far, haven't had time to do a re-read!

As i look at the rules, it does not appear random. If you look at Rez perspective of when he first start training, assuming he start his training at the age of 6. Rules 3 - 12 could assume he is starting cardio / strength training / stealth training.

As a young boy, with nothing going much for him, he could only train so much. As the years progress, and he learn more of the rules and the training becomes harder, more rules are added. I look at this perspective and i see the rules as logical.

I do think that the rules are a bit of a literary contrivance. While there is some logic to the rules as it seems he learned them from 258 to 1, the first rule he learned "Obey your masters" would make sense.

That being said, I find it difficult to believe that KK wrote out 258 rules that would not be contradictory or repetitive. But maybe that is because I am not a "big man" that has learned all the rules. There is probably a rule 164 "Use your imagination" :)

I hadn't tried to analyze the order of the rules much. I was mostly curious because I also thought it would be easier for the author to just pull up a rule as needed and assign it a number--maybe trying to keep the simpler ones, more suited to a child in one area or other, but otherwise using the numbering more as a literary contrivance, as Rick put it...

However--they could have been very cleverly arranged in an order that made sense for training... or edited to be so afterwards!

And some authors are obsessive enough to have made complete lists--although that would be counterproductive, since different ones might have to be made up to suit different situations as the story evolves... So it would be best to leave a lot of the rules blank!

It is always possible that the Masters created Rules as they were needed, too!-- to suit the trainee and various situations! So it can work out well enough no matter how logical or random the Rules end up being...

The Rules seem less important as Rez evolves beyond his training, though, so I think we'll see less references to them and specific numbers.

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To me, at a cursory glance, the Rules seem to be a bit random and maybe added to as needed, either in-story or meta or whatever.

William wrote: "As i look at the rules, it does not appear random. If you look at Rez perspective of when he first start training, assuming he start his training at the age of 6. Rules 3 - 12 could assume he is st..."
But, he should have learned obey your masters as one of the first.

Yeah, "Obey Your Masters" being so far down the list, number-wise, seems weird... Although maybe they gave him the rules to learn out of order??? Well, wait... I guess they must have if they kept the first two from him! So maybe the list was given to him from the highest number down to 1 and 2??? (Still doesn't make that much sense...)

Rule 257: Be one and be alone
I think that was the only new rule from this book.

Huckabizzle wrote: "Rule 257: Be one and be alone
I think that was the only new rule from this book."

There was also Rule 19: Plan with logic and without vengeance or favor

Farson accuses Rez of bringing Mage Threll to Ferrelle with him as payback for withholding information, and Rezkin responds with that rule.

This list is also missing Rule 149: Map your body, which we hear in book 3 when Rez kicks the stone that he ends up using to help him keep his edge in Cael.

Thanks, Raymond! I've added them to the list... (this list, anyway!)

April wrote: "Edited to add:

Jennifer Wilson on the Amazon KDT Forum has made a list of THE RULES!!!

She says:
This is what I have collected so far, please update if you find any that I missed.

1: protect and..."

Rule 156 - "Do not die" has to be the most important. Failing this rule would end the story.

Heh. Too true! A bit meta, but yeah.

It's explicitly explained that the Strikers also follow the rules, although not all of them, 257 and 258 are not on their list. it's possible that the rules are grouped in such a way that different groups of people learn a different number of them but never in a way that's disjointed (for example you don't learn 131 and 133 but not 132). The Rez just learns them all. Since many of the rules are redundant we probably won't learn the majority of the list.