Edge Cases

Blurb

Rare classes and powerful skills are helpful. Too bad the system doesn’t seem built to handle them. What even are all these errors?

Our team of outcasts and adventurers will have to rely on their trust - and the bane of all stories, healthy communication - just to survive, let alone understand what the system is doing. Because they’re quickly realizing that not all is as it seems, and it’s doing something to people, to monsters, and maybe even to the gods themselves.

And their goal isn’t just to survive; it’s to make things better. It’s a good thing they’re not doing it alone.

Thoughts

As of writing this review, I’ve read the first book as an ARC reviewer.

Edge Cases follows a party of adventurers rather than a solo MC. We start the book through the eyes of Derivan, a living suit of armour. Then we have Sev (the cleric), Vex (the not-quite-a-wizard), and Misa (the tank), and scenes alternate between those characters. This isn’t like a GRRM book through, with different characters in different parts of the world doing entirely separate things, there’s a central plot that you just view from different eyes, and I really like it because each character’s perspective really shines through.

Of course, Dev and Vex are the highlight, because who doesn’t love magic.

Anyway, the plot on this one is hard to talk about and not spoil, so let me boil it down real simple: they go on a quest, a dungeon forms, things go to shit. There we go, easy. There’s a much larger global plot that gets peeled back in book one and then more in further books (I presume), and it actually reminds me a bit of Malazan and the crippled god plotline.

But who cares about the plot, the real stars are the characters. You can tell a ton of work and thought went into them all (even the side characters), and it’s refreshing to read from the perspective of people with their own goals and aspirations instead of just a self-insert character.

For those that want to theory craft and want those min-maxer vibes, this book probably isn’t for you. Characters level up, but they don’t allocate skills and have agency in how their classes develop. They simply get skills from the system, but the good thing here is that the skills are fun and inventive. It’s not just “Ah, SUPER fireball, gotcha.” But I can’t tell you what they are, because that would spoil how those skills are used in ways I didn’t expect to solve problems.

Anyway, that’s probably a good summary. Read if you like:

• Party dynamics and combat.
• Strong characterisation.
• Dungeons and gods.
• Less player agency with stats/classes/skills.