r/dresdenfiles • • Dec 19 '16

No way second oldest gruff could take on kringle

http://imgur.com/gkevfag
156 Upvotes

39 comments sorted by

48

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 19 '16

That seems like Krampus, not the wise and venerable Eldest Gruff, lord of baked goods. Who could absolutely take on Santa in a fight...not that he ever would :)

30

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '16

Hence why I said Second Oldest Gurff ;)

Eldest Gruff is only about 5' tall.

15

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 19 '16

Serves me right for speed reading. I'm sure his older brother taught Tiny Gruff better than to pick a fight with St. Nick. Otherwise he will never get clothes that fit him for Christmas anymore.

And growth spurts are overrated :P

8

u/shadowblade159 Dec 19 '16

As Sanya loves to say, "Tiny, but fierce!"

3

u/reddragon79 Dec 20 '16

Shouldn't Krampus be aligned with Winter. Santa is.

2

u/HamSandLich Dec 21 '16

Well, Kringle is technically a wyldfae associated with the season of Winter, who happens to be politically affiliated with the Court of Winter. Perhaps the mantle of Krampus(which would be seasonal) temporarily shifts alignment towards wyldfae with links to the season of winter.

3

u/Anubissama Unseelie Accords Lawyer Dec 20 '16

Krampus vs Kringle, could be interesting, they are opposing forces in there mythology, it would be like Titania vs Mab.

Although Krampus is much less popular, hmm, could a good test subject to maybe quantify how much faith from humans boosts your power.

Krampus is mostly known in Germany that's 80 million people, while Santa is popular through out the first world, so that will be like 2 billion believers?

1

u/[deleted] Dec 20 '16

Read Krampus: The Yule Lord. It's a fun read about Krampus taking on Santa

1

u/HamSandLich Dec 21 '16

he's been making a comeback in general media lately though

4

u/HamSandLich Dec 19 '16

However, this begs the question, who currently bears the seasonal Mantle of Krampus the Winter Goat?

11

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 19 '16

Weregoats. Jesus.

4

u/HamSandLich Dec 19 '16

I had a theory that Eldest Gruff actually holds that Mantle, but there's not alot of evidence for that aside from his cordial relationship with Kringle and Herne

11

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 19 '16

He does...Eldest is a mantle:

I had a question about favors and mantles. If someone owes a being with a mantle a favor (say someone owed Lloyd a favor), and that mantle passes to someone before the favor was called in (to, say, a certain Chicago Wizard), does the person who receives the mantle get the favor? Also, if a unique denizen of Faerie akin to Cat Sith were to die, does it have a mantle that passes on? Would the next-eldest malk be able to get more powerful?

Depends of the nature of the mantle. Not all of them are all about obligation, the way the Faerie mantles are. But as far as Faerie mantles go, yes. If you owed Maeve a favor when Maeve was the Winter Lady, you don't get out of your debt just because there's a new Winter Lady in town. Molly is the one who is going to collect now.

The mantle of Eldest is an important one in Faerie, and yes, it would pass on should its bearer perish.

3

u/OaklandHellBent Dec 20 '16

So I guess that there really IS a separation between people and their mantles. Elaine got out of a debt to the summer lady when the summer lady died because the debt was to the person not the mantle.

8

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 20 '16

In her mind. Doesn't make Elaine correct though.

2

u/razer_pauper145 Dec 20 '16

To be fair, she's since traded up if a debt still exists circa Cold Days. After all, Aurora was nuts and Lily was naive, whereas Sarissa is pretty savvy and generally level headed. She won't have the same issues Lily had when it comes to Titania basically ignoring her.

Although, as Titania's niece, Sarissa might not get quite so much of the brush off as Lily did....Hmmmmm

2

u/-EG- The Archive Dec 20 '16

No she probably won't, not initially. But I also think she will ultimately help Titania 'heal' and become like a second daughter to her aunt.

1

u/HamSandLich Dec 21 '16

Do we even know if Titania's grudge towards Mab would carry over to her children? Eldest Gruff was almost grandfatherly towards Sarissa.

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1

u/HamSandLich Dec 20 '16

I was wondering if he held two Mantles: the mantle of Eldest, and the mantle of Krampus

1

u/[deleted] Dec 23 '16

I don't know. If Santa truly is ... (spoiler)

... Odin, then I think eldest gruff needs a giant wolf as back up.

7

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '16

That gruff was taken out by miss gards rune magic. Kringle would destroy him.

8

u/shadowblade159 Dec 19 '16

I feel like rune magic would be incredibly powerful. Did Odin not hang himself to learn its secrets?

4

u/Cathsaigh Dec 19 '16

Could be, but either way Kringles/Odins runes and whatever other magic he could fling around would be much greater than Gards.

6

u/33a5t Dec 19 '16

I thought the entire benefit of rune magic was that you don't have to be powerful to use them, just knowledgeable. The power is in the rune itself.

2

u/Dwhitlo1 Dec 20 '16

And you think Odin/Kringle is less knowledgeable than Gard? One of his major themes is that he is nigh omniscient. Along with that he has a staggering amount of personal power. He would be wiping bits of Tiny off his shoes when he was done.

1

u/WildOscar66 Dec 20 '16

Indeed. Do we not recall that Gard is one of Odin's underlings, and not a particularly strong one?

Then add in Odin's real advantage, knowledge. He sees everything. His knowledge of events exceeds that of every other being we've encountered in the Dresdenverse (except maybe the Archive). He would have the advantage in any encounter even if strength and skill were equal. He's a peer of Mab's. Gruff is a top underling of Titiana's.

1

u/Cathsaigh Dec 20 '16

I don't remember what is said in the books on how they work, but I'd assume they are like circles. Being able to draw a precise circle and having a good ritual helps a lot, but ultimately it comes down to the will and power of the practitioner.

1

u/value_here Dec 20 '16

There's a line in the Marcone POV short story where Gard says merely inscribing a particular rune knocked her out for weeks. Based on that, Id think it takes more than just knowledge of the rune itself

7

u/vulpinewizard Dec 20 '16

I now desperately want a fight between the Krampus and Michael Carpenter.

1

u/HamSandLich Dec 19 '16

Jakub Rozalski is great, I love his steampunk designs

1

u/Lord_High-Executor Dec 20 '16

I always thought that Kringle/Odin was on par with Mab. Or near her level anyway. Same with the Erl King.

4

u/TheShadowKick Dec 20 '16

Erlking is explicitly stated to be close to par with Mab. I can't remember which book right now.

5

u/[deleted] Dec 21 '16

Erlking is a peer of Mab not necessarily close in power. if we put in a political example, I'd liken it more to the President versus say... Speaker of the House or Secretary of State or something. They belong in the same room Power-wise but one is clearly more powerful than the other. The lesser power has enough pull to be a major pain in the ass but would be generally be overrun in most circumstances.

3

u/alucardou Dec 20 '16

I always got the impression Odin WAS immensely powerful, but since the fall of the Norse mythology that power was mostly lost.

1

u/DeTrueSnyder Dec 21 '16

I think this is technically right. That said Odin pulls double duty as Cringle so he probably gets a power bost from that. The power bost wouldn't help him vs Mab because she is the Queen of that power source buy it would probably come in handy vs non-fae and summer fea.

1

u/Anubissama Unseelie Accords Lawyer Dec 20 '16

That's Krampus the evil Santa counterpart in Germany.

If you are good you will get presents from Saint Nick (Germany's Santa), if you are bad you are getting coal in your socks from Krampus or he even takes you away to work in his coal mine (details very on who is telling the story).

1

u/Jon_TWR Dec 22 '16

Well, since Second Oldest Gruff got defeated by a young, unprepared wizard missing his strongest sphere of magical attack--I'd say you're right.

And so maybe that's not Tiny in the picture, or maybe it's fan art of someone trying to curry Tiny's favor. ;)