The Vance that I've read (the Dying Earth books/collections, and the Demon Princes) don't have any characters, just archetypes. I despise McKillip's novels that I've read. Brust's long works (The Phoenix Guards et. seq.) are his best, and his recent Vlad books have been disappointingly light on story. Bujold and Butcher both write medium-length fiction, significantly longer than those old-style SF books.