I find some clues from this book about what XiaoLai had said as follows:

My very first impression upon a recent rereading of the Iliad ,the first in my adulthood ,is that the epic poet did not judge his Herod by the result:Heroes won and lost battles in a manner that was totally independent of their own valor;their fate depended upon totally external forces,generally the explicit agency of the scheming gods.

Heros are Heros because they are heroic in behavior,not because they won or lost. Partrocles does not strike us as a hero because of his accomplishments but because he preferred to die than see Achilles sulking into inaction.

Clearly,the epic poets understand invisible histories .

Also later thinkers and poets had more elaborate methods for dealing with randomness,as we will see with stoicism.

I like plain English .