A Song Of Ice And Fire

Also I read Arys Oakheart's only chapter. Arianne, I know you want vengeance for your father but using Myrcella as a patsy for your revenge is way worse than keeping her in a place where she'll have kids to play with, can hang out in a much more friendly area with the boy she's betrothed to. You may be Oberyn Martell's daughter but I doubt he would approve of your manipulations and lack of forethought.

Arianne is Oberyn's niece, not his daughter.

Whatever. He still wouldn't approve.

Hmmm I don't think we know enough about Oberyn to say that he wouldn't have approved of Arianne's plot. I think there is more evidence to suggest he would have approved it paraphrasing: "I'm a bloodthirsty man" "it's me you have to contend with and not my patient brother" "when will the justice be served"

I mean for what's it worth, I think Arianne's plan had some merit. Dorne had legitimate grounds in proclaiming Myrcella queen. And it would have been interesting to see how the rest of the kingdom would have reacted.

Actually Oberyn would approve as he was trying to get Tyrion to go south to help him crown Myrcella.

No guesswork is needed. It's within the text of ASOS.

@Mad Skills 1) Okay, you cam say it, but it won't make you right.

2) And what hes most interested in is money. Stannis doesn't even have a castle at this point.

3) 50 thou's the bar. The Lannisters have at least 10,000 more men normally and can put more of their men in the field than the North.

4) Not really. Torrhen Square, Deepwood Motte, the Stony Shore and most of all Moat Cailin. Many were killed by Ramsay although seceral people escaped. DM having 200 is way to low. If they were that weak they wouldn't be as prominent as they were in Robbs council.

5) Maybe not, but he was family for a few decades and she hates Ned.

1) Maybe it can.

2) I wasn't talking about the current Stannis and Bronn. I was talking about Bronn right before the Blackwater. And Bronn isn't most interested in money. He's interested in advancement and his life. He even told Tyrion that he had plenty of money when he asked him to take on the Mountain.

Personally I think he'll defect to Aegon/ Daenerys as his castle is in a good position to use against King's Landing plus he could use Lollys to stake a claim on Rosby.

3) Nope.

GRRM officially confirmed this figure.

The figure for the Westerlands is 50,000-60,000.

4.) The Stony Shore is a huge sparsely populated area with a few fishing villages.

House Glover is actually not a strong house at all. They're of masterly rank not lordly rank. The only reason they have such high positions is because they're directly sworn to Winterfell.Their actual title is the Master of Deepwood Motte not the Lord of Deepwood Motte.

Torren's Square is also weak. And the house that owns TS are the Tallharts who are also of Masterly rank and not lordly rank. They too are directly sworn to Winterfell.

(Technically Winterfell owns most of the Western half of the North)

And Robb only left a small force of about a 100 archers at Moat Caitlin which is a drop in the bucket really.

And concerning Ramsay's betrayal. Rodrik only had 2,000 men with him. Ramsay was smart enough to kill all the leaders and then scattering much of the leaderless group. I'll be generous and say 500-1000 died. Regardless many of the survivors go on to join Stannis.

Check and mate.

5) Yes and she also loved Brandon. And she hates Ramsay and the Freys. Whose faction is she going to end up hating more, really? The Stark faction with the guy who didn't bring her husband's bones or Ramsay's faction. You know Ramsay Snow the guy who wants to make boots out of her. The guy who killed her beloved nephew. Included with Ramsay are the Freys too who killed many of her men.

edited 2nd Feb '15 6:12:51 PM by MadSkillz

I started reading The World of Ice and Fire today. Those illustrations are gorgeous, though Valyria the city doesn't look like how I imagined it, not to mention the lack of safety regulations by BUILDING AMONG 14 VOLCANOES.

RE: Arianne

I can't stand Arianne. She's just so damn stupid. Her plan was a bad joke, and her characterization consists of being a Smug Snake resenter who sleeps with anything that moves. In short, she's just another Cersei, with a few more morals, and a touch less paranoia.

Then again, I dislike the Dornish in general. They don't really bring anything to the story. Oberyn worked as a device for getting rid of Gregor Clegane and moving Tyrion's arc along, but as a group the Dornish plot has gone nowhere. Arianne, Quentyn, and even Doran are incompetent at best, and the Sand Snakes may well be the most obnoxious group of morally myopic idiots in the setting.

Seriously.

"We want to avenge our murdered father! Even though he got himself killed for being reckless and stupid and fought in trial-by-combat of his own accord!"

It seems like the Dornish plot will start to tie in with the Faegon plot which I personally found to be interesting. Unfortunately the show cut out both which means they're probably not going to be too important in the long run.

How did they cut out both? We haven't even gotten to the season that they would take place in.

I hate it when people use the justification that they're not in the show to illustrate that a plot isn't important in the long run. The books are the books and the show is the show. The show is forced to truncate its story because the producers don't want to spend over a decade on this show and because its a bitch and a half to keep all the actors together after their original contracts end not to mention increasing costs and the inability to hire so many more characters.

Anyways the producers may get to the same ending that GRRM has in store but I'm willing to bet that if they had replaced Ned with someone else that you could get the same ending in the show as well. And I dare you to say that Ned wasn't important.

Besides the Dornish plot wasn't cut just Young Griff (probably we aren't sure).

edited 2nd Feb '15 8:03:06 PM by MadSkillz

Well of course. The Lannisters promised them justice which was supposed to mean Gregor's head. Instead Oberyn was forced to risk his life to get it.

I'd be pissed too if my father had to take an unneeded risk that got him killed because you decided to break a promise over a lapdog.

Did you just Slut Shame Arianne? Good job. God forbid that women sleep around. Please keep your misogynistic thoughts to yourself in the future.

Anyways I don't see how Cersei or Arianne are anything alike. The only thing they have in common is that they're women in positions of power who had a bad plan. :l

Are you going to call Daenerys another Cersei too?

Anyways she did this thing called character development. I wouldn't call her a Smug Snake anymore.

You don't like a society that doesn't stigmatize homosexuality and sleeping around?

Anyways the Dornish plot is build up to the second Dance of Dragons which is pretty important.

And did you miss where Doran's placing all the Sand Snakes? You know in the court of KL (maybe to kill Tommen) and another by the High Septon's ear.

You need to wait for the slow payoff.

edited 2nd Feb '15 8:18:09 PM by MadSkillz

I have to say, now that I know that the Dornish and the Tyrells hate each other because Oberyn crippled Willas, Loras flirting with Oberyn in the show is the stupidest shit!

Willas doesn't exist on the show. There is only Loras.

I really like Loras' actor.

But man how I hate how they write his character sometimes. Hell even the actor who reads the books hates how they treat his character.

Here's hoping they give him a badass battle at Dragonstone instead of having the High Septon cart him away for being gay.

edited 2nd Feb '15 8:26:07 PM by MadSkillz

Correction: Mace hates the Martells for Oberyn crippling Willas. Willas doesn't blame Oberyn and the two supposedly corresponded regularly. I don't think that we know the rest of the Tyrells' views on the Martells.

Also, Willas doesn't exist in the show's continuity.

No, I know Willas doesn't exist in the show, I was just musing.

If we're going to see Willas and Garlan next book then I'm guessing Euron takes Oldtown and forces Sam to head to Highgarden.

Just gimme my Victarion versus Garlan battle, GRRM!

At the very least I wanna see Garlan cutting through swathes of Ironborn scum.

edited 2nd Feb '15 8:33:52 PM by MadSkillz

The Librarian: I thought the producers already said Aegon and Arianne wouldn't be appearing in season 5. I doubt they'd leave them out of season 5 if they ever intended to use them.

Madskillz: At this point the showrunners know more than we do about where the series is going. I know they can't adapt everything but if they leave out an entire plot where someone tries to take the throne it's a pretty good indication that Aegon and Arianne probably won't be serious contenders for the throne. Even ignoring that I don't see how you can do the Dornish plot and keep most of the stuff the same without Arianne and Quentyn(he was cut too right?). I wasn't thrilled with Arianne's plot in AFFC but keeping Dorne in at all without her around is even sillier.

@Differences between book and show: Look, I get it, they have to cut things out. It's unfortunate but up until the final stretch of season 4 I was pretty okay with most of the changes they're making. Unfortunately I think truncating the last two books into one season is an even stupider decision than making book three two seasons. If they gave it two seasons then I don't see any reason why they couldn't include all the material from the books. It might also give Martin a bit more time to finish the series although at this point there's practically no chance he'll finish it before the show ends.

I just discovered the greatest ASOIF theory ever.

They pretty much confirmed that Arianne doesn't exist unless she shows up as a cousin. We just have no word on Aegon Blackfyre.

Anyways how can Aegon not be a serious contender for the Iron Throne if we're going to have a second Dance of Dragons?

GRRM has already confirmed that there'll be multiple people sitting on throne besides Tommen. He already has Storm's End so I'm pretty confident that he'll take King's Landing.

You can easily do the Dornish and Aegon plot without Quentyn though. It'll be tough to do without Arianne but it's doable. The gist is Aegon with the GC and Dorne ally and take down Tommen in time for Dany to get there and fight them.

I don't necessarily think Aegon's plot will be cut though so much as replaced. Instead of Aegon and Arianne versus Tommen and Marge we'll get Trystane and Myrcella versus Tommen and Marge.

No Dance of Dragons just a Dance of Lions. Dany can come afterwards to clean Myrcella and Trystane up.

I don't know... That theory is a bit dubious. Their evidence for it is kinda weak.

How can the Mountain and the Hound be brothers when they're both Daario?

smh

1) Nope.

2) So he'd run off to serve Stannis? The same guy who cut off the finger tips of the man who saved him because he was a smuggler? Besides that, is House Stokeworth even that powerful?

3) Where did you get that from? George said that the north and the vale are about equal to the in universe perceived strength of dorne (50,000). I'm pretty sure thats from the non-canon game.

4) Its a big leap from fairly weak to 200 men, I'd say.

5) 100 Archers and a bunch of Crannogmen that are counted in the total strength of the North.

6) Some survived no doubt. But he didn't just kill the leaders and chase off the rest. Thats insane. He killed a bunch of them. Probably wiped out the majority.

7) And she also loved her nephew. Honestly, counting her in the Stark camp as if its a fact just isn't going to fly.

edited 2nd Feb '15 9:05:55 PM by 940131