The Red Wedding
OT Posts split from http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?743633-How-to-beat-Joffrey-as-Rob-Stark
Last edited by a moderator:
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
The Red Wedding
OT Posts split from http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?743633-How-to-beat-Joffrey-as-Rob-Stark
I don't think so. Even in the book it was very annoying from a storytelling perspective. The entire plotline you followed for three books? Ends abruptly for cheap shock value. It was really awesome to read, but it also slowed the pace of the books to the tiresome crawl they're in now.
On this I agree with you, but I think breaking betrothals should be punished in some way (generally, not just in this case), at least with a loss of prestige.
Probably. Maybe the family you spurned also won't join you in any plots for a certain amount of time. Also, I have to add that if something like the Red Wedding happens in-game it would essentially be a very cheap way to restrict the player from doing something other than what the game forces on him.
The Red Wedding only happened because Robb was losing the war.
If, as can happen in the mod, he'd finangled a marriage to the Tyrells and was in the process of battering down the doors to Kings Landing neither Frey nor Bolton would have dared move against him.
If, as can happen in the mod, he'd finangled a marriage to the Tyrells and was in the process of battering down the doors to Kings Landing neither Frey nor Bolton would have dared move against him.
You know I don't agree with this. I like the idea that plot-armour is not as powerful in the GOT than in other series. For instance, despite the fact that Jon's death would destroy a plotline we've been following for five books and make a lot of the politicking that has happened on the wall irrelevant I would enjoy it quite a lot. It would subvert quite a few tropes.
With the Red Wedding, the Boltons destroyed a great rival they had for ages, while the Freys (allegedly) secured an alliance with the Lannisters.
The Red Wedding also leaves the Great Bearded Glacier at a dead-end regarding the North. Most of the North's levies are dead, and there isn't much that can happen there for the rest of the series. And you know, a good story is not made by subverting tropes just to show how edgy you are (Which occurs all too much in the series). Plot armour also happens to be as strong as it might be on other fantasy series for some characters like Daenerys or Littlefinger and Varys.
In short, there is no reason to destroy a very long plotline so you can make the reader go "I didn't see that coming". And we all know how it ended. The books are now incredibly long and tiresome affairs that take years to come out (Although part of the blame goes to the fact that Martin writes a good 500 page story in 1000 pages).
It begins to sound like Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time just before his death, when descriptions >>> plot advancement. Also, Dany gets good plot armour. Varys and Littlefinger know how not to stick their necks out.
The North will have things imposed on them.
The North will have things imposed on them.
Varys and Littlefinger also happen to be the two characters that know everything going on a South America-sized continent because "Spy networkz, lol". How the aforementioned spy networks are faultless and inform them of everything going on perfectly despite the distances involved is never explained. Daenerys is a (Very creepily so) oversexualized 14 year old who has made more wrong decisions than all the Starks put together, yet she has never lost anything in the entire series since book 1.
Last edited:
And Martin can easily used A Wizard Did It for Dany and maybe Varys. Littlefinger is more of "underestimating his cruelty".
The Red Wedding was incredibly cheap, and an obvious attempt to be edgy by Martin. Anyone who defends this tactic is simply too much fan boy to see the situation subjectively. There is a reason why good writing and story telling has norms and standards. It is because they work. Anyone can pull a Deus ex machina like that for cheap thrills, but it takes real talent to tell interesting, involving stories without cheap tricks like this.
Agree with most of this. But come on....Daenerys has never known her family, has lived on the run her whole life, lost her brother, saw her war gains undone, lost her child, lost her husband, possibly she's lost her ability to have children, etc. And her decisions haven't been that bad....at least not as bad as, giving her enemies a head's up about her plans, or alienating a huge chunk of her vassals...because they killed her enemies...
I love the Stark's in this novel, but they aren't winning any best and brightest awards.
Let's examine the event from an in-universe viewpoint:
Why was the Red Wedding shocking? It violated the basic belief of sacred hospitality, which is one of the fundamental beliefs in Westeros, whichever god you may worship.
Why did the parties involved go with it? The Lannisters take out a big threat, with the Freys and Boltons taking the fall in terms of the ill reputation the event brings them. The Boltons kick out the Starks, righting an old wrong. Roose Bolton basically thinks "Customs? You'll fear the Flayed Man more." Walder Frey is the one who gets the short end of the stick, as he thinks he gets Lannister friendship (he doesn't), and the damage to his reputation is... extreme.
The Red Wedding is not just for shock value. Parties involved get very tangible rewards from it. Crushing what is essentially a pretty big army with that kind of casualties for the Freys and Boltons will earn a nod from Sun Tzu himself. (And yes, he'll also say,"Screw hospitality.")
They know what goes on in King's Landing because they pay the peasants, whom the highborn overlook, to feed them info. I must have missed the part where the were magically aware of what was going on in the rest of Westeros.
Its a five-way civil war, people gonna die.
@lazydrunk: 4 way, actually. At no time were the five kings active at the same time.
Except for you know, providing reliable info from as far as Winterfell to King's Landing?