Game of Thrones

[Lanny]

10 hours ago, SDS said:

The one puzzling stone in my shoe was where the hell was Dany when they lit the trench? The dead were all just standing there. I figured that was the time to light them all on fire. 

 

I think they implied that the plan was for the dragons to light the trench, Davos flagged them but they couldn't get the signal due to the storm. 

[sabills]

1 hour ago, nfreeman said:

I don't think this is correct.

I'd have to go back and look, they looked like metal to me. Could be wrong though.

[darksabre]

Whither Lightbringer, the Sword that was Promised?

Something doesn't make sense. The Long Night, in a literal sense, never fell. And Lightbringer was never pulled from the fire.

Was this whole Night King thing just a plot device? Is the Long Night something else entirely?

Magic and religion in the GoT universe obviously have a ton of importance. So how could the Lightbringer prophecy not bear fruit?

[Hoss]

50 minutes ago, sabills said:

I'd have to go back and look, they looked like metal to me. Could be wrong though.

i’m rewatching now on my own tv and they appeared to be darker than metal so i’m thinking they were dragon glass.

also, it’s still too dark but it’s not nearly as dark on my tv.

[SDS]

10 minutes ago, Hoss said:

i’m rewatching now on my own tv and they appeared to be darker than metal so i’m thinking they were dragon glass.

also, it’s still too dark but it’s not nearly as dark on my tv.

The common consumer doesn't know that black levels are everything on a TV. Most shop size vs price. Low black levels are very difficult to achieve. Most LCD screens give a medium grey as black.

It's why I choose plasma until they couldn't match size/cost numbers of LCD, but low-cost LCD have awful black levels. Scenes like last night highlighted the issue with their choice of tech.

[Hoss]

4 minutes ago, SDS said:

The common consumer doesn't know that black levels are everything on a TV. Most shop size vs price. Low black levels are very difficult to achieve. Most LCD screens give a medium grey as black.

It's why I choose plasma until they couldn't match size/cost numbers of LCD, but low-cost LCD have awful black levels. Scenes like last night highlighted the issue with their choice of tech.

if you’re creating something you know will be consumed by the masses you should probably consider the “common consumer.” but it’s become very clear that they didn’t create something anybody actually needed to see. having slightly better sight on the fighting isn’t opening my eyes to anything. the idea was to hide it.

[SDS]

 

3 minutes ago, Hoss said:

if you’re creating something you know will be consumed by the masses you should probably consider the “common consumer.” but it’s become very clear that they didn’t create something anybody actually needed to see. having slightly better sight on the fighting isn’t opening my eyes to anything. the idea was to hide it.

https://gizmodo.com/a-theory-about-why-last-nights-game-of-thrones-was-too-1834379081

[SDS]

3 minutes ago, Hoss said:

if you’re creating something you know will be consumed by the masses you should probably consider the “common consumer.” but it’s become very clear that they didn’t create something anybody actually needed to see. having slightly better sight on the fighting isn’t opening my eyes to anything. the idea was to hide it.

Also note that the budget for this episode was probably $15Mish... not $250M+ like a real movie. It is a television show. Like Grey's Anatomy or CSI. And this was a single episode. Never forget this is just a TV show with a huge comparative budget, but not movie-like budget. Expectations should be set accordingly.

[Hoss]

6 minutes ago, SDS said:

 

https://gizmodo.com/a-theory-about-why-last-nights-game-of-thrones-was-too-1834379081

yea, this all has me feeling more confident in my frustrations. a lot of good points.

[josie]

17 hours ago, Hoss said:

if you’re creating something you know will be consumed by the masses you should probably consider the “common consumer.” but it’s become very clear that they didn’t create something anybody actually needed to see. having slightly better sight on the fighting isn’t opening my eyes to anything. the idea was to hide it.

I'm logged in for the first time in nearly 2 months so I might as well say somethin'.

 

I could see a lot, might be our TV- and I loved it. I loved the contrasts, the chiaroscuro concept art come to life. That scene of the Dothraki riding out, arakhs aflame, with fiery boulders soaring overhead? Stunning. The dragons in the blizzard, unsure who's who? Confusing. Shots of blood streaked faces screaming in darkened hallways, unsure what's wight and what's living? Completely impossible to sort out. And that's what I liked about it. I felt as confused/hopeless/terrified as the characters. Fog of battle, a blizzard, yeah, it's a mess. And it felt like one. And I loved it. I kept waiting for a living person to accidentally kill another non-wight it was so confused. 

I like that Dany and Jon just messed everything up and were idiots. Because they both are (Sorry, not a fan of either really), and battles aren't usually perfect. It's a fantasy battle- there's gonna be some *~magic-y moments~* like the King and generals being solemn and still when meeting Bran at the Godswood (that tree has a lot more gravitas in the books- you get a distinct sense the Starks are truly the most in touch with the Old Gods/magic/nature). You have 12 hours to prepare against an army half of you still don't really believe/can't believe is real, you're going to make dumb decisions (fighting a necromancer? Let's stuff our most vulnerable folks in a crypt!). 

There's still issues of course, I'm still not the biggest fan of the show-writers- plot armor on our main chars (brienne, jamie, tormund, gendry), Jorah somehow teleporting around, sending the Dothraki in first instead of a dragon artillery salvo (they would've been insulted if they weren't allowed first but at least wait until you can see/hear the enemy), not staging it so Bran is literally the most protected thing but easier access to NK... imagine y'all if they tossed Bran out there, no battle, over with. C'mon, it's a fantasy show, we gotta battle the waves of the undead.

I loved the moments where you see dragons strafing and Arya going supernova and characters reacting with awe because- oh yeah, they haven't seen this/didn't know this existed before! 

No clue how the hell they're gonna wrap the rest of it up in 3 episodes without sorely disappointing me, though. 

 

IDK, for an hour and a half of TV fantasy show now riding (mostly) without source materials, I was pretty happy. 

 

[Swedesessed]

Great post above and one thing that you can say about many great shows that we have seen over the years, usually the ending isn't that great. Very hard to end a show on a perfect note. Breaking Bad to me was one of the best endings, show was 5 years, and they wrapped it up beautifully. But its rare. I'm not expecting the world here from GOT, I look at the entire body of work and the masterpiece it was and is.

[LGR4GM]

Part1:

The Battle of Winterfell was fine. I enjoyed the episode. I do however want to discuss the tactics involved. We are going to set ourselves in the universe for this exercise. So the rules of magic and such still apply. We are however going to consider tactics used by several real generals from antiquity. To name a few, Hannibal Barca, Scipio Africanus, and of course Gaius Julius Caesar. I picked these particular names because GoT takes place in a similar world. I could have gone with medieval but I somehow feel that this time period best suits some of the other tactics we have witnessed in the series. We see a lot of poor or mediocre armies face off against some better trained and equipped armies. The Lannister army is really the only professional army in Westeros for the most part. The dothraki are more of a tribal army of individual warriors than a really coherent fighting force. The unsullied are a well trained spear and shield army (who are not for the most part in westeros), somewhat like a light hoplite (which is technically a bad description but go with it). 

On one side we have the living. They are an army of probably around 40 thousand. We know there are about 6 thousand unsullied. The dothraki are probably in the 20k range. In the books the dothraki are in the 100k range but that is not what we see. In reality Winterfell could not support such an army with their mounts. Then there is roughly another several thousand northerners made up of soldiers and volunteers. I am including the free folk in this number. 40k might be high but the dothraki really are a huge force. 

On the other side you have the undead. Rough estimate would be 200k-250k but honestly we could go higher. They have been collecting dead people for years. They have none of the supply restrictions a normal army would have in this situation. They clearly outnumber the other side by a wide margin. 

Now the general tactics of the battle are straightforward but we will break it down. The dothraki charge is logical (later I will explain what I would have done different). In the ancient world, Calvary often acted as skirmishers rushing forward and then falling back when pressed. The issue in this case is that the press part was overwhelming.  The cavalry were enveloped and routed. Another note during this seen is that the long range ballista are used as the cavalary charge. Under normal circumstances this would be quite effective. It would break or weaken and enemy line. The one thing that is silly however is that the ballista are all in front of the main battle lines and they are never used again. 

This is when Danerys breaks from the plan. They were going to hold until the Night King revealed himself. She mounts her dragon and starts strafing the zombies. This is obviously not something that could happen in Caesars time but it seems to have minor impact on things. For the most part we will ignore the dragons from here out as they have very little impact on the actual battle tactics. 

Now we have the zombies charging. Here is where we see the first real tactical mistake. You don't want to allow a charging army to hit you with that charge. The front line will buckle and inexperienced troops are likely to break. The Romans would typical throw spears just before a charge and almost always did short charges into their opponents to help gain momentum. I will come back to this later. Basically they do nothing to slow or break the charge. The front ranks get overwhelmed and we start the retreat. The unsullied hold the center and they fall back behind their siege lines. So why was the majority outside those siege-works to begin with? They would have very effectively slowed the charge and given you an advantage. Again, poor planning here. You can sit behind effective defenses and break the charge and hit an opponent who is now coming at you in pieces as opposed to an ordered mass. Considering you already know you have a number disadvantage this is poor planning by any commander IMPO. 

It is worth pausing to consider the Unsullied for a moment. They are a light spear and shield army. Light meaning their armor and shields. They have medium shields that appear somewhat sturdy and light leather armor. They seem to be able to form shield walls and demonstrate the ability to work as a formation. Their shield wall at the center is quite resilient to the charge and like any good shield wall, stops the enemy. A good shield wall will have a front rank basically doing nothing but holding the ground while the ranks behind are thrusting over them. 300 actually has some good scenes of this before they go all 1 v 1 no shield wall melee. This is what we see the Unsullied do. This gives us a solid center but the flanks are turned leading to the retreat to the gate. 

Finally everyone falls in behind the siege-works and they light the pits. This is all very logical. What is not logical is the depth and width of the pits. In 52BC during the siege of Alesia, Caesar would have larger pits in case of a cavalry charge. The trench protecting Caesar at Alesia was 20 feet wide. We see the dead crossing the Winterfell trench by filling it up. Looks to be 4-5 feet wide and maybe 3-4 feet deep. All in all an ineffective defense for more than a few minutes. Before someone tells me that they didn't have time, they had lots of time. They have known the Knight King was coming for months. Caesar built his siege-works in less time. Technically speaking he built 2 in less time. The inner circle facing Alesia and the outer waiting for the Alesia relief army. 

Now at this point we have everyone retreat inside the walls. I have read criticism that that is where everyone should have started but I disagree. It would be quite normal for armies to form outside of walled cities and skirmish or fight before retreating inside of them. The first Punic War was characterized by this type of fighting in the limited full scale land battles. After the outside fight came a siege and such. So everyone is on the walls and for the life of me I do not understand why they do not immediately go on the walls but fine whatever they go up there. Winterfell looks to have 20 ft walls and the dead have no siege engines. SO they go full zombie horde and just pile up until they reach the top. At this point I am forced to consider if Winterfell is surrounded. I think not. I think the Northeast is fully enveloped but probably the Southwest is open. This matters because you can concentrate troops to one side. The dead eventually scale the walls and everything goes crazy. The main gate is taken, it is a mess. 

This generally ends the battle of Winterfell. There are no tactics after this other than the Night King feeding in reinforcements so to speak. The defenders have lost and outside of the magical rules of this world, would have been killed completely. Thus ends part 1 of this. We have mentioned most of the tactics involved and some issues I have. Part 2 will involve real tactics that would have helped and could have been employed using the technology of the era. 

Edited April 30, 2019 by LGR4GM

[GASabresIUFAN]

@LGR4GM

interesting post.  I’m no military historian, but the logic fails in the battle plan.

Why aren’t the cavalry protecting the flanks?  Why isn’t there a huge trench as you described further out with the infantry and catapults behind the lit trench?  Why isn’t there more dragon glass and flaming pitch on the walls? Why aren’t there rows of archers sending vollies of arrows and catapult bombs constantly being thrown over the correct trench throughout the battle.  Just dumb.  

That almost ruined the episode for me.  It was like watching a bad horror movie where the injured, broken and bleeding killer is chasing the final healthy victim and still catching them.  Dumb.

I understand the cavalry charge and shallow thin moat was done for cinematic reasons, but the episode would have been better had they at least got some of the tactics correct instead of none.

[Hoss]

@josie i agree with almost everything you said and still didn’t like the end result of the episode. that’s where my biggest gripe lies. i rewatched it on my tv and could see more which allowed me to appreciate more of the battle. but in the end it didn’t really mean a whole lot. the night king was a nobody who forgot to tell his buddies to make sure nobody runs by with a lethal weapon and also went for fashion over protection.

it was a beautiful mess that was built up for almost the entire series and ended with all the main players standing. even a guy with one hand who we’ve been told over and over can no longer fight properly survived the front lines and being pinned against a wall.

the actors, the musical score, the shooting and all that was great. the writing wasn’t there for me.

Edited April 30, 2019 by Hoss

[Hoss]

 

[LGR4GM]

Part 2: Post 30,000

Let us now turn our attention to why as a commander, you should have never have fought at Winterfell to begin with and other tactical issues. 

Map: http://quartermaester.info/ 

First Winterfell is an undefendable castle. It has no natural restrictions to it. The land around is rolling countryside with some trees here and there. The castle itself is formidable but would do nothing to negate the biggest issue you have facing the Night King, his army is significantly bigger. Staying at Winterfell means that the full force of that larger army can be brought to bear. This is a better situation than meeting the Night King in a pitched battle out on the field but still not a great strategy.

Now we have to account for the magic here. My first instincts would be to find a wide river and post up on the opposite bank, make the Night King cross it. However we know that he has some powers to control weather and freeze things so this might go poorly. What then? Your advantage is gone and you are now fighting a pitched battle which you will lose quickly as the Night King just has to extend his line out and flank you. 

That brings us to 2 options. First is Moat Cailin. Moat Cailin is built in a marsh with a wide river on 1 side and the marsh on the other. I have already questioned the use of magic and freezing so maybe not the best idea but you are at least accounting for numbers. Option 2 is the better choice. The Bloody Gate and the Eyrie.  A narrow pass protected by high mountains. The Night King seems somewhat simple in his tactics so this might work. Fortify the Gate and the Eyrie. Now you are funneling his large numbers and helping to negate them. The downside of this plan is of course your Dothraki are useless but I will get to that. 

I have decided to make my stand at the Eyrie and have to act accordingly. Everyone from Winterfell is fleeing to White Harbor. Danerys still has a sizable fleet and Captain Jack Queen Banger is preoccupied so he can't interfere. With my troops safely shipped to the Eyrie I have now given myself probably 2 weeks to prepare. This is where I have the advantage because the Night King has to react to me.

So the first thing is that the Dothraki will be used. In 217 Hannibal lured a roman army into an ambush along a lake. I would propose the same thing. The Dothraki can strike fast and withdraw. The key being you have to inflict double the damage otherwise you are just providing more soldiers. The best place for this would be to along the green fork before the vale leading to the Bloody Gate. Here you could strike and move away. You can keep Bran near the head of the vale since the Night King knows where he is and therefore lure him along your chosen route. You can also set traps as he has to march to meet you. 

Second as the Night King with his 200k instead of 250k reaches the vale, I send away the bulk of my cavalry with Jorah. Bulk meaning about 10-12k. I would guess that I have suffered some losses from my 20k but still have roughly 3k with me at the Bloody Gate. We know Dothraki can fight on land so this forms a good unit for wall defense. Further now my cavalry is behind on the Night King. He either has to split his army or ignore them. Either way it works for me. Jorah is under orders to wait until the Night King is fully engaged and then attack his rear, again using hit and run tactics. 

Third, as mentioned before I need to look to Caesar and his siege of Alesia. I have rocky ground and a gate to defend. I need to build a pit across the front and also need to build a second line of defenses behind the gate, assuming the gate will fall. I would put my Unsullied behind the pit in the vale. They are anchored on the flanks by the mountains. You have 3 lines.  The first line can be as deep as you need followed by a 2nd line of immediate reserves to plug gaps. Lines does not mean single line of soldiers in this case. The 3rd line is a rear guard for the eventual withdrawal of forces behind the Bloody Gate. Now we have a pit with fire to stop the charge and your best shield wall to meet what makes it over the pit eventually. 

You also need to cover the retreat of the Unsullied when it happens. This is where the wall and the arrows come in. You get everyone who can fire a bow to fire a bow. All of the glass tipped arrows you have and if not get burning arrows. You have pitch and oil ready to go. You can literally coat the ground in the stuff as the Unsullied leave and set it on fire. This will burn the dead you leave and help take a few more of the undead with them. 

This brings us to the Bloody Gate. You will see the same pile up as before. At this point you might even get the Night Dragon to come forth and blow up the gate. Either way you have already sent the Unsulled behind the 2nd line of fortifications you have that lead to the Eyrie itself. This line has the ballista and is aimed for the gate. The second you lose the gate, you open up on it. Anyone who hasn't retreated from it yet is dead anyways. 

This is when the battle really gets in full swing. You have probably taken another 50-75k troops from the Night King after he uses any of your dead for replacements. On top of that you have lost probably half of your unsullied so you have about 4k left. You also have another 15k other troops and have probably only lost a few thousand at the gate. You are doing what you should be doing though, limiting losses while inflicting heavy casualties. At this point you are in a flat valley with mountains on either side and the actual Eyrie on the one. You are always retreating towards that.

You also still have Jorah and his 10k behind enemy lines. Now someone will be like "THE TRENCH! You can't cavalary charge through a trench!" Which is true and why the Dothraki have built a 25 foot portable wood bridge. It goes on top of the undead filled trench for their attack. They charge the back of the undead army. In the real world, I win. The army would break and route and thats that. Here though the Undead just wheel and attack the Dothraki. After taking heavy casualties they withdraw. Half of them are dead but they killed another 20k undead as the undead were trapped between the second line of defenses and the Dothraki. The Undead don't get to charge the Dothraki in this instance either. 

So lets pause to consider where we are at. I have taken out roughly 100k thousand more troops and lost about 10k of my own. This means that the Night King has around 75-100k left and I have roughly 20k left. Now comes the withdrawal to the Eyrie. I light the pits and fall back again being covered by the Unsullied who are still awesome. The zombies now have to come up a narrow path, uphill, to get to me. I simply sit in the gap and feed in reinforcements until I destroy them all. If the dragon comes, I use my 2. If the night king comes, everyone has dragon glass. If the zombies charge the are coming uphill so they have to have even more numbers to swamp me. There numerical superiority has been spent. If they try to climb the cliffs to the Eyrie, you kill them. Unlike winterfell they can't pile up to accomplish this. All in all I have fought and won. The Night King will waste his strength trying to take the pass and will fail. Even should they succeed at that, you are looking at massive casualties. Let's say 50k die taking it, I might lose a couple thousand. I am now at the Eyrie facing 50k to 15k and they have to take the walls. Still better than Winterfell. 

Bottom line is that with just a little more strategic ingenuity, the battle could have gone differently and we could have witnessed a victory. Now there are problems with the Night King doing what you want but with Bran being the target you can just force him to react to you. The only downside to the strategy described and why I might be inclined to fight the Night King at Moat Cailin is that you are giving him an advantage if he is smart. He can ignore you and go take Kings landing and then it is all over. This is the biggest flaw with my strategy. 

 

[nfreeman]

Here’s a pretty entertaining professional breakdown of the living’s battle plan:  https://www.wired.com/story/game-of-thrones-winterfell-battle-tactical-analysis/

[darksabre]

Everything about the Winterfell strategy depends on whether or not the Night King is singularly focused on the Three Eyed Raven. Indications are that this is certainly the case, but it's a tough roll of the dice. The Night King was created by the Children of the Forest to wipe out the First Men, and that includes more than just the memory of man as contained in the Three Eyed Raven.

I do think the battle should have been fought somewhere more appropriate than Winterfell because, as mentioned, it's a bad castle. But it's ultimately also the last thing standing between the army of the dead and the rest of the people of Westeros (if you care about those kinds of things, Jon...Dany...Jaime...).

Rock and a hard place. Do you fly Bran on a dragon to an island closer to the wall and hope the Night King comes calling? Or is the Night King more than just a machine and capable of strategy?

[GASabresIUFAN]

To bad Dany and co. couldn’t find a choke point to use the Unsullied like the 300 to bottle up the advancing horde.  

There were some 300esq qualities to the battle.  Hopelessly outnumbered defenders against a leader with unlimited armies and more armies then sense.  

Seriously, other then Bran, why even attack the castle with the full force?  Why not attack with an incredibly large force,  but by pass Winterfell with the bulk of the army and head south.  Essentially cut off Winterfell.  2 Dragons aren’t enough to stop your un-dead army.  Lay siege to Winterfell and eventually they’ll die and join your army.

 

[SDS]

4 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

To bad Dany and co. couldn’t find a choke point to use the Unsullied like the 300 to bottle up the advancing horde.  

There were some 300esq qualities to the battle.  Hopelessly outnumbered defenders against a leader with unlimited armies and more armies then sense.  

Seriously, other then Bran, why even attack the castle with the full force?  Why not attack with an incredibly large force,  but by pass Winterfell with the bulk of the army and head south.  Essentially cut off Winterfell.  2 Dragons aren’t enough to stop your un-dead army.  Lay siege to Winterfell and eventually they’ll die and join your army.

 

Why are you putting yourself through this?

[GASabresIUFAN]

45 minutes ago, SDS said:

Why are you putting yourself through this?

Lol.  I’m not, just making conversation.

[nfreeman]

I just completed the re-watch.  It was a freaking masterpiece.  Riveting, tense, moving and beautifully filmed and scored.

I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that there will probably never be another episode of TV like it.

[Brawndo]

Considering his track record with Toronto Sports Teams...RIP Arya Stark 

 

[carpandean]

Well ... Dany's had better days. ?

[SDS]

Tyrion should be dead. Cersei showed she was the monster. There was no reason to spare his life.