We saw him do it once before last season. Although this is the first time he really did something while controlling him.
Its not that they would be captured by Mance, but more like they would change sides and swear allegiance to Mance, and spill everything willingly. Its one of those things, that you cant leave to chance, if you were in the position of castle black for the intel level, and on a lesser note, they are self disciplining.
Desert and they will get you.
Plot wise, it takes care of the other side of the wall and advances the next plot point in the black castle. There is an election coming up.
Declan
Just feed it to Lysa. It’ll make its way to Robin eventually.
Nobody’s perfect. I think it’s far more plausible that Littlefinger just plain missed something totally unexpected than that he learned a massively useful piece of information and then just did nothing with it ever.
Some other comments:
-I agree that the Locke/Craster’s Keep storyline may not turn out to have a huge lasting impact. So? It’s better than two episodes of Bran wandering through the woods and occasionally having visions. And it arguably showed us Bran getting farther along the rode of being a Warg.
-I think it’s somewhat ambiguous what was motivating Cersei while she was talking to Margaery. Obviously it’s very out-of-character for her to be nice, so the cynical explanation is that she’s just trying (and probably failing) to manipulate Margaery, presumably involving Tyrion’s trial. It’s also possible that Joffrey dying was enough of a shock to her that she’s having a moment of clarity, and she really DOES love Tommen, and she actually wants him to have a happy and successful life, and has realized that Margaery is going to be a key part of that whether she likes it or not
-I wish someone had used the “if Tyrion did NOT kill your son and we only hold a show trial, then whoever actually did it will get away free” logic on Cersei. It wouldn’t have worked, of course, but I wish someone had tried
-It’s interesting how the revelation about Littlefinger having set everything in motion changes everything, but also changes nothing. Even if everyone in Westeros found out right now, it wouldn’t change the ongoing struggling for the throne (although it would probably cause everyone to view Littlefinger with a lot more suspicion).
-Arya and The Hound continue to be the most awesome pair, and there are some awesome pairs.
If the Bank decides to collect, who’s going to defend you? Those legions of soldiers who you haven’t been paying? The other families or kingdoms who don’t wish to risk the wrath of the Bank and also now see that your kingdom is powerless and bankrupt?
Now that I think about it, the real risk doesn’t come straight from the Iron Bank. It comes from the Iron Bank announcing your weakness to the surrounding area and employing them as a collection agency.
So, upsetting a stable regime doesn’t always work out like you thought? Whodathunkit?
It might be interesting to see some actual governing going on. I don’t think we’ve seen the nuts and bolts of governance since S1, when Bran was holding court at Winterfell, settling disputes, dispensing justice, and Rickon was smashing walnuts.
The story seems to be massively underrating the unsullied as a military force. They don’t hesitate, they don’t feel fear, they don’t break and rout. They’re strong, healthy, and trained in formation spear tactics among other things.
In a foot melee in the real world, a relatively small percentage of overall battle casualties came from the actual face to face fighting, especially if they fight in a protected, standoff sort of way like phalangites, which the unsullied seem to be modeled after to some degree. It’s been said, and some historians believe, that Alexander lost less than a thousand men in all his conquests, because his armies never broke. Most of the casualties are inflicted after one side breaks and routs, and the other one pursues and slaughters them. That point is the decisive moment of battle - which side breaks first is slaughtered.
The unsullied will never break. They will hold formation and fight to the last man if need be. Their enemies know that they will never break, and that they are have an almost superhuman battlefield prowess, which will in turn case enemies to break earlier or even desert rather than engage with them. The unsullied will tolerate hardship and hunger, forced marches and constant strife. They won’t alienate the locals with rape and pillage, and may even be put to use to help local populations to engender support.
Essentially, the story has made the unsullied either too good, or too plentiful. Since Westerosi armies number in the 20-60 thousand range, which includes recent conscripts handed a spear and sent to the front, 8000 unsullied under competent leadership could easily wipe the floor with them. And those armies are exhausted by the wars between the Starks and Lannisters, and the Lannisters and Stannis.
Now you add the dragons - which, even if they aren’t full grown, should scare the living shit out of people - and that increases your morale problem even further. Add in Westerosi houses who feel loyal to the Targaryens or simply see the way the wind is blowing adding to the fight in their favor.
Even without local support, her dragons, or her cavalry, the army of 8000 unsullied should sweep aside the Westerosi like Alexander did. Add in those other factors, and she could clearly be the dominant player in Westeros the moment she landed.
Now - maybe she wants to rule Slaver’s bay for a while and let her dragons grow. Maybe she doesn’t realize the tactical advantages she possesses (although it’s implausible that Jorah and Selmy couldn’t see it). But the story seems to be treating her as a minor power until her dragons are grown. But that’s only because it doesn’t logically follow through with the implications of the strength of the unsullied, most likely due to the writer’s lack of historical knowledge of what 8000 super soldiers could do in early medieval battles.
This. Jon grew up learning to spar and learning tactics, but to get men to follow him (which I assume is where his story is going) he needs to prove himself in real combat.
Most of the battles would not be just two forces facing each other, it would be her unsullied trying to storm well defended castles. Stannis took massive casualties and that battle was his huge army vs mostly city guards. She would lose thousands of unsullied every time she stormed a castle, hell taking kingslanding alone would cost her a large chunk of her army.
In season 1, when talking about the potential of an invading Doth’raki army, Robert Baratheon explained why they couldn’t simply sit behind their walls while an invading army ran rampant over the countryside. Especially if they’re concerned that her claim and heritage (and dragons) might engender support. They wouldn’t have to storm King’s Landing to build a power base in Westeros, and at some point a royal army would have to be assembled to try to stop them.
But even if they did siege the castles, it’s pretty clearly shown that King’s Landing isn’t set up to withstand a siege for long, since they’re barely being kept afloat with food being brought in constantly. The unsullied have also been shown to have the engineering prowess to build catapults, so they’re likely capable of siege warfare.
I did not understand why they were so afraid of Mance Rayder learning Night’s Watch intelligence from the mutineers. Mance was once a member of the Night’s Watch; presumably he’d already know the basic layout of the forts and how they fight and all.
To be fair, Khal Drogo had over a hundred thousand horsemen at his disposal, which is over ten times the horse as Dany has foot, even if the Unsullied are a special kind of foot. If Dany landed with her current army, the outcome would depend on how many lords she could get on her side. Individual great houses have armies in the 50k+ range. I think Renly said that his Tyrell+Baratheon armies were over 100k in season 1 for example.
If the other nobles sided with the Lannisters, Dany would be utterly crushed at least until her dragons are more fully grown. They’re probably still small enough to be killed by a single crossbowman. If some of the nobles sided with her, she’d have a good chance. There’s been a lot of civil wars in the past decades and a lot of resentment, so there should definitely be something to work with there.
Jon had told him there were a thousand men at Castle Black. There’s actually like a hundred. Mance’s belief that there is a substantial force is the reason he’s so cautiously approaching his attack of the fort.
That’s been covered pretty heavily in last week’s thread. The summary is that Mance & Co. were under the impression that there were 1000s strong at Castle Black, when in actuality, there were far far fewer. The mutineers knew what the actual numbers were. Should Mance learn the actual numbers, it’d be easy enough to assemble the necessary forces to overtake the castle.
He needed Bram alive to tell him where Rickon is. Bolton needs both boys for sure dead.
So Baelish was made lord of Harrenhall by Joffrey after Blackwater for negotiating the Tyrell/Lanister alliance. I remember him announcing that he was going to the Aerie to marry Lysa some time later–maybe even just last season, but I can’t remember if we were given any context as to how that got set up.
He was going to the Eyrie to negotiate a marriage pact to bring the vale back into the fold, which was obviously already pre planned but still required he be made a major lord to make it viable. He made it look like he was doing the Lannisters a favor when he was just following his plan.
So remember folks, if you are looking for a deal on an army, come see SenorBeef at SenorBeef’s Used Unsullied Lot. No credit? No problem! Low-low down payment and special financing available. Let me put YOU in a new Unsullied army today!
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I think the Craster’s keep storyline is meant to help establish Jon Snow as some sort of leader of the Night’s Watch. It was hinted at in the previous episode as well when the Lord Commander was talking with the guy who used to be Kings Guard…
Daenerys is learning about the wold adage wining the peace is harder than winning the war.
I’m 99% sure there was a scene with Littlefinger talking to Sansa in King’s Landing (when he was trying to convince her to go away with him on his ship,) where he mentioned that Ayra was alive and well.
I’d say so. Arya’s sword looks reasonably similar in dimension and proportion to a early-renaissance rapier, with a very simple hilt, and the Braavosi “water dancing” from what we see in the show, seems similar to historical Italian rapier fighting. In the real world, a properly sharpened rapier requires about 5lb of force to penetrate skin and hit something vital. Depending on the size of the chain links, the blade should be able to fit through the links, but from later images, the Hound is pretty well protected against a rapier thrust.