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Mance Rayder General-Beyond-the-Wall?


Corvo the Crow

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I've been wondering about this some time, we see Mance trying to implement some discipline into his wildlings and make use of siege equipment and tactics that an army would use south of the wall but where did he get the idea? Where did he learn the know-how? Below are a few examples, feel free to add more if you find more but I'd especially like to know or at least get an idea how he came up with these.

 

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"We know how few you were, when you stopped the turtle. We know how many came from Eastwatch. We know how your supplies have dwindled. Pitch, oil, arrows, spears. Even your stair is gone, and that cage can only lift so many. We know. And now you know we know."

 

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 "Harma, mount up your raiders. Tormund, find your sons and give me a triple line of spears."

 

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Mance donned his helm with its raven wings. His men were mounted up as well. "Arrowhead," Mance snapped, "to me, form wedge." Yet when he slammed his heels into the mare and flew across the field at the rangers, the men who raced to catch him lost all semblance of formation.

 

Bonus,

Quote

"I see golden banners, oh . . . " A mammoth lumbered by, trumpeting, a half-dozen bowmen in the wooden tower on its back. "The king . . . no . . . "

 A makeshift planetosi tank? Mammoths belong to the giants so this would be a very recent invention. Did someone from his host thought this would be a good idea? Or maybe mance was trying to replicate the idea of horse archers but he failed it with his wildlings but furthered on the idea with Mammoths? OR he may have just replicated the Essosi way the elephants are used; we know Golden company have elephants but do they use it as a mobile archery platform?

 

All quotes from ASOS 73

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I think Mance is the Westerosi version of Gaius Julius Civilis.  Born in one culture, raised in another, then took his knowledge and expertise back to the other side.  He was raised by the Night's Watch, which probably means taught by Maester Aemon.  

(Civilis was aided in rebellion by a seeress named Veleda. Val?)

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5 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

I've been wondering about this some time, we see Mance trying to implement some discipline into his wildlings and make use of siege equipment and tactics that an army would use south of the wall but where did he get the idea? Where did he learn the know-how?

My scientific wild ass guess is that he sat around the food table and listened to the elders talk and tell tales of what once was and how it happened. Perhaps Mance had conversations with the boss of Shadow Tower, Denys Mallister (a knight) or the Halfhand (a mystery) or maybe Mance read some books.

LC Qorgyle seemed interested in The Mance enough to take him to WF to meet Stark.

Har! I don't know how old Mance is, adjusting my antennae, but Bloodraven was LC before Qorgyle. After Qorgyle was Mormont & his raven. The tinfoil plot thickens. :wideeyed:

 

 

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The Watch is a military order, and even with a great reduction in knights and no regular use for the kind of tactics Mance employed in Storm, he would have still been familiar with them.

In fact, Mance may well have been on a fast track for leadership based on his intelligence and lifetime with the Watch. This would have given him even greater exposure to these tactics than just a curious Ranger would have gotten.

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16 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

I've been wondering about this some time, we see Mance trying to implement some discipline into his wildlings and make use of siege equipment and tactics that an army would use south of the wall but where did he get the idea? Where did he learn the know-how? Below are a few examples, feel free to add more if you find more but I'd especially like to know or at least get an idea how he came up with these.

Bonus,

 A makeshift planetosi tank? Mammoths belong to the giants so this would be a very recent invention. Did someone from his host thought this would be a good idea? Or maybe mance was trying to replicate the idea of horse archers but he failed it with his wildlings but furthered on the idea with Mammoths? OR he may have just replicated the Essosi way the elephants are used; we know Golden company have elephants but do they use it as a mobile archery platform?

 

All quotes from ASOS 73

More food for thought on the Mance is Arthur Dayne theory.  This plus his ability to bring peace and relative unity to the Wildlings is a monumental achievement. Of course I doubt most Wildlings will ever take to being more disciplined.

Crackpot aside Mance spent most of his life at the Wall. Plenty of books in those libraries and I am sure books of siegecraft and the like could be found. Also Mance seemed close to LC Qorygle (I mean he got hand picked for heading to Winterfell) I am sure he was a knight.

 

7 hours ago, The Mountain That Flies said:

The Watch is a military order, and even with a great reduction in knights and no regular use for the kind of tactics Mance employed in Storm, he would have still been familiar with them.

In fact, Mance may well have been on a fast track for leadership based on his intelligence and lifetime with the Watch. This would have given him even greater exposure to these tactics than just a curious Ranger would have gotten.

I agree if Mance hadn't joined the Wildlings he probably would have been fast tracked similar to Jon. Didn't Qhorin call him the best of the Watch?

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12 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

More food for thought on the Mance is Arthur Dayne theory.  This plus his ability to bring peace and relative unity to the Wildlings is a monumental achievement. Of course I doubt most Wildlings will ever take to being more disciplined.

Crackpot aside Mance spent most of his life at the Wall. Plenty of books in those libraries and I am sure books of siegecraft and the like could be found. Also Mance seemed close to LC Qorygle (I mean he got hand picked for heading to Winterfell) I am sure he was a knight.

 

I agree if Mance hadn't joined the Wildlings he probably would have been fast tracked similar to Jon. Didn't Qhorin call him the best of the Watch?

There's pretty much no evidence that Mance can read. Given Jeor's own words, I'd argue heavily against it:

“Apart from the men at my table tonight, I have perhaps twenty who can read, and even fewer who can think, or plan, or lead.”

Mance's plan was kinda half cocked. One turtle and a raiding party over the wall? I'm not expecting him to build counterweight trebuchets and mine the wall but sending people to hold the top of the wall as well would surely be common sense. Don't have to worry about hot oil, frozen barrels, or spitfires if the battlements are full of allies.

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To be honest none of that seems beyond anything he could learn through osmosis during his time at the wall or just common sense really. 

Also just because the mammoths use giants doesn't necessarily mean that other groups of Wildlings haven't domesticated them as well. 

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36 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

There's pretty much no evidence that Mance can read. Given Jeor's own words, I'd argue heavily against it:

“Apart from the men at my table tonight, I have perhaps twenty who can read, and even fewer who can think, or plan, or lead.”

I agree that here has been no evidence that Mance can read.

The thing with Mance is I don't know his age. I don't know if he left the NW while Qorgyle was LC or if Mance left while Mormont was LC.

Halfhand was stationed at Shadow Tower. Halfhand is the one who gives Jon the story about Mance. Mallister, the boss at Shadow Tower was the one who tried to make Mance get rid of his tattered cloak.

Expanding on the quote you provided

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A Game of Thrones - Tyrion III     The Lord Commander took no notice of the irritating bird. "Gared was near as old as I am and longer on the Wall," he went on, "yet it would seem he forswore himself and fled. I should never have believed it, not of him, but Lord Eddard sent me his head from Winterfell. Of Royce, there is no word. One deserter and two men lost, and now Ben Stark too has gone missing." He sighed deeply. "Who am I to send searching after him? In two years I will be seventy. Too old and too weary for the burden I bear, yet if I set it down, who will pick it up? Alliser Thorne? Bowen Marsh? I would have to be as blind as Maester Aemon not to see what they are. The Night's Watch has become an army of sullen boys and tired old men. Apart from the men at my table tonight, I have perhaps twenty who can read, and even fewer who can think, or plan, or lead. Once the Watch spent its summers building, and each Lord Commander raised the Wall higher than he found it. Now it is all we can do to stay alive."

If I have an enemy standing on top of an ice wall who is going to rain arrows down upon me and my men I had better come up with a plan of defense before I attack. As has been said, tactics were common sense. It that is an unacceptable response, I will go back to what I said in my post in this thread.
 

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My scientific wild ass guess is that he sat around the food table and listened to the elders talk and tell tales of what once was and how it happened. Perhaps Mance had conversations with the boss of Shadow Tower, Denys Mallister (a knight) or the Halfhand (a mystery) or maybe Mance read some books.

LC Qorgyle seemed interested in The Mance enough to take him to WF to meet Stark.

Har! I don't know how old Mance is, adjusting my antennae, but Bloodraven was LC before Qorgyle. After Qorgyle was Mormont & his raven. The tinfoil plot thickens. :wideeyed:


 

 

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Some nice ideas but do we know whether Mance can read or write? He was a wildling orphan (and a bastard of a black brother if I'm not mistaken) taken in by The Watch. There are maesters at the Wall, true, but would they teach him among their other responsibilities? And it occurs to me that learning to read and write in Westeros isn't easy even with Maesters; there are lords who can't read or write leaving this to their maesters. As for learning during his time or being groomed to command, "How do you make a turtle?" and "Spears: three lines on how to stop cavalry charges and more" wouldn't be popular topics among the brothers who are mostly common folk and even brothers of higher birth or Lord Commanders have no reason to teach him these.

47 minutes ago, Trigger Warning said:

Also just because the mammoths use giants doesn't necessarily mean that other groups of Wildlings haven't domesticated them as well. 

They may or may not have, that isn't the point, not exactly anyway. They may have domesticated mammoths as livestock but even then archer tower atop the mammoth would be a new invention, wildlings aren't very militaristic, not in the way that they'd use or develop more sophisticated weapons. Most freefolk don't even have forgeries or mine for metals, they'd not bother building this mammoth tower as they'd have no use for it.

 

Also on mammoth tower, I've found out Dany is facing against elephants with towers on their back in Slaver's Bay. (Can't find the quote now)So It is a weapon used in the Essos, however common/uncommon it is.

Again, where does he even learn all these? I don't buy into Mance is Daario and Benjen is Arthur Dayne and such. His story about his cloak, which some take as proof of he is a Targaryen, isn't a story of metaphors either, Jon sees the cloak noting the red silks on it, so just an ordinary cloak mended with Asshai Silk. How did Cog end up there is also another, though unrelated question. Free folk do trade with ships from free cities as Davos points but what could the wildlings have to make a ship go as far as frozen shore?

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How is this even a question?  Mance Rayder learned all of this at the Wall during his time in the NW.  Whether he knows how to read or write is irrelevant (although given his level of intelligence, I would say he probably can).....he could've simply learned these tactics from other Rangers and former Lords.  Doesn't seem like a big mystery to me.

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18 hours ago, acwill07 said:

How is this even a question?  Mance Rayder learned all of this at the Wall during his time in the NW.  Whether he knows how to read or write is irrelevant (although given his level of intelligence, I would say he probably can).....he could've simply learned these tactics from other Rangers and former Lords.  Doesn't seem like a big mystery to me.

Rangers would have no use for these tactics, nor would they actually get a chance to use them, never mind the fact most of them won't even have any idea about commanding men in battle, most of them are common folk, as for former lords, there are very few knights and likely even fewer nobleman among the brothers, let alone former lords.

He could've just read a book but does he know how to read and write? Are we given any proof on it?

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