[tPatQ Spoilers] How to Kill Your Dragon

[Davos's Missing Fingers]

And of course, unless I miss my guess, the ultimate fate of Sheepstealer and the Cannibal is uncertain.

Hot Pie will successfully tame Cannibal by feeding it bread baked in the shape of dragons and ultimately conquer Westeros. It is known.

[Davos's Missing Fingers]

First and foremost, I am so amazed at how many misconceptions about Targaryens GRRM has broken in this novel. From, only Targaryen can ride dragon, to obvious lack of fireproof, to the fact dragons are not winning card and so on and on... Not that we weren't acquainted with some of those, but now some things are blatantly obvious. But, the most surprising is in fact, as you said, with what easiness you can kill a dragon. I mean, I was really expecting some greater effort when you have to kill a dragon, but apparently, you don't need magic, weirwood arrows or any sort of some God knows what... So simple, find enough archers, and dragon will eventually fall. I have to say it is a bit funny how easy it is. And now, we turn to Dany and "advantage" she has, which knowing everything from the novel is basically 0.

I don't think that's necessarily confirmed. The Targaryens wed brother to sister, but they also did branch out and certainly had bastards. In fact, Aegon II can't be found immediately following Viserys I's death. His wife-sister, Helaena, remarks that he "certainly isn't in her bed."

Hell, even Brown Ben Plumm claims to have a "drop of dragon blood in him." I seriously doubt that we can know for sure whether or not any non-Targaryen could successfully mount a dragon. Remember that a lot of people tried and failed/were dissuaded before Rhaenyra was able to find riders.

[Eli Stark]

Which is, last time i checked, Gerion Lannister, Tyrek Lannister, Howland Reed, and Loras Tyrell.

Don't forget Elvis and 2Pac as well kickin' it in Grey Water Watch.

[littleRickon]

just finished tPatQ (late to the party, I know), and I was also surprisedat how vulnerable the dragons are compared to what we knew about them from the main series. Thinking back, is there any encounter including a dragon where not at least one of them dies?

I was especially taken back by how a dragon died during an attack of the Essosi fleet. You would think that ships, floating, rocking piles of wood and cloth, would be the number one easiest targets for flying fire-breathers. All they need to do is breath fire in the general direction of the ships and they should win, yet somehow they manage to get one of the dragons entangled in the tutelage, where interestingly, the strength of a dragon isn't enough to break free while they also managed to bring down the stone dome of the dragon pit...

Feels like a bit of a ret-con to me. Familiarity with dragons is definitely a huge difference betweeen Aegon's conquest and the DoD, but how Aegon managed to burn up an army of -what, 40000?- in the field of fire without losing a dragon is now a lot less clear to me. It does explain, however, how Aegon was supposedly reluctant to use his dragons in battle and how the field of fire was the only time they all were brought out together...

Also pretty shocked about the "scorpion bolt through the neck" thing. That didn't seem possible before.

The one dragon getting wound infection (inflammation?) is a nice wink at the "dragons don't get sick" theme

[RumHam]

somehow they manage to get one of the dragons entangled in the tutelage, where interestingly, the strength of a dragon isn't enough to break free while they also managed to bring down the stone dome of the dragon pit...

Vermax, who got tangled in the rigging of the ship, was much younger and thus smaller and weaker than Dreamfyre who broke the dome of the Dragonpit. One was less than sixteen years old, the other old enough to have belonged to Jaehaerys' sister. That's a huge difference. It's also mentioned that the dome was weakened by repeated blasts of dragon fire.

[sunbro]

The skill of the rider is also important to mention.

[Ser Creighton]

As fascinating as it was to read about the flaming shit sandwich that is House Targaryen, I was actually far more interested in my initial read-thru in the dragon-fighting aspect.

I hope that the novella puts to rest the idea of dragons as some kind of invincible WMD that gives any claimant an automatic victory. More than that, I finished the novel pretty astonished at how easy it was to kill so many of them. I'm referring not so much to the dragon-on-dragon violence, but to the slaughter in the dragonpit, where a huge angry horde of people armed with fairly rudimentary weapons was able to kill multiple dragons, despite taking losses themselves.

The novella also seems to corroborate the use of arrows to kill them through the eye, given how Tessarion was ultimately put down. We're also explicitly told that Meraxes was killed with arrows scorpion bolts in Dorne. So the weirwood arrows idea seems, on paper at least, to be of fairly sound reasoning; perhaps weirwood's relative resistance to fire is what gave Brandon Snow that specific idea.

Then you have dragon-on-dragon violence, where it looks like two smaller dragons can match a larger one and the dragons basically end up ripping each other apart. And the effectiveness of a dragon can depend on the skill and experience of the rider.

So after reading the novella, what do you expect to see in the way of dragon-fighting in the future? I think it's fairly certain that we'll see some fighting, perhaps even Rhaegal and Viserion against Drogon (two smaller against one larger). I'd also be shocked if the use of arrows didn't come into play again, which is something I've figured to happen once it was confirmed what Brandon Snow's plan was.

There's also the issue of at least a few eggs/dragons/hatchlings (e.g. Silverwing) surviving the Dance, only to die out during Aegon III's reign. This could be where the maesters poisoning the dragons comes in; seeing the destruction caused by the Dance, they think it's best to just eliminate the species altogether. I noticed too that the hatching process is still kept a mystery; Targaryen children kept their eggs but it's unclear of how the eggs hatched (like if the eggs had to be taken back to a rookery at a certain time).

And of course, unless I miss my guess, the ultimate fate of Sheepstealer and the Cannibal is uncertain.

I am pretty sure the books never said they were WMD's no it was fans. Hmmmm let me think who has over and over again called them WMD's and whined about it not being fare Dany had dragons and Jon didn't but Jon was going to wake the real dragons from stone, then Jon became the stone dragons. Who was that? In fact that person even after writing this still calls them WMD's.

[RumHam]

The skill of the rider is also important to mention.

Yes. Vermax might not have died if he didn't fly so low.

[Kuma]

Poison dragon maybe, In one "the witcher" novel ordinary villagers succesfully killed dragon with such method. Dont know or this would work on SOIAF dragons.

[Fire Eater]

Poison dragon maybe, In one "the witcher" novel ordinary villagers succesfully killed dragon with such method. Dont know or this would work on SOIAF dragons.

My guess would be putting the poison in the meat or animals given to them.

[littleRickon]

so what is our take-away message here?

old, huge dragons with experienced riders used in an intelligent manner are a near unstoppable force on the battlefield, but younger, riderless dragons are not much more than a tactical advantage?

Seems to cast a very different light on the upcoming battle for Meereen, where it was speculated that the roaming or controlled-by-horn dragons might turn a seemingly decisive victory into total chaos. After tPatQ, I can't see that as very likely.

I honestly does take away a lot from ASOIAF where so much is made about dragons, controlling dragons, getting to dragons, bringing dragons somewhere etc. to now learn that the ones we have at hand (young, inexperienced) are not very likely to survive their first military engagement...

as someone else said: black, bronze, green and white herrings...

[BigBucket]

My previous 4-5 posts were about how animals can sense the moods of their masters, and react accordingly. I never mentioned that dragons can understand English, lol.

However, if people are complaining, they are probably unhappy. Animals can very easily pick up on that, and I don't see why dragon's couldn't as well.

The point i'm making is that every single behavior that her dragons display with respect to their master is no different than how animals, specifically dogs, behave towards their masters in our world. No supernatural explanation necessary.

These posts would have cleared up your questions :

Forgive me for assuming but I believe the point you may be trying to make is one about body language. Even in humans most communication is nonverbal and with regard to dogs, they have been proven to be very perceptive when it comes to this type of communication. The idea that a dragon could pick up on very subtle changes in body language and react accordingly is entirely plausible. I would say especially with regard to the Palace of Dust example. Fear, unease, disquiet etc are strong emotions and would elicit a strong body language response. Adoption of a more rigid posture, tensing of the muscles and tightening and narrowing of the eyes while looking at the Palace are all pretty clear indicators.

[direwolves_and_dragons]

I just finished it yesterday and am very interested to know the fate of Cannibal, Sheepstealer and silverwing (as well as Ran's 'fourth'). It makes me more open to some of the stone/hidden dragon theories but still sceptical, I could see Sheepstealer in Asshai possibly with Nettles having gone to Essos.

As for the 'invincibility', yes whilst I'd agree it has called that into question. I do think that Dany's relative unpopularity on these forums is hastening people in general to dismiss her dragons, their impact and consequently her chances. I think the points made are good but the conclusion drawn is a bit too severe.

Yes Dany's dragons are younger. Westeros may be more developed but these armies have not faced a dragon in c.200 years, I think they will be unprepared. Also we are not dealing with anywhere near the same amount of dragons. So many were killed in the dance by others: Caraxes, Vhagar, Meleys, Grey Ghost (off the top of my head) - many of the bigger dragons were killed by other dragons, not men. With only 3 in the main story I think this drastically reduces the chances for their deaths, we simply don't have the same amount of wildcards/chance meetings. Second, the dragon pit was a great plot device for killing the existing dragons and made perfect sense that time around but it will be really cheap if George repeats this event in Asoiaf in my opinion. Although I loved the story, I really hope they don't become as dispoable as they were in tpatq and doubt that they will.

Whilst I agree the age of Dany's dragons is certainly going to be a factor, just my personal opinion that people are maybe wishing them away a little too much when let's face it the assumption that the dragons are near invincible has not come out of nowhere, we do have the field of fire, Harrenhal as real evidence, 'fire made flesh' and the repeated references. Drogon does seem to develop rapidly and think that soon, particularly in the absence of any larger dragons (Sheepstealer please hop across the pond and prove me wrong) no one will be able to f*** with him.

Playing Devils Advocate a little and also chipping in with my two cents here.