Preston Jacobs and the Purple Wedding

[Illyrio Mo'Parties]

16 minutes ago, Macgregor of the North said:

Sweet, I was hoping my analysis there would be met with good sense. 

Since there is no textual evidence and the ceremonial pie is cut below the dais, we must assume that other huge edible pie is cut also below the dais, and not lumped up (past the King, Queen and huge pie) on to the dais where the Royal family are sitting. That's silly is it not?. 

So, therefore i believe that if Olenna wanted to poison Tyrions slice of pie she would have to get her bony ass up and shamble down off the dais, cane in hand, to where the other pie is and place poison under the crust of the slice she is absolutely certain is destined for Tyrion, who funnily enough has drunk through the last twenty or so courses and couldn't give a mummers fart about it being ill luck not to eat his little shit of a nephews wedding pie, which is confirmed as he shows as much interest in eating it as he would eating shit. 

Thats just my way of saying that expecting him to eat it, and pinning your hopes on it, is not the work of masterminds. Tyrion could not give a shit about wedding pie courtesies and his behaviour throughout the wedding just backs that up. 

Yeah, I mostly agree, except there's nothing to back up that the edible pie was cut below the dais either. Nor is it even stated that the edible pie was huge: imagine people getting individual slices of a pie a few feet in diameter. How could you fit a single slice on a plate? That's mental. More likely it was lots of regular-sized pies cut into slices.

Of course, that presupposes that the pie/pies was/were sliced along its/their radius/radii, when they could've possibly just cut one huge pie into little squares.

I think people tend to fill in these details with whatever seems most likely to them - I envision the server wheeling a trolley along the front of the high table - but there's nothing written about it one way or t'other.

[Illyrio Mo'Parties]

9 minutes ago, Macgregor of the North said:

@Illyrio Mo'Parties

Cheers from breaking down JS's version of events, naturally I have counters and questions but I'll direct them at him when he's back on. I don't come on much at the weekends so won't really be playing much part but that will give him time to reply to my numerous posts and points. 

Don't thank me yet, I might have done him a disservice

[Macgregor of the North]

2 minutes ago, Illyrio Mo'Parties said:

Yeah, I mostly agree, except there's nothing to back up that the edible pie was cut below the dais either. Nor is it even stated that the edible pie was huge: imagine people getting individual slices of a pie a few feet in diameter. How could you fit a single slice on a plate? That's mental. More likely it was lots of regular-sized pies cut into slices.

Of course, that presupposes that the pie/pies was/were sliced along its/their radius/radii, when they could've possibly just cut one huge pie into little squares.

I think people tend to fill in these details with whatever seems most likely to them - I envision the server wheeling a trolley along the front of the high table - but there's nothing written about it one way or t'other.

At this point really, its make it up as per your theory then eh?. GRRM usually leaves it like that which sees threads last days as people construct their own version of events, and naturally we don't all see it the same way. It's all good fun though. 

[Illyrio Mo'Parties]

Just now, Macgregor of the North said:

At this point really, its make it up as per your theory then eh?. GRRM usually leaves it like that which sees threads last days as people construct their own version of events, and naturally we don't all it the same way. It's all good fun though. 

Tis indeed. Although this is why I think theories that really too heavily on the mechanics of events are weak.

Although that being said I'm perfectly happy to use iffy mechanics to knock down some theory I don't like (e.g. Daario is somebody else), so I guess I'm a dick.

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

@John Suburbs @Illyrio Mo'Parties @Macgregor of the North

I have another possible explanation for why Joff was able to last longer than Cressen after ingesting the Strangler. This one to go along with previous explanations of age, strength, etc...

Assuming that the amount of crystal is the same (an assumption we cannot make based on text but for this exercise bear with me) it makes sense that the ammount of wine the crystal is diluted into would strengthen/weaken the power of the Strangler in the wine. For example: mixing two shots of Crown Royal into 12 ounces of Coca Cola would result in a stiffer drink than mixing just one shot of Crown into 12 ounces of Coke. 

Recall that when Cressen puts the crystals in the wine Davos' cup is only half full. Dropping crystals into a half full cup would result in a strong poison, yes?

Quote

...for suddenly he saw the way. Ser Davos’s cup was before him, still half-full of sour red. He found a hard flake of crystal in his sleeve, held it tight between thumb and forefinger as he reached for the cup.

Recall that Joffrey's chalice is huge. Outrageously huge (compensating for something? ) 

Quote

Lord Mace Tyrell came forward to present his gift: a golden chalice three feet tall, with two ornate curved handles and seven faces glittering with gemstones. “Seven faces for Your Grace’s seven kingdoms,” the bride’s father explained. He showed them how each face bore the sigil of one of the great houses: ruby lion, emerald rose, onyx stag, silver trout, blue jade falcon, opal sun, and pearl direwolf. “A splendid cup,” said Joffrey,

One could argue that does not mean the chalice would necessarily hold a large volume of liquid and I agree. It could just have a huge stem and a smaller top. However, when Joff dumps it over Tyrion's head it soaks him all over, even soaking his doublet.

Quote

“Your Grace,” was all he had time to say before the king upended the chalice over his head. The wine washed down over his face in a red torrent. It drenched his hair, stung his eyes, burned in his wound, ran down his cheeks, and soaked the velvet of his new doublet. “How do you like that, Imp?”

This would mean that the chalice does hold a large volume of wine. 

When Tyrion refills the chalice he fills it 3/4 full.

Quote

He had to crawl under the table to find the thing. “Good, now fill it with wine.” He claimed a flagon from a serving girl and filled the goblet three-quarters full.

Joff immediately takes one drink before heading to the pie.

Quote

But Joffrey took the wedding chalice one-handed, drank deep, and set it on the table. “You can get up now, Uncle.”

You can probably guess where I'm going with this now. Cressen's drink was much more potent than Joff's. This might allow Joff to survive longer than Cressen. This, along with other mentions of age, strength, etc. 

[Philokles]

2 hours ago, Illyrio Mo'Parties said:

@Knight Of Winter has this one covered:

As for the good knight's other points, yes, I agree that relying on Sansa to wear the hairnet is a bit weak, and I agree that the Tyrell's motivations for involving Littlefinger in their regicide are extremely weak. I think that's one of the biggest flaws in the plan, and one that gets glossed over a lot: why on earth would they trust Littlefinger?

And Tyrion? He was the far more developed fall guy with Penny and Oppo having been brought over. If Sansa had stayed, she would have been under suspicion as she had a motive and was married to suspect number one, but a missing stone from a hairnet is hardly compelling evidence. Sansa could have been the agreed reward for LF's help in framing Tyrion - removing her from Lannister hands was a win in itself. It also removes one of the few people smart enough to disentangle the plot and with a suspicion of LF. I doubt this was the first time where Olenna and Baelish worked together.

[John Suburbs]

19 hours ago, Jasta11 said:

Different concentrations/quantities? Old man vs young man? The wine/food diluted some of the poison? GRRM isn't an expert on poisons and let this detail slip? There's several explanations for this.

It can also be hard to estimate exact timeframes in a book, or draw any conclusions from this fact alone. 

Joffrey's wine is purple running down his chin and "deep purple" at the end of the scene. Cressen sees nothing unusual about the color, consistency, viscosity or any thing else about his wine. If anything, Joffrey's wine is more concentrated, and he is consuming a substantially larger quantity.

The soft tissue of the throat does not weaken or become more or less porous with age. If a six-year-old and a 60-year-old were to drink a shot of ammonia they would be burned to the same degree and in the same amount of time.

The poison does not enter the stomach and then pass back to the throat through the circulatory system. If it did, all victims would succumb in about a minute, not seconds. The text proves unequivocally that the strangler works directly on contact.

GRRM is the most detailed writer of his generation. He is the only one to put zombies on the page who bothered to research what happens to blood in the body when the heart stops beating. It is grasping at straws to suggest that he would add all this unnecessary action and dialogue after Joffrey drinks the supposedly poisoned wine just by mistake. If the wine was poison, Joffrey would simply drink and die, and Tyrion would be accused because he was the last one to handle the cup.

Both poisonings unfold in real time, and we can judge the time down to the second based on what was said and done:

Poisoning 1:

Cressen: Drinks wine, drops cup; 1 second

Mel: "He does have power here my lord, and fire cleanses"; 5 seconds, tops

Cressen: Words get caught in his throat.

 

Poisoning 2:

Joffrey: yanks chalice from Tyrion's hands, drinks long and deep multiple times; indeterminate amount of time, but while he is drinking:

Margaery: "My lord, we should return to our places. Lord Buckler wants to toast us.

Joffrey: "My uncle hasn't eaten his pigeon pie." Grabs pie. "It's ill luck not to eat the pie." Eats pie. "See, it's good."

You can read the rest for yourself, but notice that Joffrey's real choking, and particularly the point at which "his words get caught in his throat", is approximately six seconds after he washed the pie down with a drink of wine -- the exact same timeframe as Cressen.

[SFDanny]

15 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

Not the videos about how Westeros is secretly a post apocalyptic sci fi world?

One of the fortunate side effects of an early judgement on the crackpot nature of his analysis is that I missed all of that. I read a lot of people I think are informed, intelligent fans of ASoI&F but that also means I have little time for nonsense like you describe. I know that means I perhaps miss something of value, but I think I gain by reading more serious analysis.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there also a question about his use of all that fan art in his videos without the artist's permission? I love fan art, but I don't use other's work to promote my own thinking. If true, it seems a bit sleazy.

 

[John Suburbs]

17 hours ago, Colonel Green said:

Yes, he would, because after the assassination the castle would be locked down.  The agent would not be able to just leave.

Well, first of all, there is no text anywhere that says the castle was locked down. So if Littlefinger's boat cannot move because the text doesn't say it does, then the same logic should apply to the castle not being locked down.

Secondly, so he does escape secretly, same as Sansa and Dontos do. Big deal.

17 hours ago, Colonel Green said:

Nonsensical.  If he can dip close to port to pick up one ship or just to, what, listen for bells in the one-in-a-million chance he accidentally killed the king, he can do that to pick up Sansa.

And yet if he's worried about Varys' little birds that much, he would not take his ship that close to the city when it's supposed to be off in the Vale.  It's far more likely that the ship would be recognized than that somebody would somehow identify Sansa.

But neither is at all something to be worried about in the dead of night well out into the rush/harbor.

Not nonsensical. Common sense for a sharp operator like Littlefinger. Close enough to get a signal -- red to flee, green to proceed as planned -- and hear the bells, or get word from a single-sailed vessel or one with a team of rowers. Then he waits until dawn until Sansa and co are far enough into the bay and there is enough light for LF to make sure there are no dromonds around to nab him with his fugitive. Again, it's all about minimizing your risk.

18 hours ago, Colonel Green said:

Joffrey was dickishly harassing Tyrion.  That's hardly evidence of any sort of custom that could be relied on to that extent, least of all with Tyrion, who is a sarcastic, disrespectful asshole who doesn't like Joffrey.

The big pie is wheeled into the throne room to great fanfare. All the guests stand. The bride and groom make a big show of cutting it together. Joffrey even wants to use his new Valyrian steel sword. Does this sound like a normal course to you? It is the Wedding Pie; the same as our Wedding Cake. All the guests are obligated to eat at least one bite; common courtesy at a normal wedding, absolutely necessary at a royal one.

[The Ned's Little Girl]

2 hours ago, SFDanny said:

I have to disagree with your doubt about a double cross. What benefit is it for the Tyrells for Littlefinger to smuggle Sansa out of King's Landing and into the Vale? Petyr's plans to marry Sansa to Harry the Heir certainly don't benefit the Tyrells. We have no indications that the Tyrells even know anything about Sansa's disappearance, do we? No, I don't think there is any question this is purely Littlefinger's work and the Tyrells would be mad as hell if they found out what he did. One doesn't have to plan a marriage if the agreed upon plan is that Sansa is executed for her "help" in murdering Joffrey. 

I have to apologize. I had originally written a sentence or two about how clearly neither side had any incentive nor inclination to inform the other about their own private plans for Sansa and that there absolutely was a double-cross (in which LF succeeded and the Tyrells failed). But I cut those sentences out in the interest of brevity, which may have left the impression that I was doubtful about it. I'm not doubtful about that at all and I'm just as sure that neither side shared this aspect of the regicide plot aftermath with the other. Each side had their own "Plan B" with regard to Sansa's fate, which the other knew nothing about.

[SFDanny]

2 minutes ago, The Ned's Little Girl said:

I have to apologize. I had originally written a sentence or two about how clearly neither side had any incentive nor inclination to inform the other about their own private plans for Sansa and that there absolutely was a double-cross (in which LF succeeded and the Tyrells failed). But I cut those sentences out in the interest of brevity, which may have left the impression that I was doubtful about it. I'm not doubtful about that at all and I'm just as sure that neither side shared this aspect of the regicide plot aftermath with the other. Each side had their own "Plan B" with regard to Sansa's fate, which the other knew nothing about.

No apology necessary. I may have missed something in my read as well. I think we agree here. Good stuff! 

[John Suburbs]

17 hours ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

I think he got the details right, it's just that people are looking to make this way more complicated than it is.  Olenna took the strangler bead and gave it to Margery.  Margery administered the poison at the right moment, not just because Margery is the only person who could have administered the poison while ensuring she did not drink from the chalice, but also when Joffrey is eating to make it look like he choked.  Remember tho, that if the choking story was not bought, that the Tyrells had a backup plan in Sansa.  Since LF wanted Sansa he had a different plan, to frame Tyrion.  As far as poisoning the pie go's, that is simply a non starter.  It is as you say, the only way to accurately poison Joffrey is for the person who handed him the pie to slip it in, running a huge risk of being seen or that he would feed Margery from his piece.  The poison would also not dissolve and spread throughout the piece as it would in a liquid, and would run the risk of him biting down on a hard object and spitting it out, perhaps not ingesting any.

Add in the wine changing colors, and there is no mystery here.  People can talk about Joffrey having a delayed reaction all they want, without knowing all the details of the poison, how concentrated a dose he got, how the poison was turned into the bead(was it diluted in that it needed to be combined with another substance so it would take a bead shape?)  Qyburn tells Cersei that when a poison is diluted it weakens, maybe that is what happened, or maybe Joffrey being younger and healthier than Cressen happened, there are way too many variables for a couple seconds delay to matter.

Joffrey drank long and deep before joining Margy on the dais. So there was no poison in the wine before the cutting (there was no poison after either, but just for the sake of argument...). Then Joffrey bounds back to Tyrion and takes the chalice directly from Tyrion's hands to start drinking. At no time does Tyrion see Margy handling the chalice nor even that she was anywhere near it during this time, so she could not have possibly poisoned the wine.

It is not a couple seconds of delay, it is about five or six orders of magnitude. Joffrey grabs the chalice from Tyrion, stirring the contents, tips it up end to start chugging it, each chug stirring the contents. So if the poison is not thoroughly dissolved after all this, I fail to comprehend why anyone would pay half a groat for something that requires the victim to swish their goblets around for minutes on end before drinking. At the end of the scene, after the chalice he been still for a while, Tyrion looks into the bottom and sees that the wine is "deep purple." So unless someone can come up with a plausible explanation as to how, and why, someone would add more poison to the chalice after Joffrey dropped it, then the only rational conclusion is that the color of the wine was consistent all the way through and that the deep purple is indicative of extremely poisoned wine.

[John Suburbs]

17 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

OK:

1. LF gives poison hairnet to Sansa, and his plan with QoT at this point is allegedly to poison someone and blame it on Sansa, using the hairnet as evidence. Perhaps LF offered the QoT Jeyne Poole (as fake Arya) to seal the deal assuming Sansa would be exectued, effectively taking control of WF away from the Lannisters and giving it to the Tyrells. Obviously LF would never actually carry out this plan, but QoT doesn't know that yet.

2. Sansa wears the hairnet to the feast, and QoT removes a crystal. This is necessary because as someone else pointed out, it wouldn't be socially acceptable for some random serving person at the feast to touch Sansa's hair. It had to be the QoT.

3. QoT, obviously not willing to risk being witnessed poisoning someone, hands the crystal off to a LF crony.

4. Either this crony was the pie server, or he was just a middle man to hand off the crystal to the pie server, another LF crony. Either way, the pie server likely hid the poison in the lemon cream that he covered the pie with, possibly even taking the time to thoroughly mix the poison crystal into that particular spoonful of lemon cream. Lemon cream may not be wine, but it is creamy, and it may be possible to easily mix the poison into it. Quote from ASOS:

A serving man placed a slice of hot pigeon pie in front of Tyrion and covered it with a spoon of lemon cream.

It would probably be difficult to poison the correct slice of pie ahead of time, or put a single crystal in the first bite of the pie or something along those lines, but I do think it would be reasonable to poison the lemon cream.

And yes there are some holes in the premise that it was the pie that was poisoned, but there are also holes in the premise that the wine was poisoned. And since all the characters in the story come to the conclusion that the wine was poisoned, and the characters are usually wrong about important things, and Mace Tyrell won't shut up about how Margaery could have been poisoned too, and the simple fact that GRRM decided to make it ambiguous in the first place by making Joffrey eat pie and drink wine at the same time, I lean toward it being the pie that was poisoned.

Close, but I have several problems with this.

First, the more people who are in on the plot, the greater chance if being discovered -- if not through outright betrayal, then a little bird overhearing a conversation.

Secondly, Lady O is providing the feast, and she is known to be a micromanager, particularly when it comes to food. "The cheese will be served when I want it served, and I want it served now." So it would be the easiest thing in the world for her to arrange it so she knows exactly which pie is for Tyrion, and she even has a high probability of knowing which will be his one and only bite: the pointy end, which is also the easiest to place the poison.

Thirdly, lemon cream is yellow, and if the pie sits there for any amount of time there is a good change of it becoming discolored. Pigeon pie filling is dark, so much less chance of it being noticeably discolored.

[John Suburbs]

16 hours ago, SFDanny said:

I absolutely agree with your first point, but I don't think two is right. With all due respect to a great contributor to these pages. I think, and it may have been a point made already in the next five pages, that the Tyrells are the ones who need Sansa to wear the hairnet, not just to bring in the poison, but to be the patsy the crime is pinned on after the murder. If both Tyrion and Sansa are held for the crime, then her wearing the hairnet proves their guilt to one and all. It a double cross on Littlefinger's part to get Sansa out of King's Landing and deprive the Tyrells of their patsy. It ends with Tyrion being convicted regardless, but the plan between Littlefinger and the Tyrells is to blame it all on both Tyrion and Sansa.

As to Preston Jacobs, sorry, I don't take anything he proposes seriously. He lost me at his convoluted and crazy theories about the lemon tree in Braavos.

It would be absolutely disastrous for Lady Olenna if Sansa were found to be carrying the poison on her hairnet. There is no way in a million years that Tywin would believe the Sansa alone, or Sansa and Tyrion, would cook up such a scheme. In the first place, if their intent was to poison the king, they would simply carry the poison in a pocket, not create a special hairnet with a trick clasp that only makes it difficult for Sansa to reach it herself, and impossible for Tyrion.

The only reason to smuggle the poison in this way is if someone else, someone taller, needed to get the poison. So the first question they would asker her in the dungeons would be: "Who touched your hairnet." And long before the hot poker got even close to Sansa's pretty blue eyes, she would blurt out "The Queen of Thorns" and that would be it for Lady O, and perhaps the rest of the Tyrells in the capital as well.

Sansa's escape is vital for Lady O because she has the only evidence that connects the poison back to her.

[John Suburbs]

13 hours ago, Macgregor of the North said:

Except that doesn't make sense either. That means Olenna took the poison from the hairnet, and handed it to some lowly food servant with the intention of murdering a member of the Royal family, in this instance its Tyrion.

They have to take into account the serving man may botch it, or get cold feet and run squealing that he was forced into it, or if seen he may have implicated the Tyrell's. That's far too much trust in a lowly serving man that we know we're picked by Cersei. She picked all the serving people.

You also have to think about this poor servant after the fact. Now he has knowledge that could get Lady O's head lopped off, and she's as hard-nosed a player of the Game of Thrones as Littlefinger. How long would this guy expect to survive knowing that he is such a liability to one of the most powerful women in the realm.

13 hours ago, Macgregor of the North said:

Add this also, the Strangler and everything that's known about it shows that it is  a dissolving crystal weapon, meant for dissolving in liquid drinks. Not once has it ever been mentioned as a poison for food stuffs. Never. 

The people involved will know this. LF and Olenna are smart, they won't break tradition and try something new with food, especially when there is wine everywhere. 

That's not that great really. It only seems to make it seem much more silly that Tyrion's pie was targeted with a liquid dissolving crystal poison. 

Heat and moisture in a pigeon pie -- perfectly reasonable to think it would start to dissolve, slowly to be sure, but that's all it takes. As evidence: "A bit dry, though, needs washing down." Then Joffrey drinks wine, washing the pie in his mouth down his throat and viola, mere seconds later he starts choking in earnest -- just like Cressen.

[Colonel Green]

42 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

Well, first of all, there is no text anywhere that says the castle was locked down. So if Littlefinger's boat cannot move because the text doesn't say it does, then the same logic should apply to the castle not being locked down.

Entry and exit to the Red Keep is guarded by default.  You can't enter or leave without passing through guards at multiple checkpoints.  In the middle of an assassination of the king, people would not be allowed to leave.  That's a common sense supposition.

That's entirely different from suggesting that Baelish's boat sailed much closer to the city for some ill-defined reason, but couldn't stay to pick up the rowboat.

[Colonel Green]

9 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

It would be absolutely disastrous for Lady Olenna if Sansa were found to be carrying the poison on her hairnet.

Not according to GRRM.  And common sense, besides; the only reason to put the poison on a third party who isn't involved in the plan is to set them up to take the fall if necessary.  Olenna could otherwise have just carried it in herself.

[John Suburbs]

13 hours ago, Macgregor of the North said:

That's the reason? Sorry but that doesn't cut it with me at all. LF could simply say, I meant it for your husband to take you out of that life as the thought of you in that bed with him filled me with pity blah blah, but the Tyrell's changed the goal posts at the very last minute it seems and you were to be framed alongside your husband, but I still saved you. See, I am the only person you can trust now. 

"IF" Tyrion was his intended target there is many ways he can tell Sansa without her not trusting him. Infact, he could manipulate her many ways into trusting him more. By sharing something with her that's important, that gains trust. 

In this conversation below, I think that LF could easily have told Sansa his intended target and explained how it turned out different, but he doesn't, Infact there's no hint really that it was anything but exactly how it was. Joffrey was his target. 

A Storm of Swords - Sansa VI 

"As you moved Ser Dontos to poison Joffrey?" It had to have been Dontos, she had concluded.

Littlefinger laughed. "Ser Dontos the Red was a skin of wine with legs. He could never have been trusted with a task of such enormity. He would have bungled it or betrayed me. No, all Dontos had to do was lead you from the castle . . . and make certain you wore your silver hair net." 

Lol, yes I had a plan but was double-crossed by the Tyrells, now the entire realm thinks your a kingslayer and the queen has put a bounty on your head so that knights all across the land are out looking for you. So just pretend your this other person all the time, including in front of the some of the most sharp-eyed lords in the Vale, and trust me because I have everything under control.

Or, yes we meant to kill the king. Everything is going according to plan.

Which one produces the greatest confidence in Littlefinger's game-playing abilities?

[OtherFromAnotherMother]

19 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

Heat and moisture in a pigeon pie -- perfectly reasonable to think it would start to dissolve, slowly to be sure, but that's all it takes. As evidence: "A bit dry, though, needs washing down." Then Joffrey drinks wine, washing the pie in his mouth down his throat and viola, mere seconds later he starts choking in earnest -- just like Cressen.

Let's look at what happens right before Joff remarks that the pie is dry.

Quote

The king’s chalice was on the table where he’d left it. Tyrion had to climb back onto his chair to reach it. Joff yanked it from his hands and drank long and deep, his throat working as the wine ran purple down his chin. “My lord,” Margaery said, “we should return to our places. Lord Buckler wants to toast us.”

“My uncle hasn’t eaten his pigeon pie.” Holding the chalice one-handed, Joff jammed his other into Tyrion’s pie. “It’s ill luck not to eat the pie,” he scolded as he filled his mouth with hot spiced pigeon. “See, it’s good.” Spitting out flakes of crust, he coughed and helped himself to another fistful. “Dry, though. Needs washing down.” Joff took a swallow of wine and coughed again, more violently. “I want to see, kof, see you ride that, kof kof, pig, Uncle. I want …” His words broke up in a fit of coughing.

Doesn't it make sense that his throat may be dry because the he took a drink and the poison is beginning to take hold? 

[John Suburbs]

12 hours ago, Macgregor of the North said:

@John Suburbs

I'll reply to this for now.

Everything we know about the strangler is that it is a dissolving crystal poison that is placed in liquid. Absolutely any other way to use it, such as placing it in food, is made up by people reading the books. Nobody in the story has ever mentioned the strangler as something that is used in food. 

And "the fact" you state is wrong I'm afraid. The wine is purple way before the end. Plus there is absolutely no mention of barfed up pie chunks or crust or anything at all like that in the chalice when the wine is left to spill at the end. Only a half inch of the purple wine.

"But his eyes fell on the wedding chalice, forgotten on the floor. He went and scooped it up. There was still a half-inch of deep purple wine in the bottom of it. Tyrion considered it a moment, then poured it on the floor."

Joffrey had picked up the chalice and drank the wine that was sitting on the table where he had left it, with the strangler in it, and drank deep while the then purple wine dribbled down his chin. Then literally seconds later, he jams Tyrions pie into his mouth. You seem to have him eating the pie first, which isn't so. You read the scene again, I've read it many times 

A Storm of Swords - Tyrion VIII 

"No. I like the look of you this way. Serve me my wine."

The king's chalice was on the table where he'd left it. Tyrion had to climb back onto his chair to reach it. Joff yanked it from his hands and drank long and deep, his throat working as the wine ran purple down his chin. "My lord," Margaery said, "we should return to our places. Lord Buckler wants to toast us." 

"My uncle hasn't eaten his pigeon pie." Holding the chalice one-handed, Joff jammed his other into Tyrion's pie. "It's ill luck not to eat the pie," he scolded as he filled his mouth with hot spiced pigeon. "See, it's good." Spitting out flakes of crust, he coughed and helped himself to another fistful. "Dry, though. Needs washing down." Joff took a swallow of wine and coughed again, more violently. "I want to see, kof, see you ride that, kof kof, pig, Uncle. I want . . ." His words broke up in a fit of coughing.

The Strangler had went to work from the wine, stopping the pie going down his throat, it appears he's choking on the pie of course. The Strangler would have killed him anyway but it looked like choking on pie for all the world to see. Brilliant, although not for Tyrion. 

Yes, the wine running down his chin is already purple, unlike Cressen's wine which doesn't appear discolored or altered in any way. If you're going to present the purple wine on Joffrey's chin as proof-positive that the wine was poisoned, it is also proof-positive that it was more poisoned than Cressen's. So even if concentration had anything at all to do with the speed at which a contact poison acts, not the intensity as is clearly established by generations of research in physiology and physiognomy, the result is still the same: purple wine means more poisoned wine which means Joffrey should have fallen sooner than Cressen, not later.

I don't know where you're getting the idea that I think the pie was eaten first. If it had and the rest of the scene played out the same way, then my whole theory would be blown out of the water. Joff takes multiple chugs of wine so poisoned it has turned purple (magically turning back to red a few moments later, and then back to purple shortly after that), eats pie twice, drinks more wine, starts koffing, tries to drink more wine but ends up spitting wine from his mouth back into the chalice. No chunks of pie or crust, just wine that has now been discolored by the residual poison in his saliva.

If the strangler had indeed stopped the pie in his throat, then there would have been chunks barfed back into the chalice. There wasn't, therefore the strangler did not go to work until after the pie had passed down, which wouldn't be the case if Joffrey's first contact with this "deep purple" wine was way back at his first chug 15 or even 20 seconds before.