Ramsay Killed LW

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

4 minutes ago, Renly's Banana said:

Because then nothing has to be explained. Nobody has any true motivation or backstory -- it's just magic. It's always magic. "How does Varys know so much?" "Oh he's just constantly getting visions from Bloodraven." See how old and uninteresting that gets?

I disagree. I don't think every single person in the world is getting visions from BR, only the people we have evidence for, and that is a small list. Personally, I take the list of people that everyone accepts receive visions, and I basically add to that list LF, Ramsay, and Euron, and that's it. Not Varys. Not Illyrio. Not Tywin. Not everyone. And just because someone like Ramsay or LF might receive visions, that doesn't make their motivations or backstory unimportant.

6 minutes ago, Renly's Banana said:

Half the people you listed are Targaryens -- which get a pass cause we know they have weird ties to magic -- and more than half are long dead. People like Jojen, Bran and the Ghost of High Heart get true visions because they have ties to the weirwoods and the old gods. Ramsay fits into none of these categories.

You seem to making up somewhat arbitrary rules about who can and can't receive visions, but I get your point.

[House Beaudreau]

21 minutes ago, Renly's Banana said:

Half the people you listed are Targaryens -- which get a pass cause we know they have weird ties to magic -- and more than half are long dead. People like Jojen, Bran and the Ghost of High Heart get true visions because they have ties to the weirwoods and the old gods. Ramsay fits into none of these categories. Knowing that people may attack him when he was with Reek doesn't make him psychic. Neither does suspecting that maybe Theon wouldn't find Bran and Rickon so he prepared for an alternative. Honestly Ramsay was just winging it up until the end of Clash; he's not really as smart or as gifted as you may think. 

We do have some evidence that Northerner made blood sacrifices to the Weirwoods and Old Gods. If anyone was doing this historically it would be the Boltons for sure.  Could there be a chance that on all of Ramsey's hunts he killed rape and flayed these women in front of heart trees or at least in view of the trees.

Could he have awaken something in the old gods/ Bloodraven/ Others with his Blood Sacrifice hunts and have some sort of connection to the weirwoods. We have no Ramsey POV to go off of...????

but yea probably not but i never rule out Telepathic visions and dreams effecting characters... dream are to important throughout the story. Bran, Arya, Jon, Dany, Tyrion....    

[Tralalala]

32 minutes ago, Renly's Banana said:

Because then nothing has to be explained. Nobody has any true motivation or backstory -- it's just magic. It's always magic. "How does Varys know so much?" "Oh he's just constantly getting visions from Bloodraven." See how old and uninteresting that gets?
Half the people you listed are Targaryens -- which get a pass cause we know they have weird ties to magic -- and more than half are long dead. People like Jojen, Bran and the Ghost of High Heart get true visions because they have ties to the weirwoods and the old gods. Ramsay fits into none of these categories. Knowing that people may attack him when he was with Reek doesn't make him psychic. Neither does suspecting that maybe Theon wouldn't find Bran and Rickon so he prepared for an alternative. Honestly Ramsay was just winging it up until the end of Clash; he's not really as smart or as gifted as you may think. 

Visions and magic are like salt. You don't add too much of it into the food, only enough to flavor, not overpower. 

He fits right up there with bran and jojen or are the old gods saved only for starks and reeds?

[Renly's Banana]

11 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

You seem to making up somewhat arbitrary rules about who can and can't receive visions, but I get your point.

I'm really not, though. The rules regarding visions and magic in our story are very strictly laid out by the author. If we focus on who is getting visions, we can break them down into four camps: heritage, religion, magic, and drugs. Some of them overlap slightly, but every single person within our story who claims to receive visions falls into one of these categories. 

Heritage is mainly tied to some people of the North, and this one overlaps with religion a bit. The Starks and wildling shamans and Jojen all have blood ties to greenseers and the First Men, who were close to the Children of the Forest. As far as I know, not a single Bolton has been mentioned in-text as having this gift. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here, but not every Northern family has this ability.
The Targaryens also squarely fall into this category. Ever since Daenys had them flee from Valyria, prophetic visions have been in this bloodline for a while. So it's genetic. Note that not a single group of families outside of Starks and Targaryens can boast of having this power consistently.

Religion is anyone who worships the Old Gods and may or may not have First Men ancestry. The Ghost of High Heart is a good example, and also Bloodraven himself (though he's also a Targaryen, so double whammy). The religion of R'hllor is also in this camp. The red priests see visions in fire, and this may or may not overlap with Magic; we simply don't know yet. Some other religions in Essos claim to see the future because of their gods, like the Moonsingers and Dothraki. 

Magic is the most straightforward one. Some people claim to see the future because they've studied arts allowing them to do so. Maggy the Frog could be put in this category. She was a maegi same as Mirri Maz Duur. Quaithe can also see the future because she is a shadowbinder, like Melisandre... Though unlike Melisandre, Quaithe seems to know what the hell she's doing.   

Drugs are almost exclusive to the warlocks of Qarth. Shade of the Evening can trigger visions, and this is the reason Euron seems to be so prophetic. It's not his bloodline, just liquid LSD. This one may be considered a magical substance and overlap with the previous category, but we don't yet know. 

As far as I know, every person who is outside of these categories and claims to see the future is a fraud. 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

11 minutes ago, Nevets said:

Hosteen Frey entered with BW carrying LW's body.  It's likely that they informed Ramsay prior to their entrance, which would account for the conversation you mention.

Ramsay also claims to be "Lord of Winterfell"  Bran and Rickon may be alive, but they are not present to contest his claim, nor are they likely to be anytime soon.  Certainly Roose decimated the other Northerners in the south, but Manderly has been recruiting recently and has considerable forces now.  

 

At this point, it seems likely that the Frey army (and "Arya";s presence) are the only thing keeping the assembled Northerners from tearing the Boltons from limb to limb.  Getting rid of them seems a bit foolhardy.  Of course, some have to be sent out to keep an eye on the Manderlys, who are highly untrustworthy.  And having open fighting doesn't seem to make sense, either.  They have enough problems as it is.  

Why would the Freys refuse to follow Ramsay?  They don't seem the type to care about his misbehavior, and the Northerners hate them even more than they do the Boltons, so if Roose is gone, Ramsay would be the only game in town.

Essentially, the putative motive for the killing doesn't make sense to me.

I tend to believe that Big Walder committed the murder, but that it wasn't preplanned, but the result of an argument, a fight, or possibly an assault by Little Walder on Big Walder, and BW defended himself.  This would account for the butchery.  BW would figure it would be easier to put the blame on someone else than to explain his actions.  As for the blood on his clothing, it is unlikely that he has spares, especially of outerwear, so he's stuck with the bloody coat.

Hosteen and BW certainly could have informed Ramsay. That's possible.

Yes Ramsay claims to be Lord of WF, but that's what he should say. Claiming to also be the heir to the Dreadfort right in front of Fat Walda is basically a direct challenge to Fat Walda and her future baby. Ramsay is not the heir to the Dreadfort, yet he claims to be for some reason. Why claim the Dreadfort if you expect to keep WF?

No, the Freys are not the only thing keeping the Boltons alive. As I stated in the OP, we don't know the exact numbers, but it appears that the Dreadfort men outnumber all the other remaining northerners due to Roose being so effective at killing them off in the Wot5K. So the Frey army is helping, but they aren't necessary. And yes open fighting is bad for Roose, but the entire theory is that Ramsay wanted the fight specifically to force out the Freys so they die.

The Freys would absolutely refuse to follow Ramsay. The Frey family is split into factions based on Old Walder's various wives. And we know from Merrett's pov that many Freys fear getting kicked out of the Twins after Walder dies. The Freys in the North are expecting that Fat Walda will marry Roose and her children will be heirs to the Dreadfort, so they will presumably be able to live at the Dreadfort or, in the case of Rhaegar and his dad, possibly at White Harbor via Rhaegar's pending marriage to Wynafryd Manderly. If Ramsay kills Roose in order to claim the Dreadfort instead of WF, there would be a huge conflict between Ramsay and the Freys over the Dreadfort. It is also likely that Ramsay would also kill Fat Walda and her (possibly unborn) child to solidify his claim, which would 100% make the Freys want to kill him. And the Northerners may claim to hate Freys, but for the most part the Freys in the North were not the ones directly responsible for the RW. That was all Roose and Lame Lothar (Blackwood) Frey, Big Walder's uncle. Considering what Ramsay did to Lady Hornwood, which Lady Dustin specifically brings up in front of Roose, people have no love for Ramsay. And at least Lady Dustin (and probably the Umbers and Manderlys and mountain clans and maybe everyone else at this point) knows that Bran and Rickon are alive and may suspect that Ramsay, not Theon, was responsible for the sack of WF. All that is to say, Ramsay may actually be more hated in the North than those particular Freys. So in the event of Ramsay killing Roose and Walda, it is possible the Freys could team up with the northerners against Ramsay, and Ramsay is ensuring this will not happen.

The murder being unplanned would account for the butchery, but I find it hard to believe that Big Walder would be able to so effectively overpower and butcher his bigger, stronger cousin. Good point about the blood, though.

 

[Nevets]

4 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

The murder being unplanned would account for the butchery, but I find it hard to believe that Big Walder would be able to so effectively overpower and butcher his bigger, stronger cousin. Good point about the blood, though.

 

If Big Walder can get in a good, solid blow before Little Walder can effectively react, it wouldn't really matter how big he was.  And we have seen Arya take out men far bigger than herself, essentially relying on surprise.  Heck, the Tickler probably had about as many wounds as LW by the time Arya was finished with him.  And, btw, she used a dagger, not Needle.  And the Walders are the same age, so I don't think the imbalance would be that great.  

 

11 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

The Freys would absolutely refuse to follow Ramsay. The Frey family is split into factions based on Old Walder's various wives. And we know from Merrett's pov that many Freys fear getting kicked out of the Twins after Walder dies. The Freys in the North are expecting that Fat Walda will marry Roose and her children will be heirs to the Dreadfort, so they will presumably be able to live at the Dreadfort or, in the case of Rhaegar and his dad, possibly at White Harbor via Rhaegar's pending marriage to Wynafryd Manderly. If Ramsay kills Roose in order to claim the Dreadfort instead of WF, there would be a huge conflict between Ramsay and the Freys over the Dreadfort. It is also likely that Ramsay would also kill Fat Walda and her (possibly unborn) child to solidify his claim, which would 100% make the Freys want to kill him.

The Freys seem to lack much sense of family affection.  While Ramsay's murder of Fat Walda would cause trouble with Roose, I'm not convinced the other Freys would be too upset.  As for the Northerners, they tend to put all the Freys in the same basket, with the possible exception of those known to have been friendly with the Starks, such as Perwyn, Olyvar, etc.  I have difficulty imagining them teaming up with the Freys to take out Ramsay, although I suppose it is possible.  And keeping the Freys around keeps the balance of troops solidly on the Boltons' side.

[Makk]

I would have thought if Ramsay had to pick someone to kill to sew chaos between the Maderlys and the Freys, he would much more likely have picked Big Walder over Little Walder. There may well be some other reason about why he had to murder Little Walder however nothing has been presented to indicate this so far.

I don't buy the fact he received a prophetic vision about a Raven coming that day. Every single vision and prophecy we have been presented with so far has been imprecise and mysterious. Almost tangential to the storyline and more for the readers than the characters.

However I do think it's very fair to assume that Ramsay would like Roose dead so he could well be plotting something. I'm open to Ramsay murdering Little Walder, but this hasn't convinced me.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 hour ago, Renly's Banana said:

I'm really not, though. The rules regarding visions and magic in our story are very strictly laid out by the author. If we focus on who is getting visions, we can break them down into four camps: heritage, religion, magic, and drugs. Some of them overlap slightly, but every single person within our story who claims to receive visions falls into one of these categories. 

Heritage is mainly tied to some people of the North, and this one overlaps with religion a bit. The Starks and wildling shamans and Jojen all have blood ties to greenseers and the First Men, who were close to the Children of the Forest. As far as I know, not a single Bolton has been mentioned in-text as having this gift. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here, but not every Northern family has this ability.
The Targaryens also squarely fall into this category. Ever since Daenys had them flee from Valyria, prophetic visions have been in this bloodline for a while. So it's genetic. Note that not a single group of families outside of Starks and Targaryens can boast of having this power consistently.

Religion is anyone who worships the Old Gods and may or may not have First Men ancestry. The Ghost of High Heart is a good example, and also Bloodraven himself (though he's also a Targaryen, so double whammy). The religion of R'hllor is also in this camp. The red priests see visions in fire, and this may or may not overlap with Magic; we simply don't know yet. Some other religions in Essos claim to see the future because of their gods, like the Moonsingers and Dothraki. 

Magic is the most straightforward one. Some people claim to see the future because they've studied arts allowing them to do so. Maggy the Frog could be put in this category. She was a maegi same as Mirri Maz Duur. Quaithe can also see the future because she is a shadowbinder, like Melisandre... Though unlike Melisandre, Quaithe seems to know what the hell she's doing.   

Drugs are almost exclusive to the warlocks of Qarth. Shade of the Evening can trigger visions, and this is the reason Euron seems to be so prophetic. It's not his bloodline, just liquid LSD. This one may be considered a magical substance and overlap with the previous category, but we don't yet know. 

As far as I know, every person who is outside of these categories and claims to see the future is a fraud. 

I think genetics are clearly important, and you are correct to point out that many Targaryens have had prophetic visions, but they were also incestuous. Genes are generally not tied to family names. If some Starks at some point had the right genes, who's to say their blood hasn't mixed with the Boltons or Ramsay's unknown mother by now?

As far as I can tell, religions in this story are not "correct" or "true", just like GRRM's view of religion in real life. So any religious method for receiving visions would really be accidentally employing some form of pseudo-science. For instance, we learned in TWOIAF that the priests of Boash, the Blind God, wear eyeless hoods in order to open their "third eye". This idea is obviously corroborated by Bran's time spent in darkness in the crypts and in the cave and Arya's time spent blind.

As for magic and drugs, I don't think "magic" exists in asoiaf, but GRRM has written about drugs being used to affect telepathic ability. Particularly, in Nightflyers, the characters first use a telepathy-suppression drug on a telepath because they think he is paranoid. But later, they start to believe him and use a telepathy-enhancing drug on him. In asoiaf, we have seen the drug sweetsleep used on Bran and Sweetrobin to suppress their "dreams", and we have seen shade of the evening and weirwood paste (both interestingly derived from trees) used on characters to enhance their telepathic experiences.

So I would sum it up like this: genetics seems to be connected to receiving visions, and it may be necessary to have special genes to receive visions, even those from glass candles. Certain religions and "magical" groups have managed to develop practices to tap into their telepathic abilities, like the worshipers of Boash. And some drugs, namely sweetsleep, shade of the evening, and weirwood paste, have a direct affect on telepathic abilities.

[Ser Loras The Gay]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Coincidences happen, but not generally on the level of significance or frequency that they appear to happen in asoiaf. The most prominent example in my opinion is LF's dagger being used by Bran's would-be assassin. Most people accept that it was a necessary coincidence to advance the plot that Joffrey happened to pick that dagger. I disagree. And I definitely don't want to open that particular can of worms in this thread, but that's a good summary of my view on coincidence in asoiaf.

And how do you explain the shadow baby killer? And the freaking dragons? 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

10 minutes ago, Ser Loras The Gay said:

And how do you explain the shadow baby killer? And the freaking dragons? 

I'm not sure I understand your question. What was coincidental about the shadow baby killer?

As for the dragons, I assume you are referring to Dany's dragons and specifically the event of their hatching as a coincidence? I think the dragon eggs were given to Dany on purpose to hatch them in Asshai and it was Jorah's job to make sure that happened.

[Aegon VII]

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Please, avoid all discussion of PJ. Is this a PJ-related topic? Yes. But the whole reason I had to create this topic is because some of us were having a nice discussion about the recent PJ theory that Ramsay killed LW, and at some point the thread was not just locked, but deleted entirely. I'm assuming this is because one person in particular (I won't name names, but you know who you are) repeatedly called PJ theories "fan fiction", and the conversation quickly went downhill. So please, for the sake of this thread, pretend PJ doesn't even exist.  

 Thank you for creating this thread. Definitely a great topic of discussion and I feel the last one got bullied into deletion. After all the time I spent on my "Big Walder Analysis" thread I feel especially close to BW and enjoy discussing him.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I will summarize the valid points of the theory briefly:

• BW is smart enough to not have LW's blood all over him after committing a murder, and

It's important to remember in this time having blood on ones clothes wasn't that odd. Bloods messy and it's hard to hand wash stuff. BW walder would either have to struggle through washing them himself, or have a serving person do it. Either way, it's evidence that he commited a crime and was trying to cover it up. It would be odd if BW has squires wash blood out of his gloves the one night LW is murdered. Would anyone actually take Manderly serious if he accused BW of killing his cousin? It's unthinkable and wouldn't happen. Cleaning the gloves is unecessary and actually has additional risks associated with it.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• BW generally lacked motivation for killing LW. LW may have been ahead in the line of succession, but so are a million other Freys, so killing LW doesn't really help make BW Lord of the Twins in any practical sense.

A lot of your/PJ's theory is explaining why Ramsay is motivated to have large numbers of Freys die. For BW though, we already know his motivation. BW claims he will be Lord. Really the only conceivable way this happens is for many Freys to die, the ones ahead of him in succession. Yes a lot of Frey soldiers will die, but if he can get most of the senior Freys in WF killed it absolutely helps his pursuit of becoming lord.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• Additionally, BW ends up getting sent out to fight Stannis as a direct result of this event, a result which BW surely would not want.

BW probably isn't going out there at all, he's nine.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• LW was butchered (not just stabbed in the back or something sneaky),

 The description of "butchered" comes from Hosteen Frey who would want to make the murder sound as gruesome as possible when announcing it in the hall.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• and it seems unlikely that BW would be able to overpower and butcher LW, considering LW physically bested him in both their Lord of the Crossing game and jousting. The butchering seems to implicate Ramsay instead.

Though LW hits harder with the lance due to sheer power BW rides a horse better which shows he's somewhat athletic. That plus the element of surprise and it's very concievable BW could kill LW.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• BW "hesitates" toward the end of his story about the murder, possibly implying that everything he said before the hesitation (LW went to find someone who owed him silver from dicing) was true, but what he said after the hesitation (it was White Harbor men who taught dice) was a lie.

That is one theory to explain the pause, it dividing truth and fiction. I would propose instead that it's all fiction and that the reason BW hesitates is because he knows the gravity of his next statement and the general consequences it's going to cause.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• It seems weird that White Harbor men would dice with a Frey, and Luton and Skinner were specifically observed by Theon dicing that night, so it is more likely that LW was dicing with Luton and Skinner and was somehow owed money by one of them (probably Luton)

I believe the whole story of dice to be fake.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• During the ensuing fight (which was chaotic and involved around 60 men and we also don't get a description of after the first 5 seconds) after LW's body is brought in, Luton is somehow the only Dreadfort man badly wounded, and Ramsay quickly "silences" him.

I would have to chalk up Luton playing dice AND dying as a coincidence / red herring.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• Prior to the fight, Ramsay enters buckling his sword belt, Roose and Ramsay are seen arguing, and Fat Walda shows a look of fear that "spoke volumes". Walda also screams when the fight starts but was silent when the corpse of her brother was brought inside. This implies that Ramsay knew LW was dead and was informing Roose. That would explain why Walda had a look of fear during the argument and screamed at the beginning of the fight but did not react when LW was brought inside.

Good observation about Walda but we also have to respect the difference between seeing a corpse, which even highborn ladies did quite often, to seeing violent bloodshed of people she knew.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• A raven arrives with a map of Stannis's location, and we know that Roose was fully expecting this intel because it was sent by the Dreadfort maester, who was brought along by Arnolf Karstark. Food is dwindling, tensions are high, and Roose had likely been anxious for this map to arrive so that he could send disloyal men out into the snow to fight Stannis. However, the fight, caused by LW's murder, forces Roose's hand into sending loyal Frey men out to fight instead. Side note - Theon observes that the raven was still wet from the snow, so barring some ultra-deception on the part of Roose/GRRM, the map arrived long after the murder of LW.

Is it likely that a maester would deliver the raven like that in front of everyone rather than come and whisper in the lords ear? What if it was bad news and then Roose had to think up a lie on the spot? To me it seems more likely that Roose and Ramsay had gotten the letter that morning, and arranged for it to be delivered in front of everyone. LW's murder interrupted this and forced Rooses hand.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• Ramsay, even during his wedding to fake Arya, claimed among his titles to be heir to the Dreadfort. It seems he may have no intention of trying to maintain control of WF or Hornwood. This makes sense, considering he knows Bran and Rickon (not to mention Sansa) are alive, and the Hornwood men surely despise Ramsay for what he did to Lady Hornwood. Since Roose was quite effective at killing off rival northerners during the Wot5K, the remaining Dreadfort men may outnumber everyone else in the North, not including the Freys.
• If we do the math for the vague numbers of northern soldiers we are given in ADWD, it appears likely that the 1400 Frey men are the "swing" army in the North, just like they were the swing army at the Trident. If Ramsay kills Roose, he would gain control of the Dreadfort and the largest army in the North, but the Freys would never follow Ramsay, and the other northerners together with the 1400 Frey men could potentially overpower him. So to get the Dreadfort, Ramsay must first kill off the Frey forces, and then kill Roose. On a basic level, that is Ramsay's whole plan.

All reasons why Ramsay might want the Freys dead, but I think GRRM writes the story in a way that we can find motivations for all the suspects when we have mysteries like this. Just look at the PL. For BW we already know he wants Freys to have to go into battle and die so that he moves up the line of succession.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

• So the entire point of LW's murder was to force Roose's hand into sending the Freys out to die, killing the faction of men loyal to Roose alone.

I agree that it was to force Roose to send the Freys out, I just believe BW was the one who wanted this.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

So, just for a moment, pretend you totally buy into all that logic like I do . Ramsay's entire plan would depend on spectacular timing. That is, he killed LW at the perfect moment, the night before the raven arrived with the map. That's some luck. Even Roose himself would have had no idea when exactly the raven was going to arrive. That knowledge, in fact, would only be possessed by the raven. It would only be possessed by the Old Gods. So really, for his entire plan to make sense without some sort of bull shit contrived super-coincidence, Ramsay would have to receive a prophetic vision telling him the timing of the raven. Without such a vision, the whole plan really falls apart. Is this plausible? Well I think it is not only plausible but incredibly likely.

I think this is a jump. He could have just guessed, knowing that even if Stannis wasn't close, it would raise tensions between Freys and other houses.

3 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

Briefly, let's go over the early adventures of Ramsay:

• Ramsay (as Reek) suspiciously gets captured while hunting. For some reason, he was alone in the woods with Reek where other soldiers were known to be fighting/riding around, he was a wanted man for what he did to Lady Hornwood, and he had a bunch of fancy clothes with him that could be used to pretend Reek was Ramsay.
• As a result, Ramsay is a prisoner at WF when Theon arrives and takes control of the castle, and he quickly befriends Theon.
• When they go out hunting for Bran and Rickon, Ramsay has the forethought to bring along Bran and Rickon's clothes, even though Theon seemed confident the hunt would be successful, and Ramsay shouldn't know about the location or even existence of the super-convenient miller's sons.

Ramsay's actions listed there don't make much sense. In fact, the acts of getting captured and of bringing clothes on the hunt arguably make no sense without prophetic foresight. And lo and behold, Jojen received visions of Theon coming to WF and of Ramsay skinning the faces of the miller's sons. I give it a 99% chance Ramsay received at least those same 2 visions. And so, I think it is reasonable to conclude that the Old Gods/BR, knowing the exact location and timing of the raven with the map, would send a vision to Ramsay with that info, allowing Ramsay to carry out his plan and beat Roose at the game of thrones.

So, people... What do you think of Ramsay receiving prophetic visions like Jojen? And whether or not you buy into that, do you think Ramsay killed LW?

It makes complete sense Reek brought the clothes. He knew from before they set out that worst case scenario, he could find two kids and burn em like he did. He's smart yes, but helped by the gods, I'm not so sure.

[Ser Frasier of House Crane]

I will say, after seeing Preston's video, I remembered Ramsay's line to Big Walder: "What man? Give me his name. Point him out to me, boy, and I will make you a cloak of his skin." Made me think that was an implicit threat to Walder that if Ramsay was indeed the killer and Walder spoke, Ramsay would literally make the boy into a cloak. Of course, the "of his skin" bit doesn't quite work, but I still liked the double-meaning.

I don't know if I buy that Ramsay is the killer. I think it's Big Walder, and that he learned more from Ramsay than originally given credit, especially as Li'l Walder was always considered to be Ramsay-in-training.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 hour ago, Nevets said:

The Freys seem to lack much sense of family affection.  While Ramsay's murder of Fat Walda would cause trouble with Roose, I'm not convinced the other Freys would be too upset.  As for the Northerners, they tend to put all the Freys in the same basket, with the possible exception of those known to have been friendly with the Starks, such as Perwyn, Olyvar, etc.  I have difficulty imagining them teaming up with the Freys to take out Ramsay, although I suppose it is possible. And keeping the Freys around keeps the balance of troops solidly on the Boltons' side.

I think you missed my point. While the Freys probably wouldn't necessarily go to war over the deaths of Fat Walda or LW, they would likely go to war over the Dreadfort, which Ramsay is actively trying to steal away from them. Keeping the Freys around keeps the balance of troops solidly on Roose's side, but not Ramsay's, which is kind of the basis for the theory.

[Renly's Banana]

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

As far as I can tell, religions in this story are not "correct" or "true", just like GRRM's view of religion in real life. So any religious method for receiving visions would really be accidentally employing some form of pseudo-science. 

1 hour ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

As for magic and drugs, I don't think "magic" exists in asoiaf

Whether the religions are "true" or not doesn't matter. What matters is they have methods for seeing the future, and this is not disputable. I'm not saying there's a pantheon of gods over Planetos shooting down powers into their priests, but clearly SOMETHING is giving them these abilities. 

Magic is also something that we can no longer dispute. Melisandre spawned a literal shadow demon assassin, people are able to morph their appearance at will using magic items and bring a dead person back to life over and over. An ability similar to what the ice creatures up north are using to raise armies of zombies. To say nothing of the ancient stories about the CoF or the Rhoynar. 
If getting rid of the simplistic and broad "magic" name helps, then go for it, but it exists. It's not an illusion or telepathy or futuristic technology -- in this context of THIS story, it can only be called magic.   

 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

9 minutes ago, Aegon VII said:

Thank you for creating this thread. Definitely a great topic of discussion and I feel the last one got bullied into deletion. After all the time I spent on my "Big Walder Analysis" thread I feel especially close to BW and enjoy discussing him.

It's important to remember in this time having blood on ones clothes wasn't that odd. Bloods messy and it's hard to hand wash stuff. BW walder would either have to struggle through washing them himself, or have a serving person do it. Either way, it's evidence that he commited a crime and was trying to cover it up. It would be odd if BW has squires wash blood out of his gloves the one night LW is murdered. Would anyone actually take Manderly serious if he accused BW of killing his cousin? It's unthinkable and wouldn't happen. Cleaning the gloves is unecessary and actually has additional risks associated with it.

A lot of your/PJ's theory is explaining why Ramsay is motivated to have large numbers of Freys die. For BW though, we already know his motivation. BW claims he will be Lord. Really the only conceivable way this happens is for many Freys to die, the ones ahead of him in succession. Yes a lot of Frey soldiers will die, but if he can get most of the senior Freys in WF killed it absolutely helps his pursuit of becoming lord.

BW probably isn't going out there at all, he's nine.

 The description of "butchered" comes from Hosteen Frey who would want to make the murder sound as gruesome as possible when announcing it in the hall.

Though LW hits harder with the lance due to sheer power BW rides a horse better which shows he's somewhat athletic. That plus the element of surprise and it's very concievable BW could kill LW.

That is one theory to explain the pause, it dividing truth and fiction. I would propose instead that it's all fiction and that the reason BW hesitates is because he knows the gravity of his next statement and the general consequences it's going to cause.

I believe the whole story of dice to be fake.

I would have to chalk up Luton playing dice AND dying as a coincidence / red herring.

Good observation about Walda but we also have to respect the difference between seeing a corpse, which even highborn ladies did quite often, to seeing violent bloodshed of people she knew.

Is it likely that a maester would deliver the raven like that in front of everyone rather than come and whisper in the lords ear? What if it was bad news and then Roose had to think up a lie on the spot? To me it seems more likely that Roose and Ramsay had gotten the letter that morning, and arranged for it to be delivered in front of everyone. LW's murder interrupted this and forced Rooses hand.

All reasons why Ramsay might want the Freys dead, but I think GRRM writes the story in a way that we can find motivations for all the suspects when we have mysteries like this. Just look at the PL. For BW we already know he wants Freys to have to go into battle and die so that he moves up the line of succession.

I agree that it was to force Roose to send the Freys out, I just believe BW was the one who wanted this.

I think this is a jump. He could have just guessed, knowing that even if Stannis wasn't close, it would raise tensions between Freys and other houses.

It makes complete sense Reek brought the clothes. He knew from before they set out that worst case scenario, he could find two kids and burn em like he did. He's smart yes, but helped by the gods, I'm not so sure.

You are welcome.

Just to clarify, I do think the maester came to Roose first, a few minutes earlier, with the map. In fact, considering that WF had been "awake for hours" from the horns but Roose suspiciously entered "yawning", I assume the arrival of the map is what prompted Roose to enter the hall. And based on the timing of the subsequent entrances of Ramsay and Hosteen, it seems Ramsay was waiting for the raven and told BW to go get Hosteen and show him the body right after the raven arrived.

You have presented an excellent counter-argument here. I shall now proceed to critique its weaker points:

First of all, you are almost definitely wrong about one thing. SPOILER from the super unofficial Asha fragment screenshot:

Spoiler

Big Walder is seen headed into battle by Asha in TWOW based on the description of his armor.

While BW may have been thinking that this would be a good way to kill a bunch of Crakehall- and Royce-Freys, I think it is a super risky plan considering it carries a large risk of being sent off into the snow to die with the other Freys.

Luton playing dice and dying seems like an odd red herring. Red herrings are usually a bit more obvious, like Cersei being blamed for the death of Jon Arryn. It could be a red herring, but I would say, wow George, that sure was one subtle red herring. The use of the language "Ramsay silenced him" as opposed to "Ramsay gave him mercy" or something seems like a subtle clue. "Silenced" is perfectly appropriate, because Luton was dying "loudly", but it could carry the double meaning of silencing Luton's secrets.

I think you missed my point here. Yes, obviously murdering LW in this fashion at any point in time would raise tensions, but the timing is vital if Ramsay's plan was to get the Freys sent out to fight and die. Roose seems to have a plan to send out men to fight Stannis basically to kill them. Tensions are high, and food is low, so this is a simple conclusion to come to. But Roose can't just tell people to wander off blindly into the snow. That would be bull shit. He needed to wait until he had the map. If Ramsay had elevated tensions before the raven arrived, everyone may have just stayed in the castle and been super angry 24/7. And if Ramsay had waited until after the raven, it's too late. Roose already would have sent out non-Freys to fight Stannis. Ramsay's timing was somehow perfect. He killed LW hours before the raven arrived. His timing was so perfect that LW was never even reported missing. He just shows up dead at the exact perfect moment for the Freys to get screwed over.

This last point is the only one I think we actually disagree on completely. It seems that you (and a ton of people) are suggesting that Ramsay was thinking to himself something along the lines of, "Well, we will probably find those boys because they are on foot and we have hounds tracking their direwolves. But on the off-chance we fail, this might be a great opportunity to convince everyone that Bran and Rickon are dead and blame it on Theon. I'm sure we can find a couple of boys about the right age nearby and kill their family. I'll just take a few minutes to go to their rooms and pick out some clothes and grab some recognizable jewelry."

I don't buy it. Considering the fact that Jojen received a vision ahead of time of Ramsay skinning the miller's sons, I think it is super likely that Ramsay received a similar vision. Is it possible Ramsay was just covering his bases? Sure, anything is possible. Does it make complete sense? No, I don't think it does. If that turns out to be the case, I would be disappointed with GRRM.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

1 hour ago, Makk said:

I would have thought if Ramsay had to pick someone to kill to sew chaos between the Maderlys and the Freys, he would much more likely have picked Big Walder over Little Walder. There may well be some other reason about why he had to murder Little Walder however nothing has been presented to indicate this so far.

I totally disagree. The man who matters (the one Ramsay needs to piss off) is Hosteen Frey. Hosteen is a Crakehall-Frey. The recently deceased Merrett Frey was his brother, and Fat Walda and LW are Merrett's children. So killing LW means killing the son of Hosteen's recently deceased brother. BW, on the other hand, is a Blackwood-Frey, and we know that Merrett did not trust BW's uncle Lothar, the architect of the RW. So killing BW wouldn't have had anywhere near the same effect on Hosteen.

[John Suburbs]

4 hours ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

 

So, just for a moment, pretend you totally buy into all that logic like I do . Ramsay's entire plan would depend on spectacular timing. That is, he killed LW at the perfect moment, the night before the raven arrived with the map. That's some luck. Even Roose himself would have had no idea when exactly the raven was going to arrive. That knowledge, in fact, would only be possessed by the raven. It would only be possessed by the Old Gods. So really, for his entire plan to make sense without some sort of bull shit contrived super-coincidence, Ramsay would have to receive a prophetic vision telling him the timing of the raven. Without such a vision, the whole plan really falls apart. Is this plausible? Well I think it is not only plausible but incredibly likely.

I don't think you need to have Ramsey with visions or magical knowledge of Stannis' position or the raven's arrival. They've been hearing the drums and warhorns for hours, so he knows Stannis -- or some enemy, at the very least -- is very close and the time to strike is now.

And if we assume that the blood on BW's chest and hands is caused by digging at the body, then it hasn't been in the snow for all that long.

The only truly odd thing about this is: the body was found in the ruined keep, so if the intent was to stir up trouble between Freys and Manderlys, why leave the body way out in the crumbling part of the castle where nobody is likely to find it? And who did find it, and what were they doing there?

 

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

7 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

I don't think you need to have Ramsey with visions or magical knowledge of Stannis' position or the raven's arrival. They've been hearing the drums and warhorns for hours, so he knows Stannis -- or some enemy, at the very least -- is very close and the time to strike is now.

And if we assume that the blood on BW's chest and hands is caused by digging at the body, then it hasn't been in the snow for all that long.

The only truly odd thing about this is: the body was found in the ruined keep, so if the intent was to stir up trouble between Freys and Manderlys, why leave the body way out in the crumbling part of the castle where nobody is likely to find it? And who did find it, and what were they doing there?

 

Actually, it appears that LW was killed before the drums and warhorns started, so that has nothing to do with his timing. He either has magical knowledge of the raven or is super unrealistically lucky.

LW's corpse is frozen, and therefore he has been buried in the snow for a while. I think most people assume, correctly so, that the blood on BW was caused by him being present for the murder.

But if this was Ramsay's plan, he did not leave the body in a random place and just hope they would find it. He likely waited for the raven to arrive with the map and then immediately sent BW to get Hosteen and show him the body. The timing of the entrances of Roose, Ramsay, and Hosteen support this idea.

[Makk]

18 minutes ago, 40 Thousand Skeletons said:

I totally disagree. The man who matters (the one Ramsay needs to piss off) is Hosteen Frey. Hosteen is a Crakehall-Frey. The recently deceased Merrett Frey was his brother, and Fat Walda and LW are Merrett's children. So killing LW means killing the son of Hosteen's recently deceased brother. BW, on the other hand, is a Blackwood-Frey, and we know that Merrett did not trust BW's uncle Lothar, the architect of the RW. So killing BW wouldn't have had anywhere near the same effect on Hosteen.

It's a fair point, although I think Hoosten was pretty close to breaking point anyway. I'm not sure how much he genuinely cared about little Walder or Merrett who seemed universally despised amongst the Freys, but I concede it is a fair point. I made the statement based on the fact that Little Walder would be an ally to Ramsay whereas big Walder probably wouldn't.

[40 Thousand Skeletons]

38 minutes ago, Renly's Banana said:

Whether the religions are "true" or not doesn't matter. What matters is they have methods for seeing the future, and this is not disputable. I'm not saying there's a pantheon of gods over Planetos shooting down powers into their priests, but clearly SOMETHING is giving them these abilities. 

Magic is also something that we can no longer dispute. Melisandre spawned a literal shadow demon assassin, people are able to morph their appearance at will using magic items and bring a dead person back to life over and over. An ability similar to what the ice creatures up north are using to raise armies of zombies. To say nothing of the ancient stories about the CoF or the Rhoynar. 
If getting rid of the simplistic and broad "magic" name helps, then go for it, but it exists. It's not an illusion or telepathy or futuristic technology -- in this context of THIS story, it can only be called magic.   

 

I would argue that everything we have seen in asoiaf so far, including shadow babies, resurrection, face-changing, and ancient legends, can be explained using only the sci-fi concepts presented in GRRM's Thousand Worlds universe. It can all be illusions, telepathy, or technology, so I refrain from using the word magic. I think it is likely Planetos is in the Thousand Worlds universe, so all the sci-fi rules and explanations already established within that universe are applicable. But most people will disagree with me, and I don't want to try to convince anyone of that in this particular thread.