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Military Strengths-2 and More!


Corvo the Crow

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3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

You seem to be missing the critical issue, which is that Ramsay contradicted Theon’s estimate with a more informed number at Winterfell. Who is in a better position to know the exact number between the two of them? 

Well the thing is, we are never given an exact number.

Ramsay is maester trained at a very old age and only for 2 years. Regarding the host that is brought, we have one number given by Theon, placing it at around 400 men being 1/5 of Rodrik’s near 2000 and two numbers from Ramsay, one is around 400 men, confirming Theon that his host is indeed 1/5 of Rodrik’s and another one, placing it at around 600 men, saying he promised 200 men - when he promised 100 and told he may even bring 200 - and brought 3 times as many. You say Ramsay is in a position to know better, but we are shown that he doesn’t know and repeatedly shown that his later introduction to the lordly education and training shows itself in every way imaginable.

Now, what does that say to you about Ramsay and his affinity with numbers? Of the two whose math skills would you trust more, especially regarding armies, Theon Greyjoy, Heir to the Iron Isles, Ward of Winterfell, maester tutored trained at arms and for warfare from a very young age and has lead, or at least accompanied armies and sat in council with the commanders or Ramsay who was just tutored by a maester for two years, at a very late age mind you, fights like an untrained butcher with a cleaver, since he has never been given any martial training, which includes both fighting and commanding, growing up and whose sole martial exploit up until then was ambushing Lady Donella who had half a dozen tired and if I recall old men-at-arms and perhaps some servants with her.

 

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Besides, if you really care so much about consistency, Theon’s error was to underestimate the size of Ramsay’s force at Winterfell. So why are you not insisiting that he underestimated the size of Roose Bolton’s numbers too?

As pointed above, how do you know it’s Theon that underestimates and not Ramsay that overestimates or even exaggarates on purpose, that is if he’s not just giving those numbers because he plainly sucks at “sums” and warfare?

Now I’ll grant you that we have seen Theon underestimated once, with Rodrik’s host guessing it was at least a thousand but would like to add that he has seen it from very far away, we don’t know how close to 2000 “near 2000” actually is and whether if the host had gathered it’s full strength at the time so he may not have underestimated at all, but  let’s jusr assume Theon is an underestimater all the same, give me a number for Roose’s host keeping in mind the fact Theon the underestimater thought 2 in 10 of the original “20000 or near enough” went south. What number would you place Roose’s host at? He guessed Ramsay’s men to be 400 where as you suppose it is 600, so was Roose’s army of Northmen had 6000 men, of which more than half, by your idea, Dreadforters? So if he had over 3000 now, how much did Starks have at start?Umbers? Hornwood, Glover, Cerwyn?

Now is also a good time to discredit your idea of Roose getting cavalry from Robb,  as most of the returning were afoot Now 1 horse to 3 foot is still most afoot but when Theon was a part of this host going south, it still had 1:3 so the host has noticably lower horse to foot ration than it was going south. 

 

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A guiding principle of the entire series is that the intelligence, attention, ability to observe, to count, to memorize, etc. are individual abilities of the characters involved. This is not a series were we are given objective facts as such. The narrator doesn't talk to us directly, he only shares (some of) the thoughts, words, and perceptions of the characters.

Theon Greyjoy ranks very low in intelligence, perception, and diligence, making him possibly one of the worst observers among the POVs we have (I actually think only Victarion is dumber than he is).

Ramsay would indeed rank even lower than Theon in this regard.

We have no reason to believe the average nobleman is trained to do more than loosely guess at the size of an assembled host (because that is important when you face such a host in battle) but that would be done very roughly - is a host numbering the hundreds, the thousands, or the tens of thousands. That is what makes the difference. If you have roughly the same number of men - or some more or some less - you still can win the battle easily enough. And, frankly, how on earth should the average noble youth actually be trained to practice estimating army sizes? Do we assume men arbitrarily assemble in the thousands just that some pampered youth can learn how to count people?

I don't think so.

The people actually doing the counting, taking care of the provisions, etc. are the stewards and servants of the lord, not the lord himself.

And even there we have no reason to assume that a lord commanding vassal X to join him with a thousand men is ever going to learn whether said guy ever showed up with so many men. Who would count such men? Who would care if it were 1,000, or rather any number between, say, 500-1,500?

In an army the people dealing with foraging and feeding the army would have the best guess at the size of an army - and from them the commanding guy would get reasonably good numbers. But with desertion being rampant in any army we hear about - and no lord or king being able to prevent that - we can be pretty sure that no lord had the administrative staff to really control things.

In that sense, a man like Bowen Marsh would be a very trusting source when giving an estimate on the size of a group of people based on the number of camp fires, but Renly or Catelyn would not - even if we could reasonably assume they didn't have ulterior motives to exaggerate or underrate the numbers.

The idea that George actually wants to give us accurate numbers on any army - or even the military potential of this or that region - goes completely against everything his writing style indicates. He never wanted to give us any numbers. Not dates, not distances, not army sizes. To make the story work and to have some background information on what happens we need some of that information. But it is all deliberately sketchy, doubtful, and unreliable. He retains that even in FaB where he has to give pretty precise dates on the main historical figures. We still don't get birth dates, names for days, months, political maps, proper information on military capabilities, etc.

The repeated inconsistencies in those fields show that George doesn't want realistic logistics, travel times, etc. to interfere with the plot of the story he wants to tell.

In that sense, the assumption some people might have - that knowing things about military capabilities and logistics somehow helps us to guess at future plot lines and the like - seems to be a false premise. George is not going allow some numbers he has introduced years ago to interfere with a plot line he wants to introduce, just as he is not going to have an army/commander win a battle when he wants them to lose it. No matter the numbers. 

And the latter is one of the lessons of actual military history. Numbers mean pretty much nothing when you are able to use the advantages your position, weapons, maneuverability, skills at arms, etc. to the best of your ability.

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I would generally trust numbers given by characters in the series unless you find obvious contradictions. I can't see any obvious contradiction in Theon's estimates.

We should worry less about the 12,000 gathered at Winterfell and instead just think about the 18,000 gathered by Moat Cailin. Perhaps some of the lords, like Roose, actually sent a portion of their forces south nearer along the kingsroad rather than bringing them all directly to Winterfell -- perhaps to help set up supply depots or spread out the burden of keeping them all fed -- and so on. The Karstarks were late-comers ("the last", we're told) and that may be why they brought everything they had directly to Winterfell, while others who were able to move more quickly arranged for forces to be ahead of the march.

So, I don't know. Roose's men making up more than half  of the ~4,000 northmen doesn't seem odd, especially given the fact that he demonstrably avoided limiting the casualties among his forces during the War of the Five Kings.

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I am disappointed in myself that I was not able to shut down the "debate" on Roose's portion of the returning Northmen more capably. Because it honestly is not worthy of a debate. The estimate is given to us without any contradiction by any other character or viewpoint.

There is no reason to question it. But instead of sticking to that point, my natural enjoyment in debating numbers led me to be drawn into a discussion which was unwarranted. And thus it legitimized the unfounded questioning of a basic bit of information that was provided to us not once but twice, from two separate sources.

If even one character gave a contradictory viewpoint, then by all means, the issue must be open for debate. But absolutely no one disputed it. Martin simply conveyed the fact that Roose saved most of his own men while bleeding the other Northern lords' strength, ending up with an engineered situation where the majority of the 4000 returning Northmen are Dreadfort men. Simple as that.

There is no cause to dispute that. There really isn't.

28 minutes ago, Ran said:

I would generally trust numbers given by characters in the series unless you find obvious contradictions. I can't see any obvious contradiction in Theon's estimates.

We should worry less about the 12,000 gathered at Winterfell and instead just think about the 18,000 gathered by Moat Cailin. Perhaps some of the lords, like Roose, actually sent a portion of their forces south nearer along the kingsroad rather than bringing them all directly to Winterfell -- perhaps to help set up supply depots or spread out the burden of keeping them all fed -- and so on. The Karstarks were late-comers ("the last", we're told) and that may be why they brought everything they had directly to Winterfell, while others who were able to move more quickly arranged for forces to be ahead of the march.

So, I don't know. Roose's men making up more than half  of the ~4,000 northmen doesn't seem odd, especially given the fact that he demonstrably avoided limiting the casualties among his forces during the War of the Five Kings.

I have previously thought in that direction. Since Robb had been sitting at Winterfell for some time, waiting for the Karstarks, it would have been greatly overcrowded. And since a long march lay ahead, it is certainly possible that some men departed ahead of time towards Moat Cailin.

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2 hours ago, Ran said:

I would generally trust numbers given by characters in the series unless you find obvious contradictions. I can't see any obvious contradiction in Theon's estimates.

We should worry less about the 12,000 gathered at Winterfell and instead just think about the 18,000 gathered by Moat Cailin. Perhaps some of the lords, like Roose, actually sent a portion of their forces south nearer along the kingsroad rather than bringing them all directly to Winterfell -- perhaps to help set up supply depots or spread out the burden of keeping them all fed -- and so on. The Karstarks were late-comers ("the last", we're told) and that may be why they brought everything they had directly to Winterfell, while others who were able to move more quickly arranged for forces to be ahead of the march.

So, I don't know. Roose's men making up more than half  of the ~4,000 northmen doesn't seem odd, especially given the fact that he demonstrably avoided limiting the casualties among his forces during the War of the Five Kings.

And how many men does lord’s sending men ahead leave for southern Flint branches, Ryswells, Dustins, Lockes?  Not to mention Slates that we learn of much later and other houses that may be mentioned even later on.

Worse part of the North providing the better part of the army is very odd as well but perhaps that can be dismissed saying southern ones were kept as they could provide more men much faster if needed.

Also Arya sees Umbers, Mountain clansmen and Karstarks in tents, there are no Karstark men or clansmen with Robb so Roose brought these men Lockes and Widow’s watch Flints as well since Donnel Locke and Robin Flint, who weren’t with Robb as evident with not being in Riverrun council and godswood, is there as well. These are just the ones that are undisputable based on text evidence. There may very well be more Tallharts, Glovers whatever left with him.

Not to mention the fact Roose shouldn’t even have 4000 men if he slaughtered everyone who is not a Karstark or Bolton. He has little to no troops to pull from Robb’s host to increase his numbers, which is also apparent with textual evidence; Theon who went south with Robb at the head of a roughly 1:3 cavalry to foot host says most of the host is afoot. Of course 1:3 is also most afoot but it wasn’t considered most afoot going south so the numbers should be even lower.

 

Honestly, tell me how come Roose can have 4000 northmen in MC when his surviving numbers before RW could at most be 4300 including the 600 men with Kyle Condon and Ronnel Stout and 200 with Steelshanks. His 3500 host has men from many houses, however few they may be, he couldn’t have pulled more men from Robb’s host or else his host wouldn’t be “most are afoot” how can he have 4000 men?

I can see it being 3000, which the text could support with the vague statement of “2 of 10” being actually %15 or so instead of %20.

 

@Free Northman Reborn 

Of course you were incapable to shut it down as you failed to provide textual evidence, because THERE AREN’T ANY to begin with.

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@Lord Varys

 

Good points and I agree in general, not this part though

3 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

And, frankly, how on earth should the average noble youth actually be trained to practice estimating army sizes? Do we assume men arbitrarily assemble in the thousands just that some pampered youth can learn how to count people?

He doesn’t need to gather thousands of men, for a camped army fires are enough, each fire can support so many men for warmth and food, that counting them should give a rough figure.

We see Bowen getting a very close figure by counting the fires, Chella or whoever did the same as well. Not sure how an army on the march is estimated but I can guess   People gathering couls be a thing. Not in their thousands but perhaps dozens or even hundreds. A young lordling, steward, whatever could then be take a rough sizing of that many men on horses and men and then use “boxes” of that size to guess the size of a larger army, guessing how many boxes the army has. 

Bigger the training sample means better the accuracy.

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I take particular interest in GoT numbers, even if GRRM says not to, and I honestly have no idea why this is even a point of contention. 

Pretty much any way you slice it we’re looking at ~3000 or more Boltons marching north. Ignoring any specific ratio, we know that the Karstark cavalry are broken men and the Karstark infantry went to Duskendale with Harrion.

There would be few Karstark men in that pool if only because we know where they all went. 

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16 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

And how many men does lord’s sending men ahead leave for southern Flint branches, Ryswells, Dustins, Lockes?  Not to mention Slates that we learn of much later and other houses that may be mentioned even later on.

Worse part of the North providing the better part of the army is very odd as well but perhaps that can be dismissed saying southern ones were kept as they could provide more men much faster if needed.

Also Arya sees Umbers, Mountain clansmen and Karstarks in tents, there are no Karstark men or clansmen with Robb so Roose brought these men Lockes and Widow’s watch Flints as well since Donnel Locke and Robin Flint, who weren’t with Robb as evident with not being in Riverrun council and godswood, is there as well. These are just the ones that are undisputable based on text evidence. There may very well be more Tallharts, Glovers whatever left with him.

Not to mention the fact Roose shouldn’t even have 4000 men if he slaughtered everyone who is not a Karstark or Bolton. He has little to no troops to pull from Robb’s host to increase his numbers, which is also apparent with textual evidence; Theon who went south with Robb at the head of a roughly 1:3 cavalry to foot host says most of the host is afoot. Of course 1:3 is also most afoot but it wasn’t considered most afoot going south so the numbers should be even lower.

 

Honestly, tell me how come Roose can have 4000 northmen in MC when his surviving numbers before RW could at most be 4300 including the 600 men with Kyle Condon and Ronnel Stout and 200 with Steelshanks. His 3500 host has men from many houses, however few they may be, he couldn’t have pulled more men from Robb’s host or else his host wouldn’t be “most are afoot” how can he have 4000 men?

I can see it being 3000, which the text could support with the vague statement of “2 of 10” being actually %15 or so instead of %20.

 

@Free Northman Reborn 

Of course you were incapable to shut it down as you failed to provide textual evidence, because THERE AREN’T ANY to begin with.

Starting with the last bit, I was incapable of shutting it down because you ignore direct quotes from the books. To call that a failure to provide textual evidence is quite rich, Corvo. 

As for Roose’s numbers: Here is a scenario that actually agrees with both Roose and Theon’s statements:

Roose returns to the Twins with about 2500 Bolton foot and 500 Bolton horse. Also with some 300 Karstark foot and 200 leftovers from other Houses.

That fits completely with “Dreadfort men in chief, and some Karstarks”. With the other Houses numbering less than the Karstarks.

Back at the Twins he gets back another 200 Bolton cavalry that had been with Robb in the West, because Robb only wanted 10% of his total cavalry in the East (with another 100 having been lost in Robb’s campaign).

Roose then kills the non Bolton and non Karstark forces at the Twins, leaving 3200 Boltons and 300 Karstarks after the Red Wedding.

Roose then gathers the 600 men left to guard the ford, bringing his total numbers up to 4100. Maybe another couple of hundred Karstark and other Northern stragglers and broken men join him on the march back, just like Mance joined him later.

So he arrives at Moat Cailin with 3200 Boltons, maybe 400 Karstarks and 700 assorted men from other Houses. That’s a total of 4300 men, validating Theon’s estimate of roughly 2 in 10 of the original 20k returning, validating Roose’s statement that the 3500 at the Twins were Dreadfort men in chief and validating Theon’s final statement that most of the returning men at Moat Cailin were Boltons.

And it is entirely consistent with preceding events and with the course of the story.

Edit

And the above didn’t even count the 200 Bolton men with Steelshanks, who only serve to strengthen the Bolton numbers even more.

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19 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

@Lord Varys

He doesn’t need to gather thousands of men, for a camped army fires are enough, each fire can support so many men for warmth and food, that counting them should give a rough figure.

But you have to actually know a lot of context to make good guesses at that. One assumes that in the Reach the men a single cook fire could support could be much lower due to plentiful resources than they are up beyond the Wall (not to mention that people up there would likely huddle much closer together due to the nightly cold and the prevalence of wights, possibly increasing the ratio of people per cook fire).

Cook fire data tell us nothing about the number of actual warriors - which means data derived from that do not distinguish between mounted knights, men-at-arms, archers, freeriders, rabble, camp followers, etc.

The main reason I slowly but surely reach the point where I find speculation about this whole thing pretty futile is that unspecific numbers - as we get them mostly during the main series - don't really help us to actually assess the quality of the assembled men.

19 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

People gathering couls be a thing. Not in their thousands but perhaps dozens or even hundreds. A young lordling, steward, whatever could then be take a rough sizing of that many men on horses and men and then use “boxes” of that size to guess the size of a larger army, guessing how many boxes the army has. 

You also have to keep in mind that marching orders and the like can and are used to hide the actual size of an army - giving the impression it is either much smaller or much larger than it actually is. Depending who and when and how such numbers are given this has to be taken into account as well.

22 hours ago, Ran said:

I would generally trust numbers given by characters in the series unless you find obvious contradictions. I can't see any obvious contradiction in Theon's estimates.

One can do that. Or not. It really depends whether one wants to do that. If George wanted us to have accurate numbers he could just give a detailed account on all the numbers in an appendix in each book. Those could then even be accurate numbers counted by the author himself ;-).

22 hours ago, Ran said:

We should worry less about the 12,000 gathered at Winterfell and instead just think about the 18,000 gathered by Moat Cailin. Perhaps some of the lords, like Roose, actually sent a portion of their forces south nearer along the kingsroad rather than bringing them all directly to Winterfell -- perhaps to help set up supply depots or spread out the burden of keeping them all fed -- and so on. The Karstarks were late-comers ("the last", we're told) and that may be why they brought everything they had directly to Winterfell, while others who were able to move more quickly arranged for forces to be ahead of the march.

If we assumed something like that without having any indication we could just as well assume that some of the men who arrived first went back home because they were made to wait for too long a time.

22 hours ago, Ran said:

So, I don't know. Roose's men making up more than half  of the ~4,000 northmen doesn't seem odd, especially given the fact that he demonstrably avoided limiting the casualties among his forces during the War of the Five Kings.

'Dreadfort men' must not necessarily mean all those men had to from the Dreadfort lands at the outset of the war. A considerable portion could have sworn themselves to Roose during the process of the war, especially (but not only) freeriders, hedge knights, sellswords, etc. If 'Nan' had returned to the Dreadfort with Roose she would have been a 'Dreadfort girl', too, just as she was at Harrenhal.

We don't know anything about the aftermath of the Red Wedding, but I don't think it is completely unlikely that certain survivors of the carnage agreed to enter into Roose's service rather than insisting that they join their dead countrymen. Just as it is not a given that all butchers participating int he Red Wedding must have been genuine Twin/Dreadfort men. There could have been a not insignificant number of ruthless freeriders, sellswords, etc.

In that sense, the assessment of the Bolton army returning from the Twins would only be accurate in broad strokes.

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3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Starting with the last bit, I was incapable of shutting it down because you ignore direct quotes from the books. To call that a failure to provide textual evidence is quite rich, Corvo. 

Quotes with vague meanings doesn’t really prove anything, so yeah, not evidence.

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Back at the Twins he gets back another 200 Bolton cavalry that had been with Robb in the West, because Robb only wanted 10% of his total cavalry in the East (with another 100 having been lost in Robb’s campaign).

So in total he has 900 horse returning out of 4000 and Theon calls it most afoot? Wow! Removing fingers must have improved his intelligence significantly or else why wouldn’t he warn his best buddy/foster bro Robb that his host is mostly afoot when going south? Or perhaps it’s the removal of his manly bits so he started to think of other things besides ladies.

3 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Roose returns to the Twins with about 2500 Bolton foot and 500 Bolton horse. Also with some 300 Karstark foot and 200 leftovers from other Houses.

So all those clansmen, Umbers, Locke men, Flint men and many others Roose has brought number a meager 200, some calculation you gor there!

Don’t even say Umbers may be Greatjon’s, Arya saw a camp with hundreds of horse and thousands of men, it’s obviously Roose’s camp. Robb and Roose combined has 4000 cavalry and 3000 infantry. If you consider the fact heavy cavalrymen own 2 horses, that’s more horses than men, even.

Sorry but no. Also I’d prefer @Ranto answer my question in the previous post, as I believe he’d do so with a more logical approach. If he doesn’t, well, it should be telling that because it couldn’t be answered. GRRMs numbers are all over the place, just the fact Arya saw just a few thousand men and some hundreds when she should’ve seen around ten thousand with horseman making around half of it should be more than enough proof of it.

 

@direpupy

If you read what I wrote, in this post and the previous ones, it should occur to you something’s  wrong with the numbers and if you read all the discussions regarding military stuff, you would take notice how FNR likes to give huge numbers to North and especially the Boltons.

 

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6 minutes ago, Lord Varys said:

We don't know anything about the aftermath of the Red Wedding, but I don't think it is completely unlikely that certain survivors of the carnage agreed to enter into Roose's service rather than insisting that they join their dead countrymen. Just as it is not a given that all butchers participating int he Red Wedding must have been genuine Twin/Dreadfort men. There could have been a not insignificant number of ruthless freeriders, sellswords, etc.

Only solution that makes at least some sense, even then it’s not answering everything.

 

Quote

Once I link up with Lord Bolton and the Freys, I will have more than twelve thousand men. 

Robb expected 12000, we know Roose “lost” 2000 on the way. So 10000 men, at least 4500 of them ahorse; Robb’s 3500, Roose’s 500 and that is not including casualties on the road and at least 500 Freys. Remember also Robb mostly brought heavy horse and even Karstark cavalry have 2 horses.

Quote

They passed the last of the apple trees and crested a rise, and the castles, river, and camps all appeared at once. There were hundreds of horses and thousands of men, most of them milling about the three huge feast tents that stood side by side facing the castle gates, like three great canvas longhalls. 

 

Those the above look like 10000 men and thousands of horse? Where are they? Pufft vanished into thin air.

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34 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Quotes with vague meanings doesn’t really prove anything, so yeah, not evidence.

So in total he has 900 horse returning out of 4000 and Theon calls it most afoot? Wow! Removing fingers must have improved his intelligence significantly or else why wouldn’t he warn his best buddy/foster bro Robb that his host is mostly afoot when going south? Or perhaps it’s the removal of his manly bits so he started to think of other things besides ladies.

So all those clansmen, Umbers, Locke men, Flint men and many others Roose has brought number a meager 200, some calculation you gor there!

Don’t even say Umbers may be Greatjon’s, Arya saw a camp with hundreds of horse and thousands of men, it’s obviously Roose’s camp. Robb and Roose combined has 4000 cavalry and 3000 infantry. If you consider the fact heavy cavalrymen own 2 horses, that’s more horses than men, even.

Sorry but no. Also I’d prefer @Ranto answer my question in the previous post, as I believe he’d do so with a more logical approach. If he doesn’t, well, it should be telling that because it couldn’t be answered. GRRMs numbers are all over the place, just the fact Arya saw just a few thousand men and some hundreds when she should’ve seen around ten thousand with horseman making around half of it should be more than enough proof of it.

 

@direpupy

If you read what I wrote, in this post and the previous ones, it should occur to you something’s  wrong with the numbers and if you read all the discussions regarding military stuff, you would take notice how FNR likes to give huge numbers to North and especially the Boltons.

 

Fascinating course this discussion is taking.

You seem incapable of accepting direct statements made in the books. I'm not allocating more men to the North. I'm going by the statements of Roose and Theon. Adhering strictly to their descriptions. Unlike you, who seem to be arguing from an ideological position of some sort.

Roose states that the only significant contributors to his 3500 men are Dreadfort and Karstark men, and that the Dreadfort men significantly outnumber the Karstarks. This is logical, by the way, if you read the preceding description of what happens to the Karstark men in his host.

There were 2000 Karstarks to start with. A notable number of them die at the Green Fork. At some point a thousand of them head off into the Riverlands to hunt for Jaime Lannister. And to top it all off, Roose explicitly states that he sends the remainder off to Duskendale, which is a slaughter. So clearly, even 300 being left with him seems a high number, based on the above.

And yet even the Karstarks outnumber any other lords' men by such a margin that Roose feels the rest aren't even worth mentioning.

As for your somewhat bizarre focus on Theon calling most of the returning host infantry, well that's exactly what it is. We know Roose already had 500 horse when he returned to the Twins. And that was without Steelshanks' Walton's 200, who rejoined him later.

Any Bolton horse returning with Robb from the West would push that number up to 800 or more. Which indeed would still mean that "most" of the 4000 strong host is on foot. Not sure what you are arguing about, in this case.

Overall you seem to be experiencing an intense desire to prove a preconceived idea. Whereas I am merely following the text. Not sure why you cannot accept that at face value.

 

 

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55 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

 

 

@direpupy

If you read what I wrote, in this post and the previous ones, it should occur to you something’s  wrong with the numbers and if you read all the discussions regarding military stuff, you would take notice how FNR likes to give huge numbers to North and especially the Boltons.

 

Oh i take his numbers with a grain of salt, but that does not mean he does not have fair points, just like you have fair points in many of your posts.

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3 minutes ago, direpupy said:

Oh i take his numbers with a grain of salt, but that does not mean he does not have fair points, just like you have fair points in many of your posts.

Maybe at another time you can tell me directly which numbers in this discussion you take with a "grain of salt".

I'm simply quoting the text. And Corvo is refusing to accept it.

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45 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

I'm simply quoting the text. And Corvo is refusing to accept it.

Really now!? I’ve been quoting the book and even dictionaries to point out there is some(rather manty) leeway and inconsistencies and yet you just go  “so hey the vague thing you quoted and pointed out with proof to be vague just now is  solid as rock!” And when being called on it just flat out deny it and even accuse me.

As for your “ideological position of sort” Crow calls the Raven black, a  white Raven, even. I am not the one going around all northman like, taking on the name Free Northman and even naming my second account Free Northman reborn. Some ideological position I must be in, as opposed to, well, you. And I’m sure members older than me can attest to that, Varys who frequents this topic for starters.

1 hour ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Any Bolton horse returning with Robb from the West would push that number up to 800 or more. Which indeed would still mean that "most" of the 4000 strong host is on foot. Not sure what you are arguing about, in this case.

 

Has it occured to you that 800 of 4000 is not too much lower a percentage  than 500 among 2000. You know, the 500 frey Knights among the 2000 Roose brought back to North. Nor is it too much lower than 5000 among 20000, the host Robb took south. Yet Theon calls it majority foot and yet doesn’t make a single remark on neither the Frey contingent nor the original host.

Even RW numbers are wrong and too obvious note to notice and yet you can’t admit that perhaps there’s some inconsistencies when it comes to Boltons.

Again, obvious proof below, please explain this to me as well, tell me how wrong I am and can’t just accept the text for ideological reasons.

Quote

My lord grandfather regrets that he cannot feed nor house so large a host. We have been sore pressed to find fodder and provender for our own levies. Nonetheless, your men shall not be neglected. If they will cross and set up their camp beside our own, we will bring out enough casks of wine and ale for all to drink the health of Lord Edmure and his bride. We have thrown up three great feast tents on the far bank, to provide them with some shelter from the rains."

 

They passed the last of the apple trees and crested a rise, and the castles, river, and camps all appeared at once. There were hundreds of horses and thousands of men, most of them milling about the three huge feast tents that stood side by side facing the castle gates, like three great canvas longhalls. Robb had made his camp well back from the walls, on higher, drier ground, but the Green Fork had overflown its bank and even claimed a few carelessly placed tents.

 

 Firepits had been dug outside the feast tents, sheltered beneath rude canopies of woven wood and hides that kept the rain out, so long as it fell straight down. The wind was blowing off the river, though, so the drizzle came in anyway, enough to make the fires hiss and swirl. Serving men were turning joints of meat on spits above the flames. The smells made Arya's mouth water. "Shouldn't we stop?" she asked Sandor Clegane. "There's northmen in the tents." She knew them by their beards, by their faces, by their cloaks of bearskin and sealskin, by their half-heard toasts and the songs they sang; Karstarks and Umbers and men of the mountain clans

Now explain the above to me. Where are all those thousands of men and horse Robb brought? There are just three feast tents, as Freys said, each seating hundreds and one filled with Karstarks, who weren’t with Robb, Umbers and Clansmen from the mountains, who also weren’t with Robb.

 

If even this is obvious proof is not enough to convince you then I don’t know what can.

 

@direpupy Since you say you take somethings with a grain of salt but somethings are right/making sense, please dı take a look at the above and tell me how much sense the above quotes make sense, how to make those numbers work with all our knowledge prior to and post RW.

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4 minutes ago, Corvo the Crow said:

Really now!? I’ve been quoting the book and even dictionaries to point out there is some(rather manty) leeway and inconsistencies and yet you just go  “so hey the vague thing you quoted and pointed out with proof to be vague just now is  solid as rock!” And when being called on it just flat out deny it and even accuse me.

As for your “ideological position of sort” Crow calls the Raven black, a  white Raven, even. I am not the one going around all northman like, taking on the name Free Northman and even naming my second account Free Northman reborn. Some ideological position I must be in, as opposed to, well, you. And I’m sure members older than me can attest to that, Varys who frequents this topic for starters.

 

Has it occured to you that 800 of 4000 is not too much lower a percentage  than 500 among 2000. You know, the 500 frey Knights among the 2000 Roose brought back to North. Nor is it too much lower than 5000 among 20000, the host Robb took south. Yet Theon calls it majority foot and yet doesn’t make a single remark on neither the Frey contingent nor the original host.

Even RW numbers are wrong and too obvious note to notice and yet you can’t admit that perhaps there’s some inconsistencies when it comes to Boltons.

Again, obvious proof below, please explain this to me as well, tell me how wrong I am and can’t just accept the text for ideological reasons.

Now explain the above to me. Where are all those thousands of men and horse Robb brought? There are just three feast tents, as Freys said, each seating hundreds and one filled with Karstarks, who weren’t with Robb, Umbers and Clansmen from the mountains, who also weren’t with Robb.

 

If even this is obvious proof is not enough to convince you then I don’t know what can.

 

@direpupy Since you say you take somethings with a grain of salt but somethings are right/making sense, please dı take a look at the above and tell me how much sense the above quotes make sense, how to make those numbers work with all our knowledge prior to and post RW.

This is getting a bit weird - and apparently emotional - delving into my forum name and trying to whip up a cotery of like minded individuals for moral support etc.

For the record, I lost access to my original forum name when the forum crashed some years ago (before your time). It affected quite a few members. When I had to create a new forum name then, I could not duplicate the original as it still exists to this day, and thus created the next best thing, to retain the same forum identity. I trust you found this (weird) history lesson interesting.

Anyway, back to your point which is not a point. The layout of the tents is immaterial. We only get a partial picture of the Twins and its environment. The 7000 or so horses Robb brought with him will be camped whereever there is space for them. Obviously not amongst the tents. And the men will mingle freely, drinking and feasting. It is not intended to provide an exhaustive description of where every part of the army is camped.

So this in itself invalidates the non-point you try to make about the portion of the men Arya witnessed and who is in which tent. Other than the Karstarks you don’t know which men were with Robb and which with Roose.

And your “point” about Theon remarking on most of the 4000 returning Northmen being afoot. You are grasping. Theon’s statement is accurate. If all 4000 were cavalry that would have lessened the blow, for example if it was Robb’s returning Western force. Instead, only a fifth is cavalry, with the rest of the valuable heavy horse lost in the South. This is a much greater blow than losing an equivalent number of infantry.

You are not providing anything of substance. Just random passages that don’t mean what you think they mean.

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19 hours ago, Corvo the Crow said:

 

@direpupy Since you say you take somethings with a grain of salt but somethings are right/making sense, please dı take a look at the above and tell me how much sense the above quotes make sense, how to make those numbers work with all our knowledge prior to and post RW.

Hang on there, the feasttents are not they only tents, in your own quote they speak of tents washed away by the water of the Green Fork because they where to close to the water. next its nowhere stated how many people each tents seats and Robb sees men milling around the tents meaning not everyone has found a place inside and last but not least the Umber horse was with Robb so the Umber men in the quote need not be from Roose his force. This is in no way helping your point and i get the feeling you made this post in anger because usually you pick up on these kind things yourself.

20 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Maybe at another time you can tell me directly which numbers in this discussion you take with a "grain of salt".

I'm simply quoting the text. And Corvo is refusing to accept it.

I was talking in general sence not just this tread, and i did say you have good points so why are you responding as if i am attacking you?

19 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

This is getting a bit weird - and apparently emotional - delving into my forum name and trying to whip up a cotery of like minded individuals for moral support etc.

For the record, I lost access to my original forum name when the forum crashed some years ago (before your time). It affected quite a few members. When I had to create a new forum name then, I could not duplicate the original as it still exists to this day, and thus created the next best thing, to retain the same forum identity. I trust you found this (weird) history lesson interesting.

The bolded happened to me to but unlike FNR i took a different screenname if you look around carefully Corvo you will see that there are several members of the forum with odd names they created to stay as close as possible to there original ones.

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55 minutes ago, direpupy said:

Hang on there, the feasttents are not they only tents, in your own quote they speak of tents washed away by the water of the Green Fork because they where to close to the water. next its nowhere stated how many people each tents seats and Robb sees men milling around the tents meaning not everyone has found a place inside and last but not least the Umber horse was with Robb so the Umber men in the quote need not be from Roose his force. This is in no way helping your point and i get the feeling you made this post in anger because usually you pick up on these kind things yourself.

I was talking in general sence not just this tread, and i did say you have good points so why are you responding as if i am attacking you?

Sorry. I know it wasn’t an attack. Just uncomfortable with any kind of equivalence being suggested between what I believe to generally be evidence based posts from me and the fairly convoluted reasoning being presented by Corvo at the moment. Note I say “at the moment”, because he seems to be heavily invested emotionally in this particular issue, to the point of excessive massaging of the text to support his viewpoint.

I honestly don’t know why he feels so strongly motivated to fight this rather minor issue, because on this he is clearly misguided.

Why is it so important to fight so hard against the openly stated fact that the Boltons had more than 2000 men returning from the South and the strong suggestion that they had 2500 or more in Robb’s original army?

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1 hour ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

Sorry. I know it wasn’t an attack. Just uncomfortable with any kind of equivalence being suggested between what I believe to generally be evidence based posts from me and the fairly convoluted reasoning being presented by Corvo at the moment. Note I say “at the moment”, because he seems to be heavily invested emotionally in this particular issue, to the point of excessive massaging of the text to support his viewpoint.

I honestly don’t know why he feels so strongly motivated to fight this rather minor issue, because on this he is clearly misguided.

Why is it so important to fight so hard against the openly stated fact that the Boltons had more than 2000 men returning from the South and the strong suggestion that they had 2500 or more in Robb’s original army?

No problem, i agree with you on the way the "more" and "chiefly" should be read in the context of the centences in the book, but i have long ago come to the realisation that not everyone is going to end up on the same page. If he does not want to see it then you are never going to convince him.

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