Heresy 218 a brief walk on the dark side

[JNR]

2 hours ago, Black Crow said:

This may be of interest in looking at a "dragonsteel" being wielded very early on when most men were armed with bronze weapons, far less tripping around with Valyrian/Damascus steel blades

That's been my suggestion all along.  I think there was an extraordinary sword in the Long Night, and GRRM solved the anachronism problem -- "but they didn't have steel at all back then" -- with a dropped meteor.  

This way, he got his one-off sword when the story called for it, but the First Men had no way of making more, and the Andals were still able to invade successfully thousands of years later.

[Brad Stark]

8 hours ago, St Daga said:

As to a meteorite leaving some area of destruction around it, I agree. It seems like ever smallish meteorites leave some type of impact crater, so I would think some kind of crater would exist near Starfall. Isn't Starfall said to be built on an island? I wonder how big of an island it is?

Starfall is built on an island on the Torrentine.  If a meteorite landed in a low land river, it would leave a crater, but not one that lasted thousands of years. 

[Brad Stark]

3 hours ago, Black Crow said:

This may be of interest in looking at a "dragonsteel" being wielded very early on when most men were armed with bronze weapons, far less tripping around with Valyrian/Damascus steel blades

Possibly, but all we really know about dragonsteel is the Others couldn't stand against it.  So it had some nonphysical properties bronze did not.  Dragonsteel probably had some advantages over dragonglass, as dragonglass was presumably more readily available. 

[Brad Stark]

1 hour ago, JNR said:

Well, first, I'm going to assume by "3EC" you mean Bloodraven.  In which case, I think it's trauma-related memory failure. 

While Bloodraven can communicate through dreams -- just as Bran does with Jon, in ACOK -- I don't think a greenseer has the power to edit or delete memories, even during skinchanging.  Bran, in fact, really can't even access Hodor's mind :

I don't think Br is the 3ec, but we have evidence in Bran's dreams where he is told not to remember something or not to think about it.  So I think the 3ec is causing Bran to avoid certain memories that would create problems, and he is doing it by the power of suggestion. The memories are still there and Bran has access to them, but chooses not to think about them because he was told not to. 

[redriver]

Whatever you do don't picture a pink elephant.

[Janneyc1]

11 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

I don't think Br is the 3ec, but we have evidence in Bran's dreams where he is told not to remember something or not to think about it.  So I think the 3ec is causing Bran to avoid certain memories that would create problems, and he is doing it by the power of suggestion. The memories are still there and Bran has access to them, but chooses not to think about them because he was told not to. 

I am in agreement on both points, Bran's memory issues seem to stem from the manipulation of not needing it. 

As to the 3EC, I don't think we have been introduced to the character that is playing the 3EC. It affects Bran, Euron, and Jojen, seemingly with the goal of using the power of greenseers (and what are the odds that all three would be greenseers? there's a 1/1million chance of being one and we have at least three). Perhaps the 3EC is the Great Other? 

[Melifeather]

18 hours ago, Janneyc1 said:

I disagree, Ned's memory issues can be associated with PTSD. My issue is that casting shadows or raising wights doesn't fit with the narrative of the crannogmen. While I think that Howland helped Ned out a lot, my bet is that it was through more mundane means. and by mundane, I mean poison. 

I agree with the PTSD. I think what he experienced and saw during the Sack of Kings Landing caused him to block out the memories, but after he saw Robert in his bed of blood, the memories came flooding back in jumbled flashes causing him to have the 'old dream'.

As for how Howland helped Ned with Arthur Dayne? IMO he tried to skinchange him like Bran did Hodor, causing Arthur a lot of confusion.

[Melifeather]

1 hour ago, Janneyc1 said:

I am in agreement on both points, Bran's memory issues seem to stem from the manipulation of not needing it. 

As to the 3EC, I don't think we have been introduced to the character that is playing the 3EC. It affects Bran, Euron, and Jojen, seemingly with the goal of using the power of greenseers (and what are the odds that all three would be greenseers? there's a 1/1million chance of being one and we have at least three). Perhaps the 3EC is the Great Other? 

Are you sure about that? When Bran came to Jon in a dream (while dreaming he was Ghost) he saw a weirwood sapling. Crows and ravens are associated with Bloodraven, who I suspect was already skinchanging into them way before he went to the Wall. It's why people said he had a thousand eyes and one. The thousand being the crows and ravens and the one being his own.

[Janneyc1]

1 hour ago, Feather Crystal said:

Are you sure about that? When Bran came to Jon in a dream (while dreaming he was Ghost) he saw a weirwood sapling. Crows and ravens are associated with Bloodraven, who I suspect was already skinchanging into them way before he went to the Wall. It's why people said he had a thousand eyes and one. The thousand being the crows and ravens and the one being his own.

I am sure that Bloodraven is a skinchanger and a powerful one at that. But he does what is best for the realm... Furthermore, we hypothesize that 3EC visited Euron in his dreams and contributed to his Euron-ness. While it is possible that Euron went down a different path than what the 3EC laid out, I don't tend to think so. Anyways, Bloodraven does what is best for the realm, and anyone showing Euron how to use magic is definitely not looking out for the realm. 

 

I get that BR could have started not knowing what Euron would turn into, but thenI have to question how he picks his students/targets. 

 

[JNR]

15 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

we have evidence in Bran's dreams where he is told not to remember something or not to think about it

Not sure what passage you have in mind here. 

However, there's a general trend in these books that characters often don't like to/want to think about traumatic events (which is how people work in the real world, too).

For instance, re Bran, we have:

Quote

The falling, Bran thought, and the golden man, the queen's brother, he scares me too, but mostly the falling. He did not say it, though. How could he? He had not been able to tell Ser Rodrik or Maester Luwin, and he could not tell the Reeds either. If he didn't talk about it, maybe he would forget. He had never wanted to remember.

Re Sam, we have:

Quote

The dead have no mercy left in them, and the Others . . . no, I mustn't think of that, don't think, don't remember, just walk, just walk, just walk.

Sobbing, he took another step.

And then there's the Ned passage quoted earlier, that applies immediately after Lyanna died.  I don't think we need to invoke greenseers to explain this sort of thing; it's just human nature.

[Janneyc1]

9 minutes ago, JNR said:

And then there's the Ned passage quoted earlier, that applies immediately after Lyanna died.  I don't think we need to invoke greenseers to explain this sort of thing; it's just human nature.

yeah humans are terrific at forgetting painful events. I've said it before, but GRRM really knows how to write a human character. It is one reason why I like this series so much. 

[Matthew.]

I believe the passage that some interpret as the 3EC messing with Bran's memories is this section of Bran III, AGOT:

 

Quote

Bran was staring at his arms, his legs. He was so skinny, just skin stretched taut over bones. Had he always been so thin? He tried to remember. A face swam up at him out of the grey mist, shining with light, golden. "The things I do for love," it said.

Bran screamed.

The crow took to the air, cawing. Not that, it shrieked at him. Forget that, you do not need it now, put it aside, put it away. It landed on Bran's shoulder, and pecked at him, and the shining golden face was gone.

 

[alienarea]

10 hours ago, redriver said:

Whatever you do don't picture a pink elephant.

This story rather requires pink dragons. :P

And unicorns.

[JNR]

7 hours ago, Matthew. said:

I believe the passage that some interpret as the 3EC messing with Bran's memories is this section of Bran III, AGOT

Hmm, yeah, it could be interpreted that way, I suppose. 

I've always just read it to mean the 3EC had a very specific agenda for that dream:

Quote

Now you know, the crow whispered as it sat on his shoulder. Now you know why you must live.

..and really didn't want Bran's runaway emotions steering the plan into a ditch.

[Brad Stark]

If Bran remembered what he saw and told his parents, things certainly would turn out differently 

[Black Crow]

And we wouldn't have a story...

Really its just another variant of the old literary device where a character claps his or her hands together and announces a cunning plan. However instead of explaining it [unless its going to turn out badly] we move directly on to the action and only after the bad guys are lying dead in the ditch do we learn what the cunning plan actually was.

[SirArthur]

On 2/13/2019 at 1:23 AM, JNR said:

But a hundred-pound meteor could still hold enough ore to create a few failed swords (because the smith is completely unfamiliar with the metal and doesn't even know its melting point) and a successful one. 

It's not only about having the material, it is also about having the heat to melt it.

[Janneyc1]

9 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

If Bran remembered what he saw and told his parents, things certainly would turn out differently 

Yup Jaime would be headless instead of handless...

Joking aside, I don't think things would have worked out too much differently. The North might be a little more blood thirsty, but everyone that could have done something about the Fall had already gone south when Bran awoke.

1 hour ago, SirArthur said:

It's not only about having the material, it is also about having the heat to melt it

 We have speculated that there were dragons in Westeros in the Dawn Age. Perhaps they provided the heat?

[JNR]

7 hours ago, Black Crow said:

However instead of explaining it [unless its going to turn out badly] we move directly on to the action and only after the bad guys are lying dead in the ditch do we learn what the cunning plan actually was.

In this case, I think it's pretty easy to explain why Bran doesn't want to think about or remember the specifics of his fall.

But the series is loaded with events/situations that are... uh... less plausible, right from book one.  Catelyn taking Tyrion prisoner and hauling him to the Eyrie to be tried and killed was blatantly irrational and forced, IMO, like pouring gas on a fire... as anyone of her age, with her background, would surely have known. 

Jon deciding to join the Watch was similarly rather forced, given the large number of better options he had at the time and would continue to have for years.

But if characters like this had acted sensibly,

7 hours ago, Black Crow said:

we wouldn't have a story

 

 

[Janneyc1]

1 hour ago, JNR said:

Jon deciding to join the Watch was similarly rather forced, given the large number of better options he had at the time and would continue to have for years.

We are all in agreement that Benjen knows about Jon's parentage though right?