Can't the Night King just wait them out? Confused

[Ice Queen]

6 hours ago, Nerevanin said:

I'm confused. Ice was reforged into two swords, one was given to Jaime who gave it Brienne iirc, the other one was given to Joffrey and idk who has it now. Or do you mean that there are two swords called "Ice" - one was the Ned's valyrian steel sword and the other one is a WW sword?

I'm talking the very first Stark sword, not the current Ice. Ned Stark's Ice was 300 or 400 years old and is Valyrian steel--House Stark has been around for 8,000. Every noble house has its pride and joy weaponry. 

What a prize one of their swords would be. If the NK is buried at Winterfell (highly likely), they may have buried the sword with him. 

Way back in the prologue to the first book, we get a good description of the White Walker's weapons. Their swords are translucent and crystal--ice. 

The Other slid forward on silent feet. In its hand was a longsword like none that Will had ever seen. No human metal had gone into the forging of that blade. It was alive with moonlight, translucent, a shard of crystal so thin that it seemed almost to vanish when seen edge-on. There was a faint blue shimmer to the thing, a ghost-light that played around its edges, and somehow Will knew it was sharper than any razor.

 

[Nerevanin]

4 minutes ago, Ice Queen said:

I'm talking the very first Stark sword, not the current Ice. Ned Stark's Ice was 300 or 400 years old and is Valyrian steel--House Stark has been around for 8,000. Every noble house has its pride and joy weaponry. 

OK. Another stupid question: is it ever anywhere mentioned that there was a house sword in the Stark house before valyrian Ice?

[Ice Queen]

7 minutes ago, Nerevanin said:

OK. Another stupid question: is it ever anywhere mentioned that there was a house sword in the Stark house before valyrian Ice?

According to A Wiki of Ice and Fire:

The name "Ice" is a legacy from the Age of Heroes, and predates the current sword. About four hundred years before King Robert I Baratheon's reign, the Valyrian steel greatsword was spell-forged in Valyria and acquired by House Stark, who named it after that legacy.

Ancient houses had their swords. Dawn has been in the family of House Dayne for at least 10,000 years. 

More astronomical associations. Dawn is meteoric in origin. 

 

[Nerevanin]

20 minutes ago, Ice Queen said:

According to A Wiki of Ice and Fire:

 

 

Ancient houses had their swords. Dawn has been in the family of House Dayne for at least 10,000 years. 

More astronomical associations. Dawn is meteoric in origin. 

 

I see. thanks! :)

[legba11]

8 hours ago, ummester said:

4. The NK is the pact - he is some kind of natural balance between magic and humanity trying to set things straight in Westeros.

Good addition, that is (imo) kind of a sub heading under the creeping doom.  He has no motivation, he just is,  Nothing technically has no motivation, just where does that motivation come from.

[StoneColdJorahMormont]

Would be great if he completely bypassed Winterfell on his own and flew to Kings Landing and totalled it with his Dragon while his army set about Winterfell.

He could most likely handle the job himself due to them not expecting it/being ready and not having anything to take it down.

[legba11]

They have ballistas.

[LadyNoOne]

On 4/15/2019 at 7:36 PM, legba11 said:

I think we need to stick which have been (frequently) a part of the show as the NK's motivation.  If he has one.  

Things like the Isle Faces have little to no presence on the show, not likely to be suddenly dropped on the show as some NightKing ex Machina (yea that makes no sense).

 

Possibilities:

1. He has none.  He is creeping doom, similar to the Walking Dead.  Evil for evil's sake.  I hope not.  To be fair this is how much of nature is and is not really evil, he is just trying to make more babies.

2. He needs to kill the light.  Basically the Red Priests are correct and this is the apocalypse.  The light could be a person (Jon, Dany, Bran seems the most likely) or more of a concept (all of humanity, the lands of man, etc...).  I think this is the most likely.

3. He is actually thinking like a human general and trying to win a war he has been fighting for a very long time.  He is like Stannis and just waited patiently until he had the pieces he needed to win.  In this case, maybe he would think like a general lay siege (indirectly) to Winterfell and the armies by cutting off all their supplies.  This is supported by 8.1 as it explains everything he has done so far.

I like where this thread has gone.  What is it that the NK and the WWs want?  It does not seem productive to kill all of the humans as humans are the only means of procreation for them...

Here is an interesting (for some value of interesting) youtube video on this very topic, basically proposing that the NK had a human wife, and that the bits of land flanking the wall to the east were neutral zones:

Hope you enjoy!

P.S. I am seriously confused as to the difference between White Walkers and wrights... Can someone help me out?  Sorry...

[Kajjo]

35 minutes ago, LadyNoOne said:

I am seriously confused as to the difference between White Walkers and wrights... Can someone help me out?  Sorry.

White Walkers are the ice-blue-white persons portrayed in the youtube video title screen you linked above. White Walkers are created by touching living human babies and turning them into White Walkers. They need to grow up. They are individuals, have culture like symbolism and the altar to turn the babies.

White Walkers have the ability to raise the dead to wights. A wight looks like a zombie out of Walking Dead, i.e. maimed, rotten, dead, missing limbs and body parts. If a White Walker dies, all wight die who were created by him.

[LadyNoOne]

1 minute ago, Kajjo said:

White Walkers are the ice-blue-white persons portrayed in the youtube video title screen you linked above. White Walkers are created by touching living human babies and turning them into White Walkers. They need to grow up. They are individuals, have culture like symbolism and the altar to turn the babies.

White Walkers have the ability to raise the dead to wights. A wight looks like a zombie out of Walking Dead, i.e. maimed, rotten, dead, missing limbs and body parts. If a White Walker dies, all wight die who were created by him.

Excellent, thank you!

[CrypticWeirwood]

On 4/15/2019 at 10:27 AM, bloodsteel bitterraven said:

The Night King clearly wants something, or someone, and he's trying to get it.

He's come for the Princess Who Was Promised to him as his pregnant bride of fire, to take back up to the Lands of Always Winter to reign as his queen so that can perpetuate his race, something that he cannot do without her.

Remember that the Others are living beings, not animated dead. If the first book's prologue, they even have their own language.

[LadyNoOne]

2 minutes ago, CrypticWeirwood said:

He's come for the Princess Who Was Promised to him as his pregnant bride of fire, to take back up to the Lands of Always Winter to reign as his queen so that can perpetuate his race, something that he cannot do without her.

This could be a good theory if referring to Cersei...  Remember the witch?  She was told she would have three children, not four.  Previously, I had assumed she might miscarry due to her age, but it could be likely that this baby becomes another WW, 

If referring to Dany, there is no evidence she is (or can become) pregnant again with a human child.

[Guest]

As far as the NK just waiting for Winterfell to starve, I don't think that would be good tactically for him. He'd have to use his army to cut off all lines of supply, which exposes them to attack, and his wights don't show any intelligence unless they're being actively led by a WW. His army is massive, but is it truly massive enough to cut off all supply lines against a more mobile enemy, especially when it exposes his cannon fodder to attacks by Dany's remaining dragons?

However, the NK is also patient, as we've seen over the course of the past 7 seasons. I think it would be interesting if he intends to use his newfound mobility as a dragon rider to attempt to head south while keeping Winterfell busy with the main portion of his army so he could outflank his enemy and raise a 2nd army from among the much more densely populated south.

As for what the NK wants, my personal theory is that it's actually very simple. The CotF used their magic and a human man to create a weapon to wipe out humankind. That somewhat backfired, as it appears to have turned against its creators and humans. But now that the CotF are pretty much wiped out, the NK is pursuing the geas that was put on him: wiping out the rest of humanity. Perhaps his thinking is that accomplishing his task will break the spell he's labored under for thousands of years.

[CrypticWeirwood]

Just now, LadyNoOne said:

This could be a good theory if referring to Cersei...  Remember the witch?  She was told she would have three children, not four.  Previously, I had assumed she might miscarry due to her age, but it could be likely that this baby becomes another WW, 

If referring to Dany, there is no evidence she is (or can become) pregnant again with a human child.

The most direct evidence that she can become pregnant is the show's repeated and somewhat heavy-handed foreshadowing back in season seven.

In the books, you cannot help but wonder whether she didn't miscarry after Drogon airlifted her out of Mereen in Dance. 

The show never mentioned final part of the Mirri Maz Duur's dying curse to Dany, the line that ran "When your womb quickens again and you bear a living child". But she seems to think it true nonetheless, although we don't know why. Even so there are many ways this could happen; her womb is probably already quickened thanks to Jon.

For her to be with her husband again and have a family, that living child would have to be born alive. Remember the Others always take living children for their own, and that dead children they use in their "artwork".  Her rearing that child with her husband (but with either Jon or the Night King, not Khal Drogo) far, far north in the snow-covered Lands of Always Winter is what her vision in the House of the Undying showed her would come to pass.

The wife-stealing thing is like how the wildings expect to steal a bride from outside their own tribe. That's what the show's Great Other / Night King is really after here.

The Promised Princess may have been part of the pact that ended the first War for the Dawn. Remember that that ancient war remember only as legends did not end with victory and defeat, but with a treaty after a war that had lasted a generation. This current war too will end with a treaty, and Dany giving up her crown to save her people will be the price he exacts.

That's the foreshadowing given by Sam's question to Jon at the end of this current episode (first episode of the eighth season) asking Jon if Dany would give up her crown to save her people. Though posed as a rhetorical question instead of one that expects a real answer, it's how the showrunners like to plant these seeds of what's to come. It has an answer, and that answer is that yes she would, and yes she will.

Wait and see.

[CrypticWeirwood]

16 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

As for what the NK wants, my personal theory is that it's actually very simple. The CotF used their magic and a human man to create a weapon to wipe out humankind. That somewhat backfired, as it appears to have turned against its creators and humans. But now that the CotF are pretty much wiped out, the NK is pursuing the geas that was put on him: wiping out the rest of humanity. Perhaps his thinking is that accomplishing his task will break the spell he's labored under for thousands of years.

In a pre-season interview with James Hibbard, the actor playing the Night King told him that we would learn who the particular person is who's the Night King's target that he's come south to kill.  It's just one person he wants, and that has to be one of leads.

The only three reasonable targets here are Jon or Dany or Bran; that's because he's seen and interacted with each of those three leading characters but not with any of the others. Persuasive arguments can easily be made for each. 

1. Bran is the Last Greenseer and thus the only living representative of the Children whose magics created him from the man he once was. Killing Bran might therefore be an act of vicarious revenge. It might also be an act of self-protection since the Night King knows that Bran can watch him and his from afar. Plus he's a Stark, and there's apparently something special about the Starks beyond just their First Men blood.
2. Dany woke dragons from stone under the bleeding star (comet) and by that miraculous act rekindled the powers of fire magic again, creating an imbalance against ice. She's also the first Targaryen dragonrider who is half First Men in her bloodline, which may concern him. Dragons couldn't go north of the wall before her. Perhaps he wants her other dragons, too, so that there can be no more that are not his. (Doesn't seem to have bothered him before, though.)
3. Jon is both the King of Winter and the Targaryen king of fire, a powerful warg soon to have two familiars, direwolf and dragon. Certainly at Hardhome the Night King gave Jon sharply focused attention on multiple occasions. The Kings of Winter are also his ancient foes, but this is tied up with the ancient magics tied up in the Wall and in Winterfell, and we do not understand all the linkages here. He might even want to kill Jon so that he can steal Dany from him for his bride.

Which of those three is his kill-target is yet to be shown.

1. I personally believe that Martin has set Bran up to be the ultimate gamechanger in all of this, which makes Bran the most likely of the three.
2. Dany's destiny is to raise her family in the icy north after a treaty in which she willingly gives up her crown to save her people.
3. Jon is apt to wash his hands of the whole business of king of this or king of that, as he has never sought to be anything but an honorable man.

No matter which way the chips finally fall, we'll all know everything about it just a few short weeks from now.

[House Cambodia]

^ That is very interesting indeed; however, in another interview GRRM has said the show ending will adhere closely to his books. Now, in the books it strongly suggests that the Undead began to arise some time ago. It COULD be the moment was the birth of Jon or Dany, but it seemed to me when I read them it preceded those events by some time, so maybe someone older with an unknown parentage - Tyrion? King Aerys allegedly fancied Joanna and liked his 'First Night' dibs - has it ever been suggested that the blond twins Cercei&Jamie might be half-Targaryan? Wouldn't it be brilliant is the ultimate cause of all this is Cercei?!

[Guest]

57 minutes ago, CrypticWeirwood said:

The Promised Princess may have been part of the pact that ended the first War for the Dawn. Remember that that ancient war remember only as legends did not end with victory and defeat, but with a treaty after a war that had lasted a generation. This current war too will end with a treaty, and Dany giving up her crown to save her people will be the price he exacts.

That's the foreshadowing given by Sam's question to Jon at the end of this current episode (first episode of the eighth season) asking Jon if Dany would give up her crown to save her people. Though posed as a rhetorical question instead of one that expects a real answer, it's how the showrunners like to plant these seeds of what's to come. It has an answer, and that answer is that yes she would, and yes she will.

Wait and see.

The Pact ended the war between the CotF and the First Men, before the coming of the Long Night. The Battle For the Dawn was the final battle that drove back the Others.

[Prince of the North]

4 hours ago, legba11 said:

They have ballistas.

Good point...but, of course, a dragonrider could attack at night so they wouldn't see it coming.  Half the stronghold would be burning before the first shot is fired.  Not to mention...is Viserion undead now?  If so, wouldn't it take something more than a normal ballista bolt to stop him (also acknowledging it would even be quite difficult to hit/kill a live dragon with one)?  Another thing...can't the NK perform some pretty powerful magic?  It may be somewhat difficult for people to operate ballistas when they're practically frozen solid  And, of course, every person that dies in the initial attack can simply be raised to start killing more that can then be raised, etc.  It would quickly create a "snowball" (pun intended) effect!

I'm not sure what the show will do but it doesn't seem very logical to me that the NK and the army of the dead will be defeated (if they are defeated) through conventional means.   

[Ice Queen]

41 minutes ago, House Cambodia said:

^ That is very interesting indeed; however, in another interview GRRM has said the show ending will adhere closely to his books. Now, in the books it strongly suggests that the Undead began to arise some time ago. It COULD be the moment was the birth of Jon or Dany, but it seemed to me when I read them it preceded those events by some time, so maybe someone older with an unknown parentage - Tyrion? King Aerys allegedly fancied Joanna and liked his 'First Night' dibs - has it ever been suggested that the blond twins Cercei&Jamie might be half-Targaryan? Wouldn't it be brilliant is the ultimate cause of all this is Cercei?!

Or not a birth, but death. As in Summerhall. 

Just tossing that out there.  I don't even remember if they mention that in the show at all. 

[House Cambodia]

2 minutes ago, Ice Queen said:

Or not a birth, but death. As in Summerhall. 

Just tossing that out there.  I don't even remember if they mention that in the show at all. 

Right, but IF that interview by the actor playing the NK is on the button, with Maester Aemon gone, who, other than Melissandra is still alive from that time (and I'm sure it ain't her!)?