Which of the nine Free Cities would you choose to receive more attention from GRR Martin?

[Tukata12]

If you had the opportunity to pick one of the Free Cities to receive more focus in the next books (such as a POV of a character exploring the city, or a relevant piece of the plot involving or taking place in the city), which one would you choose?

• Braavos, wealthy city of bravos, assassins and merchants (though this city already received a lot of attention through Arya's storyline)
• Lorath the grey northern city, and its mysterious, gigantic Maze and Blind God cult
• Norvos, its Three Bells, axemen and bearded warrior-priests
• Qohor, the darkest of the Free Cities, infamous for its sorcerers, necromancers, preserved mastery of Valyrian Steel and bloodthirsty god called the Black Goat
• Pentos, the mighty trading port ruled by a Prince (sacrificed in case of crisis), as well as rich merchants and magisters
• Myr, the most advanced of the Free Cities, famed for its arts and learning
• Tyrosh, flamboyant city of dyed haired mercenaries and duellists
• Lys the city of love, pleasure houses, bed-slaves and concubines
• Volantis and its countless slaves, the oldest and proudest of the Free Cities (which has also received a lot of attention like Braavos)

[TheLastWolf]

2 hours ago, Tukata12 said:

Qohor, the darkest of the Free Cities, infamous for its sorcerers, necromancers, preserved mastery of Valyrian Steel and bloodthirsty god called the Black Goat

This 

Like you said, Braavos and Volantis are already delved into in depth 

2 hours ago, Tukata12 said:

• Myr, the most advanced of the Free Cities, famed for its arts and learning
• Tyrosh, flamboyant city of dyed haired mercenaries and duellists
• Lys the city of love, pleasure houses, bed-slaves and concubines

These three equally next 

[Lady Anna]

Pentos.

[Loose Bolt]

Pentos is rich but has very weak army and Essos is very dangerous place for those who are both rich and weak. So I would want to know how they keep potential predators away. After all they should not be able to buy out all of those like they did to Drago's khalasar.

[Muffin King]

Norvos sounds so cool 

[Lilac & Gooseberries]

Braavos. A city created by people who fought against the machine and arguably broke the machine in the end? Sold.

[Julia H.]

If it had to be, my choice would be Braavos. There are intriguing things going on under the surface there, which would be interesting to explore. However, I would mainly like to encourage our beloved author to just focus on the already existing numerous storylines waiting to be resolved. 

[Floki of the Ironborn]

Norvos. 

[Rondo]

I would choose Asshai over any of the Free Cities.

[Nathan Stark]

None. The story needs to be winding down, not expanding. 

[Tukata12]

5 hours ago, Julia H. said:

If it had to be, my choice would be Braavos. There are intriguing things going on under the surface there, which would be interesting to explore. However, I would mainly like to encourage our beloved author to just focus on the already existing numerous storylines waiting to be resolved. 

Why not make one of the already existing plotlines take place temporarily in a Free City that is yet to be explored? 

[Tukata12]

31 minutes ago, Nathan Stark said:

None. The story needs to be winding down, not expanding. 

That's not exclusive. You can make one or several already existing plotlines converging to one of the yet unexplored Free Cities and resolve numerous plots there instead of Westeros for example. 

[Nathan Stark]

20 minutes ago, Tukata12 said:

That's not exclusive. You can make one or several already existing plotlines converging to one of the yet unexplored Free Cities and resolve numerous plots there instead of Westeros for example. 

The trouble with that is that exploring new settings lends itself to creating new plotlines. Dorne wasn't originally planned to be a major part of the story, but once George started exploring the Watergardens and Sunspear, we suddenly had three important new players who added more threads needing resolution. There's only so much you can add to ASOIAF before it becomes impossible to finish.

[Endymion I Targaryen]

Qohor. We have learned much about the Quarrelsome Daughters, Braavos and Volantis. I find Lorath less interesting. I believe we will learn more about Pentos in future volumes. Qohor is very  mysterious, makes Valyrian Steel, has sorcerers.

[Groo]

1 hour ago, Tukata12 said:

That's not exclusive. You can make one or several already existing plotlines converging to one of the yet unexplored Free Cities and resolve numerous plots there instead of Westeros for example. 

That might work for Braavos, Volantis, or Pentos where we already have existing characters and story lines. It wouldn't work for a new city unless you're thinking of the new locale as little more than a painted backdrop. If it has to happen, however, then I'm with Lilac & Gooseberries. Make it Braavos!

[TheLastWolf]

8 hours ago, Rondo said:

I would choose Asshai over any of the Free Cities.

Is Asshai a free city? OP is talking about only the 9 ig. But if you mean that Asshai by the shadow is more interesting than any of the 9 cities or them put together, this will mark the first time that I'm agreeing with you on the forum 

[Alyn Oakenfist]

10 hours ago, TheLastWolf said:

Is Asshai a free city? OP is talking about only the 9 ig. But if you mean that Asshai by the shadow is more interesting than any of the 9 cities or them put together, this will mark the first time that I'm agreeing with you on the forum 

I kinda disagree on this... Asshai isn't very interesting, besides being a magical Advanced Ancient Acropolis, with hints of Lovecraftian mystery added in to make it more spooky. I mean what do we really know about it? We know that it's a magic free for all and that no children live there, but that's pretty much it. It just seems the usual dark edgy mystery city which we will naturally never see.

Now a place like Volantis or Braavos, is in my eyes far more interesting, though it may be because I'm a bit of a Venice and Byzantium buff.

[Bobity.]

Qohor and Norvos!

Both of these cities share very common origins having been cultures who had split from Valyria because of the Freeholds declining religious devotion.  And what are the local religious customs?  Daily sacrifce to a demon called the Black Goat in Qohor and in Norvos a secretly named god who directly commands the ruling bearded priest theoracy.  Turns out Valryian religous orthodoxy was demon worship!

As for POV's, Aero Hotah has a familiarity with these religious practices having been sold as a slave to the Norvos preisthood, the gods axe symbol burned into his chest.

Quote

 

"Both," Hotah said. "Two brothers, three sisters. I was the youngest." The youngest, and unwanted. Another mouth to feed, a big boy who ate too much and soon outgrew his clothes. Small wonder they had sold him to the bearded priests. - AFFC - The Captain of Guards

And he smelled the stench of burning hair as the bearded priest touched the brand to the center of his chest. The pain had been so fierce that he thought his heart might stop, yet Areo Hotah had not flinched. The hair had never grown back over the axe. - AFFC - The Captain of Guards

 

My pet tinfoil is that the Red Mountains is home to a demon with vulture symbology, which the local Stony Donrish have been worshiping since the "dawn of days."  The Red Mountain Vulture King phenomeona is much too historically cyclical in my mind to not have a guiding influence. If such Dornish cultists were to be revleaed in TWOW, then Aero could serve as a POV bridge by providing relatable religous context from his home of Norvos.

[Jay21]

Those Lorathi mazes in the World Book are interesting.

[BlackLightning]

Qohor.

Followed by Myr.

But much like @Rondo I would honestly rather see Asshai, Yi Ti or the Summer Islands. We've passed through Qohor, we have seen Pentos and Volantis and we have already spent a lot of time in Braavos.

21 hours ago, Tukata12 said:

Why not make one of the already existing plotlines take place temporarily in a Free City that is yet to be explored? 

I think that's what's going to happen. Between the Tattered Prince's demands and the revelation that Daenerys and Viserys had been cheated while Aegon had been spoiled by Illyrio Mopatis, I think that we are heading towards an eventful return to Pentos.

And a lot of the plotlines in Essos are converging on Lys. Lynesse Hightower is there, Edric Storm is there, the slave trade there is both insular and undisturbed, Varys is supposedly from there, the Tears of Lys and Sweetsleep are all Lyseni concoctions and there are many ships there that can be put to use (re: stolen by the Ironborn)

20 hours ago, Nathan Stark said:

The trouble with that is that exploring new settings lends itself to creating new plotlines. Dorne wasn't originally planned to be a major part of the story, but once George started exploring the Watergardens and Sunspear, we suddenly had three important new players who added more threads needing resolution. There's only so much you can add to ASOIAF before it becomes impossible to finish.

Yes it was.

Elia Martell, Doran Martell, Arianne Martell, Elia's children Rhaenys and Aegon along with Princess Nymeria were all name-dropped in the first book. More than once. By different characters.

We weren't originally planned to have Dornish POVs or spend any protracted amount of time seeing all of Dorne. But yeah: Dorne was always going to be a big part of the story.

19 hours ago, Groo said:

That might work for Braavos, Volantis, or Pentos where we already have existing characters and story lines. It wouldn't work for a new city unless you're thinking of the new locale as little more than a painted backdrop. If it has to happen, however, then I'm with Lilac & Gooseberries. Make it Braavos!

That's the thing.

Volantis and Pentos are painted backdrop. How much do we know about the actual layout of Pentos or even Volantis? Very little when you compare it to our knowledge of King's Landing, Winterfell or even Stoney Sept.

1 hour ago, Bobity. said:

My pet tinfoil is that the Red Mountains is home to a demon with vulture symbology, which the local Stony Donrish have been worshiping since the "dawn of days."  The Red Mountain Vulture King phenomeona is much too historically cyclical in my mind to not have a guiding influence. If such Dornish cultists were to be revleaed in TWOW, then Aero could serve as a POV bridge by providing relatable religous context from his home of Norvos.

I think that Gerold Dayne is one of the Stony Dornish cultists that you speak of. And I think that these Dornish cultists are plotting a bigger takeover. I think they know who Jon Snow really is and that they are planning to make him the King of all Westeros.