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Did house Ryswell and Dustin no sent any man to retake winterfell from greyjoys?


Mrstrategy

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3 hours ago, Mrstrategy said:

Did house Ryswell and Dustin no sent any troops to  help sir Rodrik retake winterfell from greyjoys due to treason or dislike of Stark's?

 

Probably distance. They live just northwest of Moat Cailin, how were they supposed to arrive before Ramsay does?

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10 hours ago, Mrstrategy said:

Did house Ryswell and Dustin no sent any troops to  help sir Rodrik retake winterfell from greyjoys due to treason or dislike of Stark's?

 

Most of their men are in the south with Robb. They would need a sizable force to retake Winterfell, and it was pretty clear that only Robb could muster that number of men. And since this could only happen after he gets past Moat Caillen, Ryswell and Dustin men would be more helpful staying where they were and attacking MC from the north where it is vulnerable.

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41 minutes ago, John Suburbs said:

Most of their men are in the south with Robb.

That’s not technically true. Barbrey Dustin claims that she only sent a low number of troops to Robb, and we can assume that House Roswell did something similar.

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Martin did not flesh out the Dustins and Ryswells until he scrapped the five year gap and had to make up some filler plot for the North.

They were hardly mentioned in the early books and now they are suddenly revealed as major players in the North.

The retconned excuses he came up with for their early absence was the infighting between the 3 Ryswell brothers which effectively paralyzed their House, and Barbrey’s supposed grudge against Eddard.

So that’s why.

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On 7/26/2021 at 11:41 AM, Canon Claude said:

That’s not technically true. Barbrey Dustin claims that she only sent a low number of troops to Robb, and we can assume that House Roswell did something similar.

I dunno. Barbrey is probably lying to Theon about the whole I-hate-Starks thing. I suspect that was just the cover story for the real objective: unblock the entrance to the crypts and leave a trail of footprints through the snow to hide those of whomever came in through the secret entrance down there.

But IIRC, both the Dustins and the Ryswells were harrassing the ironmen in MC from the north, but that's all they could do. They were still too weak to actually take it. And up until Robb died, there would be no reason to deplete their forces trying because Robb was going to press from the south, and send men around to supplement the forces in the north. So it was best to wait them out and let the crannogmen do their thing.

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On 7/27/2021 at 12:57 PM, John Suburbs said:

 

But IIRC, both the Dustins and the Ryswells were harrassing the ironmen in MC from the north, but that's all they could do. They were still too weak to actually take it. And up until Robb died, there would be no reason to deplete their forces trying because Robb was going to press from the south, and send men around to supplement the forces in the north. So it was best to wait them out and let the crannogmen do their thing.

The Dustins and Ryswells tried to storm Moat Cailin three times, but apparently the Ironborn were able to drive them off all three times even though half of them are sick or dying, they're outnumbered, and Moat Cailin is basically just three rotting towers. 

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On 7/26/2021 at 9:08 AM, James Steller said:

Probably distance. They live just northwest of Moat Cailin, how were they supposed to arrive before Ramsay does?

The Karstarks, Manderlys and Flints of Flint Finger are all further away and all sent men.

The rest had left eight days past, six hundred men from Winterfell and the nearest holdfasts. Cley Cerwyn was bringing three hundred more to join them on the march, and Maester Luwin had sent ravens before them, summoning levies from White Harbor and the barrowlands and even the deep places inside the wolfswood.

 

They were asked to send men and just ignored the order. Which is not surprising considering they ended up on Rooses side.

 

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17 hours ago, James Steller said:

The Dustins and Ryswells tried to storm Moat Cailin three times, but apparently the Ironborn were able to drive them off all three times even though half of them are sick or dying, they're outnumbered, and Moat Cailin is basically just three rotting towers. 

Right, so there was no way in hell they were going to take Winterfell from perfectly healthy ironmen. I don't think it was half the men at MC sick and dying, though. Theon counts 63 in total, with 58 being fit to fight. At Winterfell he had less than 30, but they were all in good shape.

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1 hour ago, John Suburbs said:

Right, so there was no way in hell they were going to take Winterfell from perfectly healthy ironmen. I don't think it was half the men at MC sick and dying, though. Theon counts 63 in total, with 58 being fit to fight. At Winterfell he had less than 30, but they were all in good shape.

I do find it annoying how GRRM powered up the Ironborn fighters in his story and de-powered the Northern fighters (except for when the plot demands that they’re suddenly the toughest of the tough, of course).

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1 hour ago, John Suburbs said:

Right, so there was no way in hell they were going to take Winterfell from perfectly healthy ironmen. I don't think it was half the men at MC sick and dying, though. Theon counts 63 in total, with 58 being fit to fight. At Winterfell he had less than 30, but they were all in good shape.

Winterfell's far too big for 30 men to cover. It's another example of GRRM describing huge structures and then having people interact with them as if they're much smaller. Defending a tower with a small number of men is much more feasible than defending a sprawling castle, the only practical way for that few men to hold Winterfell would be to just hold the central keep but Theon has men on the outer walls. 

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3 hours ago, Canon Claude said:

I do find it annoying how GRRM powered up the Ironborn fighters in his story and de-powered the Northern fighters (except for when the plot demands that they’re suddenly the toughest of the tough, of course).

When does he do that?

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5 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

Right, so there was no way in hell they were going to take Winterfell from perfectly healthy ironmen. I don't think it was half the men at MC sick and dying, though. Theon counts 63 in total, with 58 being fit to fight. At Winterfell he had less than 30, but they were all in good shape.

It clearly doesn't take that many to take possession of WF. Theon did it with 20 Goodmen, so to speak. They would just have to do what Theon did, scale both walls. All they have to do is a little recon on the movements of Theon's men, maybe create a diversion.

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6 hours ago, Mystical said:

It clearly doesn't take that many to take possession of WF. Theon did it with 20 Goodmen, so to speak. They would just have to do what Theon did, scale both walls. All they have to do is a little recon on the movements of Theon's men, maybe create a diversion.

That's not the IB being overpowered. It's Ser Rodrik being a fucking moron and leaving a castle so undefended that no guard notices people climbing a wall, swimming a moat, and then climbing ahigher wall for hours. TBH I'm not even sure how the IB managed to throw an iron (?) grapple up 80 feet, but I can't pretend to know how much it would weigh.

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43 minutes ago, Universal Sword Donor said:

That's not the IB being overpowered. It's Ser Rodrik being a fucking moron and leaving a castle so undefended that no guard notices people climbing a wall, swimming a moat, and then climbing ahigher wall for hours. TBH I'm not even sure how the IB managed to throw an iron (?) grapple up 80 feet, but I can't pretend to know how much it would weigh.

Considering how big WF is, it is unbelievable (but so many things are in these books). WF is big enough that thousands can be comfortably living there (it's the size of a city). So even if you don't have many guards there anymore, there should be so many people that Theon and his 20 Goodmen would be taken care of by them no problem. Even if they were only armed with torches and pitchforks, what would 20 men do against 1000?

It's about as believable (NOT) as Ned taking 50-100 men with him when he goes south to become HotK.

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17 hours ago, Mystical said:

It clearly doesn't take that many to take possession of WF. Theon did it with 20 Goodmen, so to speak. They would just have to do what Theon did, scale both walls. All they have to do is a little recon on the movements of Theon's men, maybe create a diversion.

Eh, I dunno. Theon took Winterfell completely unaware. His men are waiting for an attack.

And let's also not neglect to mention that Cassell did organize some 2,000 men to retake Winterfell, so any contingent of Ryswells or Dustins would have likely joined that group, which was defeated by Ramsay's men.

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22 hours ago, Trigger Warning said:

Winterfell's far too big for 30 men to cover. It's another example of GRRM describing huge structures and then having people interact with them as if they're much smaller. Defending a tower with a small number of men is much more feasible than defending a sprawling castle, the only practical way for that few men to hold Winterfell would be to just hold the central keep but Theon has men on the outer walls. 

Well, it's not one tower, but three. And they are fairly spread apart.

And there is also the fact that Cassel did organize an assault to retake Winterfell, so any Ryswells or Dustins were likely in that group, which was routed by Ramsay.

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7 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

Well, it's not one tower, but three. And they are fairly spread apart.

And there is also the fact that Cassel did organize an assault to retake Winterfell, so any Ryswells or Dustins were likely in that group, which was routed by Ramsay.

The point is they're single structures covering very limited avenues of approach. Winterfell is a monstrously huge castle with a shit load towers and a shit load of walls to cover. 

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