Is Mel really as wrong as often as everyone here thinks?

[JaegrM]

Whether she's intentionally misreading it or not, the result is still the same: no worthwhile actionable intelligence. And I'm pretty sure that "Renly at the gates of King's Landing" was an actual misreading.

That's kind of exaggerating the point.

She doesn't Intentionally misread, she just can't show doubt and goes with her best guess.

[assjfjgjsgjljljglgjfjsduar]

That's kind of exaggerating the point.

She doesn't Intentionally misread, she just can't show doubt and goes with her best guess.

I think you're splitting hairs here. My original point stands: What she sees is accurate, but her interpretation of what she sees — whether it's an innocent mistake, covering her ass, lying, drawing conclusions that aren't there, fucking whatever — is where she errs.

[Tagganaro]

That's kind of exaggerating the point.

She doesn't Intentionally misread, she just can't show doubt and goes with her best guess.

As AM said, I'm not sure I really understand the distinction. Either way, Mel is always (pretty much), as wrong as everyone here thinks, either because she has accidentally or purposely misread a prophecy makes no difference. In the end, wrong is wrong, and we know that almost 100% of the time Mel has been "wrong" in how she relays her visions to other people such as Stannis and Jon.

If you really think about it, most of her visions are entirely useless anyway- I mean, "grey girl on a dying horse" means absolutely nothing worthwhile. So the meaning she attaches to it basically gives it all the importance it appears to have, but at the same time the meaning that she ultimately attaches is useless and unsubstantiated because she essentially makes it up as she goes along a la Eastwatch.

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Jon absolutely doesn't dismiss the fact that Mel has power:

This passage gives us a good summary of Jon's feelings toward Mel. He recognizes that she has real power, but he trusts neither her personally, nor magic generally. His mistrust of her is not so much about the perceived "wrongness" of her interpretations, but because Jon understands that she's playing her own power game and mistrusts her motives.

“A grey girl on a dying horse. Daggers in the dark. A promised prince, born in smoke and salt. It seems to me that you make nothing but mis-takes, my lady. Where is Stannis? What of Rattleshirt and his spearwives? Where is my sister?"

Jon clearly does doubt her powers by that point. Even more importantly he leads with something she got right! She did see a grey girl on a dying horse and it did come to pass, yet Jon here is denying an actual fact. He obviously is underestimating her power if he is dismissing something that actually is true. So with that statement I can clearly state that he is not recognizing her power.

[lomiller]

Her visions are accurate enough, though not very specific. It's her understanding of them that is frequently wrong, often very wrong

[butterbumps!]

“A grey girl on a dying horse. Daggers in the dark. A promised prince, born in smoke and salt. It seems to me that you make nothing but mis-takes, my lady. Where is Stannis? What of Rattleshirt and his spearwives? Where is my sister?"

Jon clearly does doubt her powers by that point. Even more importantly he leads with something she got right! She did see a grey girl on a dying horse and it did come to pass, yet Jon here is denying an actual fact. He obviously is underestimating her power if he is dismissing something that actually is true. So with that statement I can clearly state that he is not recognizing her power.

Not really. Again, he understands that she sees things, but she doesn't give him actionable interpretations. Where does he ever say or think that she doesn't have power? He thinks she's leading him astray with her visions, and is calling her out for this. He suspects she's not being cromulent with him.

(yes, I pretty much replied to this as an excuse to use the word cromulent to someone likely to know what I'm talking about)

[Katsa]

Her visions are spot on. Her interpretations are not.

I think if she merely describes her visions without trying to guess what they are and present these mere guesses as facts, she would have a high accuracy rating.

She needs to be more like Jojen and just describe exactly what she see's. What she originally see's is usually correct but then she always feels the need to kind of twist it into something that she wants or what someone else wants to hear.

This, basically.

[Arkantos]

“A grey girl on a dying horse. Daggers in the dark. A promised prince, born in smoke and salt. It seems to me that you make nothing but mis-takes, my lady. Where is Stannis? What of Rattleshirt and his spearwives? Where is my sister?"

Jon clearly does doubt her powers by that point. Even more importantly he leads with something she got right! She did see a grey girl on a dying horse and it did come to pass, yet Jon here is denying an actual fact. He obviously is underestimating her power if he is dismissing something that actually is true. So with that statement I can clearly state that he is not recognizing her power.

It has nothing to do with her power, he's doubting her judgement/trustfulness.

[JaegrM]

And I didn't even think about the 'daggers in the dark' prophecy she gives Jon.

That one alone is kind of proof of Jon doubting her power.

[therealbando]

IMO her visions are correct but she interprets them in a very subjective way.

[eggs]

she's skilled enough; she just fails because she refuses to look weak.

and yes, mel is usually wrong.

[Theda Baratheon]

She definitely, definitely has power however; my one real problem with Mel is her telling others explicitly what she believes her visions are, when she should tell them only what she has seen.

We all know she has many tricks that she uses to make her seem more powerful, but the shadowbabies are the perfect example of her being a dangerous asset and not someone to completely disregard because she interpreted a few REAL IMAGES in the wrong way.

[Winterfellian]

And I didn't even think about the 'daggers in the dark' prophecy she gives Jon.

That one alone is kind of proof of Jon doubting her power.

Actually Jon does reflect on her words:

And Jon thought Ice, she said, and daggers in the dark, blood frozen red and hard and naked steel. His sword hand flexed. The wind was rising.

This quote is from Jon's second to last chapter and the wording is almost the same as Mel used so it shows that the threat has been on his mind. Is just that Jon is too pragmatic and focused to pull a Cersei and let this prophecy dictate his actions or impede his judgement.

[TalalOfDorne]

What she sees does seem to come true, but like others said its the interpretation thats misleading.

[JaegrM]

Actually Jon does reflect on her words:

This quote is from Jon's second to last chapter and the wording is almost the same as Mel used so it shows that the threat has been on his mind. Is just that Jon is too pragmatic and focused to pull a Cersei and let this prophecy dictate his actions or impede his judgement.

Didn't keep his wolf with him like she reccomended and hinted would stop him from being stabbed. So he didn't take it too seriously.

Also ignored the part about how he only THOUGHT he knew who his enemies were.

[Stannis ftw]

What she sees does seem to come true, but like others said its the interpretation thats misleading.

The first part (what she sees comes true) already provides HUGE information edge for anybody with half sense. Even in today´s information society, how much more in medieval setting.

As if you are leader of modern military and you scrap the satellite system because, yeah, the pics seem to be authentic, but they are not always real-time, they dont provide interpretation, and they are often blurred so... let´s just junk it.

You guys are just intimidated by genuinely strong woman like Mel :-)

In the first books she´s one of the few (south of the Wall) who knows about the threat of Others and acts on it. "She's misinformed and misguided."

She's able to conceive and give birth to demonic shadow assassins to carry out surgical assasination missions behind enemy line. "All her powers are just gimmicks and trickery."

etc.

Admit it, you just can´t handle her.

[JaegrM]

The first part (what she sees comes true) already provides HUGE information edge for anybody with half sense. Even in today´s information society, how much more in medieval setting.

As if you are leader of modern military and you scrap the satellite system because, yeah, the pics seem to be authentic, but they are not always real-time, they dont provide interpretation, and they are often blurred so... let´s just junk it.

You guys are just intimidated by genuinely strong woman like Mel :-)

In the first books she´s one of the few (south of the Wall) who knows about the threat of Others and acts on it. "She's misinformed and misguided."

She's able to conceive and give birth to demonic shadow assassins to carry out surgical assasination missions behind enemy line. "All her powers are just gimmicks and trickery."

etc.

Admit it, you just can´t handle her.

that

[Theda Baratheon]

The first part (what she sees comes true) already provides HUGE information edge for anybody with half sense. Even in today´s information society, how much more in medieval setting.

As if you are leader of modern military and you scrap the satellite system because, yeah, the pics seem to be authentic, but they are not always real-time, they dont provide interpretation, and they are often blurred so... let´s just junk it.

You guys are just intimidated by genuinely strong woman like Mel :-)

In the first books she´s one of the few (south of the Wall) who knows about the threat of Others and acts on it. "She's misinformed and misguided."

She's able to conceive and give birth to demonic shadow assassins to carry out surgical assasination missions behind enemy line. "All her powers are just gimmicks and trickery."

etc.

Admit it, you just can´t handle her.

THIS POST IS RIFE WITH SASS. :bowdown:

[Winterfellian]

The first part (what she sees comes true) already provides HUGE information edge for anybody with half sense. Even in today´s information society, how much more in medieval setting.

As if you are leader of modern military and you scrap the satellite system because, yeah, the pics seem to be authentic, but they are not always real-time, they dont provide interpretation, and they are often blurred so... let´s just junk it.

You guys are just intimidated by genuinely strong woman like Mel :-)

In the first books she´s one of the few (south of the Wall) who knows about the threat of Others and acts on it. "She's misinformed and misguided."

She's able to conceive and give birth to demonic shadow assassins to carry out surgical assasination missions behind enemy line. "All her powers are just gimmicks and trickery."

etc.

Admit it, you just can´t handle her.

I don't think that said modern military would disregard satellite system either but am pretty sure he'll get in touch with whoever is responsible for the way the images are received and tell them to get their act together and start working on getting those images clear. They will take it up with the intermediary so to speak, not with the satellites. Which is exactly what Jon is doing. Like others pointed out, Jon believes in Mel's power is her-the intermediary in charge of processing the signal- that he mistrust and with very good reason.

About being intimidated by strong woman, this is soo wrong that I am seriously entertaining the thought that you are trolling. I am weary of Mel because of her almost complete disregard for human life, her lack of respect and tolerance for other people's cultures and religions, her "if you're no with me you're against me" mentality, her proclivity to manipulate her visions to influence her own power and influence over others (there's no better example of this that the stunt she pulled with Stannis and the leeches) and, oh yes, her being completely comfortable with burning people alive for no good reason. There are many example of capable strong women in the books (Cat, Sansa, Brienne, etc) who are not going around burning people alive so please don't class our dislike or mistrust of Mel with her being a strong woman because quite frankly is rather insulting.

For all you claim about Mel's knowledge about the Others and how she acted on it it is DAVOS who's responsible for Stannis going North. Davos was the one who told him that he had to save the realm is he wanted to win the throne. Stannis himself tells Jon that if not for Davos he would never have gone north. Mel was actually pushing Stannis towards South, to claim the Iron Throne. Unless the white walkers are hiding in the secret passages of the Red Keep along with Varys's little birds I think is safe to say that they she was guiding him in the wrong direction, meaning she knew squat. The Others don't factor in her plans until Davos shows her and Stannis the letter from the NW.

I don't deny her being able to conceive a shadow baby by sucking the life power out of Stannis in order to assassinate Renly and Cortnay Penrose. But this is good because....? Seriously I can't think of a single good reason why this is actually good. Again, like Jon, I don't deny her power but I wouldn't trust her with a pair of old shoes, much less the salvation of the realm. I never argued that all her powers were gimmicks and trickery but she does use this methods to create a more dramatic effect in order to enhance her own aura of power and therefore increase her own political influence. Again, this is good because...?

[the trees have eyes]

I've seen it said on the forum that Melisandre is always getting her visions wrong.

I really don't agree with this.

She correctly sees her threats to herself coming twice - She knew Cressen was going to poison her, and knew Davos intended to kill her.

Grey girl on a dying horse- her vision was correct, there was a grey girl coming on a dying horse, who was kin to Jon (as described before Robb takes Rickard's head) Karstarks and Starks are related.

She correctly and in detail saw the rangers dying and being returned as heads without eyes.

Many people claim she didn't do anything with the Leeches and that she saw the three deaths coming, which would be a highly accurate reading of the flames.

She correctly envisioned The Battle of Blackwater, and I'm inclined to agree with her when she says had Stannis brought her the battle would have gone differently.

Her only real sin is she goes for the Dramatic effect, and tries to appear more powerful than she is.

This leads her to doing things like burning the leeches (If she did in fact only see the deaths and not have a hand in it), Saying for a certainty that it was Arya on the horse, that it was Eastwatch falling, etc.

It's not that she's wrong, it's that she can't/wont show any doubt

Or am I missing something?

Obviously there is the whole Stannis being AA thing, but who knows?

She has real power as Cressen, Renly and Penrose (Castellan at Storm's End) all found out to their cost and she sees things in the flames that's true but she struggles to interpret accurately what she sees and to give any useful advice based on it. She makes a lot of mistakes because she hopes for what she wants to see and lets this colour her readings rather than trying to understand with real objectivity what she is seeing.

I'm struck by the similarity between the visions in the flames and the green dreams Jojen has. Both are difficult to interpret and give advice on - Jojen sees the sea come to Winterfell and Reek skinning off Bran's face but unlike Mel he knows that although the visions are true, interpreting what they mean is not easy and, equally importantly, that they can't be changed. Mel gets both things wrong as the Renly on the Blackwater vision so aptly proves.

She thinks Stannis is AA, something I believe she got wrong from the very start. Whether getting this wrong will actually benefit mankind is another matter as having Stannis and his knights in the North clearly brings a military option into play that would not be there otherwise. If you think Stannis really is AA please explain why she is falsifying lightbringer with a glamour (something Maester Aemon "saw" through quickly enough) and how burning the Seven on Dragonstone, gods Stannis had forsaken, was his Nissa Nissa moment. She is faking because she believes he must be AA so must have the sword. But she is wrong.

She sees Balon, Robb and Joffrey die. This is a vision that doesn't need any interpretation - dead is dead - so she can't really screw anything up.

She sees Renly attacking Stannis on the Blackwater - a vision that does come to pass but only because she kills Renly, Loras Tyrell takes his armour and Garlan wears it while smashing his way through Stannis' army. She sees what she sees clealry enough but she interprets it completely wrong.

She sees Cressen and Davos planning to kill her - absolutely correct and this is the one area where her interpretations are reliable. She can sense threats to herself and interprets whatever visions she has correctly.

She sees a grey girl on a dying horse and claims it's Arya. This is a lie because (she doesn't know) and of course it is Alys Karstark. She gets half marks because she deliberately sets out searching for a vision that will give her influence with Jon and although she does misread - make up - the identity of the rider, Alys does prove useful to Jon by bonding the Thenns and Karstarks together and gaining him allies and goodwill. But let's be clear: she is still wrong about what she sees.

She sees a boy with a wolf's face howling and a man with corpse white skin and automatically assumes they are servants of the Other. Fortunately she hasn't influenced any course of action regarding this because she is seeing Bran and the 3 eyed crow. Without wanting to set the crackpotters on me she is actually seeing two of the prime antagonists against the Great Other, her natural allies, but is interpreting it completely wrong.

Daggers in the dark and keep your wolf close. She sees this true and she recognises correctly that Jon is in danger. Unfortunately the oversell of Alys / Arya and Jon's instinctive distrust of her lead him to heed this but not as much as he should have.

The dead rangers. She sees this true but again dead is dead and doesn't leave a lot of room for error in interpretation or advice on a course of action.

So i think she can sense danger to herself and get the simple stuff right - particularly seeing death, and perhaps the threat of death but anything more complex and she becomes very unreliable and more often that not plain wrong. Her desire to change the future based on what she sees - unlike the green dreamer's realization that this will be - also seems futile. It is as if she doesn't understand the limitations of her own power and I think this will cost her dearly soon.