Wyndell Marnderlly - Worst plotter ever?

[Damar]

Plotting what exactly?

She was the best advisor to her son, and had done her best to prevent anymore deaths and bloodshed

Her plot to kidnap Tyrion and bring him to justice.

[WunWunAintDone]

Her plot to kidnap Tyrion and bring him to justice.

For a crime he didnt commit.

[Light a wight tonight]

Doran gets a lot of hate, but the man's plots aren't bad -- he is just disabled and has to trust OTHER people to carry them out, and that's why they go wrong. Sending Oberyn to KL to investigate and join to small council was a great idea -- until Oberyn decided to get involved in Tyrion's trial. Sending Quentyn to meet Dany, secretly, and arrange a marriage treaty was an EXCELLENT idea, but Quentyn took too long, wasn't charismatic enough, and didn't sell himself well. Betrothing Tystrane and Myrcella was a GREAT idea, since it gave him a Lannister hostage as cover for his other plots, but Arianne stealing her was ridiculously stupid. Doran's plans are awesome -- Doran just has bad people in his service

/soapbox

Gotta disagree. If he didn't know the limitations of Oberyn and Quentyn he's a whole lot less clever than he should have been. He's trying to force an unsuited person into the position. Tailoring the plot to fit the agent would be the path of wisdom

[coil]

Hi guys.

As we know, Wyndell mardely is plotting against the Boltons and Freys and his main objective is to restore the Starks to Winterfell.

However, what is the point to plot against someone who knows you are plotting against him;

Roosse knows he is plotting, He knows Roose knows, the freys know, and he knows the frey know.

And, besides that, he keep plotting against them.

This make him the worst ploter ever, cause it seems to mee he is gonna fail to surpise Boltons and freys.

Because of revenge, exactly like Doran Martell does.

It's not like Manderly wanted to play the game, rather the fact that Freys kill his king, his son and then came to him while his other son was a hostage to basically make him their subordinate.

Roose Bolton does basically the same thing, only in a less obnoxious way.

Of course they know he hates them, they are the ones who caused the hate!

Manderly's one is, rather than a great, global, masterplan... a simple, furious, act of revenge in circumstances that don't allow him to march towards their castles and burn them to the ground.

It doesn't have a long term goal, he just wants them dead at the very first occasion he'll be able to find: rather than his being a scheme, I'd say it's more like a revenge and nothing else.

Which is extremely similar to Doran Martell, but at the same time so much different.

Stoned Dragon nails it, his plot are not bad. The problem is another!

Doran gets a lot of hate, but the man's plots aren't bad -- he is just disabled and has to trust OTHER people to carry them out, and that's why they go wrong. Sending Oberyn to KL to investigate and join to small council was a great idea -- until Oberyn decided to get involved in Tyrion's trial. Sending Quentyn to meet Dany, secretly, and arrange a marriage treaty was an EXCELLENT idea, but Quentyn took too long, wasn't charismatic enough, and didn't sell himself well. Betrothing Tystrane and Myrcella was a GREAT idea, since it gave him a Lannister hostage as cover for his other plots, but Arianne stealing her was ridiculously stupid. Doran's plans are awesome -- Doran just has bad people in his service

I think that Doran is the worst (sigh, a superlative... please don't think that I'm saying he is terrible. It's just that in an elite of players, one must be the worse) of the better players, but not because of his agents.

Actually, his information network is second only to Varys' one - which it's by itself, a terrific accomplishment.

He has great warriors, Oberyn, and Arianne (who is way, way smarter than what she looks at first) and a lot of strong points.

His real problems are these:

1 he DOES NOT trust other people to carry his plans, most importantly he does not trust the people he should have.

Arianne's clumsy coup d'etat is solely Doran's fault. He never said her anything, he looks weak and pathetic and that of course made her and the sand snakes act.

There's a difference between secrecy and paranoia, and Doran definitively goes for the second, at least until Arianne fucks up big.

Only then, he trusts both her daughter and the sand snakes... and no one betrays him like expected, since all have the same goal.

The only thing he did was creating tension in his realm.

2 his habit for secrecies it's exactly what screwed Quentyn's tentative as well (plus Daenerys, but that was out of his control). Let's say Daenerys or Vyserys would have known they were promised, would have they betrayed Doran?! No, their goals are the same!

3 the worst one: unlike any other player in the Game, Doran does not want to sacrifice anything.

Not the lives of the children, nor his citizens, nor anything.

Which is perfect for a ruler in peace time, terrible for a guy who is supposed to get his revenge.

Oberyn managed single-handedly to do anything his brother couldn't do in years, and if he hadn't died against Gregor he could had said that the revenge was basically complete without losing absolutely anything.

The extremely funny thing?

Up until now, the only thing that Doran achieved was his family's ruin.

Doran's losses until now: a son, almost a daughter until he finally decided to speak, a wife (due to Quentyn), a brother.

Doran's careful achievements: none

Poor Doran, his intents are so good but he can't compromise...

Edit: oh, another thing about an important flaw.

Unlike other players, Doran relies solely on external factors to win which is not only prone to backfire, but most importantly out of his control.

Gotta be said that his army alone isn't enough, to be honest. Still...

[Light a wight tonight]

To OP and others: Please write the names correctly! I don't know why, but it gets on my nerves everytime I see a mispronounced name. :bang:

And how does one see a pronunciation?

[Belisarius09]

Doran has great plots, but other people have failed to carry them out.

Wyman also has a good plot, but lacks subterfuge. This doesn't mean his plots are bad, he's just being arrogant and rubbing it in Roose and the Frey's faces to get back at them. Because they have been extremely arrogant about the RW and have been rubbing that in the faces of the Northmen. They may know he is plotting, but aren't in a position to stop him, so he can get away with some much deserved showboating.

Cersei has terrible plots. Ex: Her attempt to ruin Margaery's name backfired completely.

[RenlyIsNotRight]

Well for one thing, I don't think we ever saw Wendel Manderly involved in any plots prior to his tragic death at the Red Wedding.

His father Wyman though...well he certainly hasn't been all that subtle, but imo at this point he's essentially on a suicide mission - his surviving son is back in White Harbor and his house will go on, he has a man working on bringing back a Stark heir for him, Stannis is poised to defeat the Boltons in battle...even if he does die, he's already won as far as he's concerned.

[TalalOfDorne]

Her plot to kidnap Tyrion and bring him to justice.

For a crime he didnt commit.

Foiled by Lysa.

And the way she made sure of the loyalties of the people in the in, and how she used the name of the king to get support and how she mislead people by going to the Vale instead of WF all show an intelligent person who can plan quickly when in a difficult situation.

And the Lannisters WERE guilty. She may have caught the wrong one but she thought she had evidence. And its not like she chased him through Westeros. She was put in a tough situation and acted.

[WunWunAintDone]

The Lannisters were not guilty of pushing Bran off the tower, only two of them were. And Tyrion was not one of those two.

[Talleyrand]

Littlefinger and Varys are both aware that the other is plotting against each other yet they aren't bad plotters. It doesn't matter that Bolton knows hes plotting against him - Bolton never would have trusted him anyway. The point is that Bolton doesn't know enough to act publicly against him and doesn't know what hes doing specifically - that's what matters

[TalalOfDorne]

The Lannisters were not guilty of pushing Bran off the tower, only two of them were. And Tyrion was not one of those two.

I already said she arrested the wrong one. But she was told that Tyrion was the guilty one as he was supposedly he owner of the dagger.

[WunWunAintDone]

I already said she arrested the wrong one. But she was told that Tyrion was the guilty one as he was supposedly he owner of the dagger.

Yeh but her plan still ended terribly.

[TalalOfDorne]

Yeh but her plan still ended terribly.

She wanted to arrest Tyrion and bring him to justice. She did that. Again it was Lysa who ruined later things not Catelyn.

[Kolantero]

Doran Martell > Everyone in terms of plotting except maybe Top Tier players like Varys, Three eyed Crow etc and that's because they have the advantage of working backstage while Doran has to be in the spotlight of politics.

Manderley is a very good plotter as well

[WunWunAintDone]

She wanted to arrest Tyrion and bring him to justice. She did that. Again it was Lysa who ruined later things not Catelyn.

She took the wrong guy, which Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

[The Dornishman's Wife]

She took the wrong guy, which Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

Cat took the wrong guy, Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

Robb married the wrong girl, Frey responded with backstabbing and everyone died. His plan was terrible.

Jaime fucked the wrong girl, Bran saw them, Jaime threw him out of the window, lost a hand, a brother, a son and a father. His plan was terrible.

Bran went climbing, saw Jaime & Cersei, got thrown out of the window and his family was scattered or killed. His plan was terrible.

Tywin sent Tyrion to KL to rule. Tyrion was blamed for Joff's death and shot Tywin with a crossbow. His plan was terrible.

Dany married Hizdahr. Drogon suddenly came flying out of the sky, killed a few people and left Meereen leaderless. Her plan was terrible.

Oh, I could do this all day (actually it's rather fun), but to make a long story short: Everyone has bad stuff happening to them. Everyone has made an action in the past which, if done differently, could have replaced that bad stuff by different bad stuff or in some cases even good stuff. Nearly everyone had more time to actually plot and plan his action than Catelyn when being unmasked by Tyrion in the inn.

Retreating to the position that she must be the worst plotter ever because she made a split-second decision which, although pretty defensible based on the facts known to her at the time (there's a reason why that was a "Fuck Yeah" moment for many readers), ultimately had bad consequences, does not seem very helpful to the matter at hand. It also does not correspond to what I think of when I hear the word "plotting".

[Stoned Dragon]

Gotta disagree. If he didn't know the limitations of Oberyn and Quentyn he's a whole lot less clever than he should have been. He's trying to force an unsuited person into the position. Tailoring the plot to fit the agent would be the path of wisdom

Oberyn was the perfect tool for the job -- heading to KL to root out the truth about Elia, learn intel about how the Lannisters are running the kingdom, etc.... Quentyn not only was the perfect tool for the Dany problem, he was the only tool -- Dorne is liberal, but he couldn't have proposed a marriage treaty between Dany and Arianne (although, that would be awesome!). How was Doran supposed to see that Tyrion would be put on trial or that Oberyn would fight as his champion? That would out of his control and because he was too far away he couldn't make the necessary course adjustments and had to, unfortunately, rely on Oberyn's best judgment.

Wyman also has a good plot, but lacks subterfuge. This doesn't mean his plots are bad, he's just being arrogant and rubbing it in Roose and the Frey's faces to get back at them. Because they have been extremely arrogant about the RW and have been rubbing that in the faces of the Northmen. They may know he is plotting, but aren't in a position to stop him, so he can get away with some much deserved showboating.

Wyman is the most dangerous man in the north right now because he doesn't have anything left to lose. He has his heir and he has knowledge of where his leige lord is - he has more money, horses, ships, and men than anyone else in the North. He also knows that Roose and the Frey's won't risk another Red Wedding, and him being assassinated by either the Boltons or the Freys would tear apart whatever shreds are holding the North to them. He has nothing else that he NEEDS to live for, so he can do whatever the hell he likes.

She took the wrong guy, which Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

Oh lord, not this again.

Ned got attacked in KL because he resigned the Hand. Jaime wouldn't have dared attack Ned if he were still Hand. What Cat should have done was take Tyrion to Winterfell. She trusted her sister that she hadn't seen in a while, and it blew up in her face. If she had taken Tyrion to WInterfell instead of the Eyrie and if Ned hadn't resigned the Handship, they would have had a high-level Lannister hostage at the START of the hostilities. If she had kept him long enough, and Ned still was imprisoned, then eventually the Starks could have had Tyrion AND Jaime as hostages and the war would have been over.

Cat just had bad luck in her sister and in Ned choosing to resign the Hand. If those two things hadn't happened, Cat would be a GENIUS

[Golden Hand]

She took the wrong guy, which Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

it wasn't a plot or a plan.

[TalalOfDorne]

She took the wrong guy, which Tywin responded with military force and Jaime attacked Ned in KL. Her plan was terrible.

The war was going to happen anyway! And Ned resigning as Hand was what made Jaime think about attacking him, otherwise it wouldn't have happened.

And like I said before, wether he was the wrong guy or not. She wanted to arrest him, she got what she wanted.

[WunWunAintDone]

The war was going to happen anyway! And Ned resigning as Hand was what made Jaime think about attacking him, otherwise it wouldn't have happened.

And like I said before, wether he was the wrong guy or not. She wanted to arrest him, she got what she wanted.

Ok she arrested a guy, but why? Thats bad to arrest somebody just to do it like wtf?