Best natural defenses

[Bright Blue Eyes]

Well we know there is alot of mines in ASOIAF (Iron islands, Westerland), why you don't think it could be change in a inner fortress.

Because people can't live in mines. Apart from the obvious facts (no food), they'd suffer from all kinds of depressions and mental illnesses soon enough.

[Penguin king]

I'm surprised no one thought about living in a fortified mountain like dwarfs in LOTR, I mean I could see it work well against dragons.

That doesn't tend to work as well as you'd think. What usually happens is the dragon or other gribbly forces his way in, kills all the dwarves then takes the mountain as his lair. It's pretty much a trope. Smaug being the prime example.

[Winterz]

The Vale, hands down.

[The Knight of Grey Garden]

Because people can't live in mines. Apart from the obvious facts (no food), they'd suffer from all kinds of depressions and mental illnesses soon enough.

I never said that could be a city, just a fortress in case of an attack and a siege. and it could do a good stockpile for food there.

That doesn't tend to work as well as you'd think. What usually happens is the dragon or other gribbly forces his way in, kills all the dwarves then takes the mountain as his lair. It's pretty much a trope. Smaug being the prime example.

Well ASOIAF dragons aren't half as mighty as Smaug, even Balerion.

[Winterz]

Well ASOIAF dragons aren't half as mighty as Smaug, even Balerion.

In terms of size, I'm pretty sure Balerion was bigger than Smaug but when we go into the fields of sentience and semi-imortality, yeah Smaug takes the prize.

Anyway, we don't know enough of ASOIAF's dragons. It could be that there are dragons in the Shadow Lands or even those in ancient times that were as big and smart as Tolkien's dragons.

[The Snowman]

Sorry for the late reply, but just in case you notice this:

Hmm, good point. Just to clarify, what stretch of land are you considering the coast of the Vale of Arryn? I consider viable coast to be anywhere between the Bay of Crabs and the estuary that leads to Heart's Home. Convoluted as it is, I still don't think that it accounts for 4000 miles of land. In any case, there are at least four major castles in this area so attacking there would be doubly hard because the enemy would never be far away.

Basically from Saltpans all the way around to the Neck. Its a long way considering how much coast the fingers would encompass.

[Piketon30]

N p

[Cameron]

Dorne and North are tied in my opinion. deserts and mountains are bloody hell on invading and occupying forces (see Iraq, Afghanistan), but obviously freezing conditions are no good (operation barbossa, invasion of finland). while dorne is significantly smaller, it is, by no means, small, particularly not for an army to cross. the lack of water is a serious impediment to travel. i believe it is stated somewhere that it takes a day to get from the water gardens to sunspear. while that is with doran being carried slowly, a marching army will move at a roughly comperable rate, whereas the tactics of the dornish (horse archery hit and runs) allow them to cover far greater distances. therefore, i posit that dorne is large enough to allow a successful guerrilla war. the north is quite simply russia, admitedly with more coastline. the ironborn made a good point about invasions by sea, and managed to take as far inland as winterfell, not an insignificant distance. furthermore, its rivers mean anyone with sufficiently small drafted ships could invade quite far inland. aditionally, the lands of ice and fire map puts all of the major cities and such on rivers or coastlines. the problem with the vale is there are hostile native forces at war with other natives, making a guerrilla war far more difficult to carry out.

[Stormkith]

1. Dorne - Not many places to invade from. Cut off from the rest of the continent by mountains, and surrounded by desert. Even their shores are described as extremely difficult and dangerous.

2. The Vale - Very mountainous, difficult terrain just getting into the region. Lack of natural resources for invading armies to make use of.

3. The Iron Islands - No approach but by sea. No way to build siege engines once you DO land. No real resources otherwise, unless the invading army is really good at fishing.

The North is a close fourth, but its size makes it easy to invade, just not to hold. During summer it's not much more difficult than most anywhere else; in winter it's a nightmare, but why would you invade the North during winter? You'd be smarter to let them use up any food they have, especially in a long winter, and then invade during the spring thaw.

[the Scorpion Knight]

I woul.d put the iron Islands BEFORE the Vale out of two reaons:

the ironborn have the seapower of westeros and they are an archipelago of islands

so basicly

1north

1dorne (i consider it a tie)

2 Iron islands

4vale...

[Abhakhazia]

The North, the Vale and Dorne are all around the same level, but all three can be taken by sea, I believe. But in any land invasion, all three are impregnable. The Vale has the Mountains of the Moon to defend it, the North has the swampy Neck and its cold climate that would bog down (literally) any army invading, and even if they got over the Neck, they could freeze or starve to death if the Northmen swing around and cut off any supply lines through the Neck. Dorne has the deserts, of course, and the Red Mountains.

[Morienthar]

The Vale is ripe for blockades,You could starve and dehydrate people to death,you don't even need to fight them.

WInter in the North is essentially like invading russia in winter like Napoleon and Hitler found out.

Dorne is like marching an army through the sahara.

[Alistair's Pantaloons]

I think the Vale and the Eyrie has to win this. Catlyn could barely make the climb up and she had someone helping and guiding her. How would an invading army do with many people trying to stop and hinder them. Perfect place to rain arrows, rocks, pitch, oil, whatever down upon the climbers. Only way it gets taken is stealth (or seduction of Lysa).

Got to love Bronn's dismissal from the show:

"Give me 20 good men and some climbing spikes. I'll impregnate the bitch."

It is made to seem safer and more secure in the books, to me. I don't see how anyone could take it, especially if it was properly garrisoned and run by someone competent (not Lysa or Sweet Robin).

[thecryptile]

I was thinking the Vale myself, as you can see in the older parts of the thread, but I had to change my mind when it was pointed out that the OP is only about natural defenses. The Eyrie and other castles aren't meant to bear on the conversation.