Skinchanging a Dragon

[Free Northman]

There is no way there are 5 million people in the north - dont know where you are getting that number (1,000 x 5,000 = 5,000,000) Also not all northerners have the blood of the first men (see Manderlys) Again I belive that the wargs were hunted down in the past and the "gift" is now rare. Among the first men thousands of years ago it may have been 1 in 1000 (also I think these are Jojen Reeds numbers and what the fuck does he know?) but that number is much lower now.

Sigh.

Please read up on the population of Westeros before making such definitive comments. Estimates for the population of the North bottom out at 4 million, and are as high as 6 million.

As for the Manderlys - they are one noble House. Nobles make up less than 1% of the population of the North. The vast majority are peasants, and 99.999999% of them are of First Men stock.

EDIT

And even the Manderlys have been intermarrying with Northerners for 1000 years. Whatever remains of their southron blood is likely so diluted that Robb Stark with his 50% Tully blood was probably far less of a First Man than Wyman Manderly is.

[manting]

Wolfmaid there is a clear difference between Dragons and Dire wolves. Dragons were extinct and Dire wolves were not.

[wolfmaid7]

Wolfmaid there is a clear difference between Dragons and Dire wolves. Dragons were extinct and Dire wolves were not.

Yes one flies through the air and another one walks;I don't see why that matters as it doesn't affect the magical nature of both.Plus Dragons haven't been extinct no one has been able to hatch the eggs,they've been dormant for thousands of years.I fail to see the point your trying to make in response to my previous post.

[manting]

Not even close on the population - 5 million is the low end - FOR THE ENTIRE KINGDOM. There is no way the north has 5 million - know why? Because they only field an army of like 20,000 thousand. The north is the most Sparcely populated (dorne is the least populated) and the second least populated of the seven kingdoms.

[manting]

Sorry Wolfmaid - my fault - im new on here and Ive read about 20 posts saying that dragons and dire wolves "returned" at the same time. Thought you had said that as well. My mistake.

[Free Northman]

Not even close on the population - 5 million is the low end - FOR THE ENTIRE KINGDOM. There is no way the north has 5 million - know why? Because they only field an army of like 20,000 thousand. The north is the most Sparcely populated (dorne is the least populated) and the second least populated of the seven kingdoms.

I suggest that you lookup the detailed threads that have discussed the population issue in depth.

In short, you are wrong.

Army size is roughly 1% of total population size in this type of setting. Furthermore, there is no indication that the North is the second least populated of the Seven Kingdoms. Most sparsely populated yes. But it has a population at least equivalent to the Vale, and probably higher, since Martin has stated that it can raise a similar army size to the Vale, while we know that the North can likely not raise as large a percentage of its population to war as the southron kingdoms can. Hence, if it can match the Vale's armed strength, it likely has a higher population than the Vale.

Furthermore, the Stormlands fall below the Vale in terms of armed strength, and just above Dorne, so already the North likely has at least 3 Kingdoms below it in terms of population size. And that excludes the Iron Isles, who are below even Dorne.

But as I said, go and look it up. You are way off track on this issue.

[Ceejtank]

Unless GRRM says something can't be done, it's leaving the possibility that it CAN be done open, he just hasn't made us aware of the parameters as of yet.

It will be interesting to see if Bran (ice) does warg a dragon (fire). Curious to see if/when this happens.

[Free Northman]

Unless GRRM says something can't be done, it's leaving the possibility that it CAN be done open, he just hasn't made us aware of the parameters as of yet.

It will be interesting to see if Bran (ice) does warg a dragon (fire). Curious to see if/when this happens.

Someone asked him directly if a Dragon can be warged. His reply was something along the lines of: " That's a good question", or "Wait and see".

Can't remember his exact wording. But what I recall is that the tone clearly hinted at this being a significant issue in the plot going forward.

[Vuron]

You can't really compare Direwolves to Dragons in this context. Direwolves are not magical creatures, although there is something about the Stark direwolves that might be different. Varamyr considers stealing Ghost at one point and knows that he can warg a direwolf.

It is hard to judge who might be the most powerful warg at this point, but Bran has the most potential due to the formal training that he's going to receive. IMO, from the text, it seems that Arya might be the most powerful at this point, as she seems to be able to enter other creatures without even trying. Also, there is something odd in the text that seems to indicate that she is able to function normally while also seeing through another creatures eyes. (She is able to tell that the Kindly Man is the one attacking her while seeing it through the cat's eyes)

We can't say for sure if distance matters. As Varamyr is dying, he seems to roam throughout the north and sees the the elk that Bran is riding, Ghost, and many other creatures that he could enter. This could be a side effect of dying, and not a normal occurrence, but he does seem to have the ability to search for other creatures while he is alive.

There's some confusion in this thread about what can, and can't be warged. Varamyr's teacher never tells him that certain animals can't be warged, but says that some shouldn't. The reason that he gives is that the warg begins to take on the personality of the animals that he's controlling. (small animals are prey and the warg becomes weak and meek, cats are vain, etc.)

[manting]

yes I read the army size is relative to 1% of the population in terms of supporting the army. huh. I wonder if 14 century europe had 7 YEAR SUMMERS, which would mena a much higher crop yield. So it would be reasonable to believe that it would be as high as 2-5% instead of the traditional not magical 1%. Even at 1% that would put it at 2.5 million. 25,000 soldiers = 2.5 million. SO if you use your own metric you come up with my number - not 5 million or more.

I just realized we are arguing over nothing. We are speculating on population density in a made up place in a magical land where winter lasts for years. My apologies.

[WildBlood]

No way the North has 5 million people...

From the wiki for the Seven kingdoms:

Population

The population of the Seven Kingdoms numbers in the millions. It is sparsely populated in the vast regions of the North and the deserts of Dorne, and mostly densely populated in the fertile lands of the Reach. The kingdoms are speckled with villages and holdfasts and a few large townships, but only five settlements can be called cities, their population numbers in the hundreds of thousands. Listed in decreasing order of size, they are:

• King's Landing, the capital of the Seven kingdoms, with a population of half a million.
  
• Oldtown, Located within the Reach. The oldest city on the continent, and home of the Citadel of the maesters.
  
• Lannisport Located within the Westerlands.
  
• Gulltown, Located within the Vale.
  
• White Harbor, Located within the North
  

KL only has 500k... And it is the most populated city.

From the Wiki of the North:

'The North' is vast in size, it is the largest of the Seven Kingdoms regions, nearly as large as the the other six kingdoms combined. The region is sparsely populated, with vast wilderness, forests, pine-covered hills and snow-capped mountains, speckled with tiny villages and holdfasts. Its climate is cold and harsh in the winter and occasionally it will snow even in the summer.

[Ceejtank]

Someone asked him directly if a Dragon can be warged. His reply was something along the lines of: " That's a good question", or "Wait and see".

Can't remember his exact wording. But what I recall is that the tone clearly hinted at this being a significant issue in the plot going forward.

That's what I'm saying. GRRM loves to keep us guessing, so until someone finds a book in the citadel, or someone who know's what they're talking about in the book says it can't be done, I'm going to assume it can be done. However perhaps besides Brynden Rivers (The skin changer who is part of a tree, and is training Bran) I don't think any skinchangers we've been made aware of were alive during the time when the last dragons were alive. So perhaps no current skin changer has been able to try it.

[wolfmaid7]

You can't really compare Direwolves to Dragons in this context. Direwolves are not magical creatures, although there is something about the Stark direwolves that might be different. Varamyr considers stealing Ghost at one point and knows that he can warg a direwolf.

It is hard to judge who might be the most powerful warg at this point, but Bran has the most potential due to the formal training that he's going to receive. IMO, from the text, it seems that Arya might be the most powerful at this point, as she seems to be able to enter other creatures without even trying. Also, there is something odd in the text that seems to indicate that she is able to function normally while also seeing through another creatures eyes. (She is able to tell that the Kindly Man is the one attacking her while seeing it through the cat's eyes)

We can't say for sure if distance matters. As Varamyr is dying, he seems to roam throughout the north and sees the the elk that Bran is riding, Ghost, and many other creatures that he could enter. This could be a side effect of dying, and not a normal occurrence, but he does seem to have the ability to search for other creatures while he is alive.

There's some confusion in this thread about what can, and can't be warged. Varamyr's teacher never tells him that certain animals can't be warged, but says that some shouldn't. The reason that he gives is that the warg begins to take on the personality of the animals that he's controlling. (small animals are prey and the warg becomes weak and meek, cats are vain, etc.)

I think on the issue of Direwolves not being magical you are wrong...They are magical i suggest you read Leaf's conversation with Bran in ADWD.Starks are not just regular Skinchangers they are Wargs which in Celtic means Wolf.Varymyr is a skinchanger that's it,unlike the Stark kids he does NOT have a familiar bond with a Direwolf .The Stark kids are essentially Werewolves without the Hollywood transformation. As Bran and Jon have stated many times "they are their wolves" that's what makes them different,that's what makes the bonds with the DW magical.

[WildBlood]

I think on the issue of Direwolves not being magical you are wrong...They are magical i suggest you read Leaf's conversation with Bran in ADWD.Starks are not just regular Skinchangers they are Wargs which in Celtic means Wolf.Varymyr is a skinchanger that's it,unlike the Stark kids he does NOT have a familiar bond with a Direwolf .The Stark kids are essentially Werewolves without the Hollywood transformation. As Bran and Jon have stated many times "they are their wolves" that's what makes them different,that's what makes the bonds with the DW magical.

The bond may be magical, these particular direwolves may be special, the direwolves being in that particular spot where they were found may have had a magical spice to it... But the animal, itself isn't magical.

[wolfmaid7]

The bond may be magical, these particular direwolves may be special, the direwolves being in that particular spot where they were found may have had a magical spice to it... But the animal, itself isn't magical.

What's your evidence in the context of the book that they aren't on the level of being magical?

[Vuron]

The bond may be magical, these particular direwolves may be special, the direwolves being in that particular spot where they were found may have had a magical spice to it... But the animal, itself isn't magical.

You beat me to it....

And to further explain my post. You can't compare the direwolves to dragons in this context because of the quote above. The Stark direwolves were "made" for the Starks, so their being able to warg them is almost 2nd nature and no real feat. There's is more of a magical bond than having to wrestle control like Varamyr. There is no effort to them going into their wolves. With a few exceptions, we don't know the Stark's abilities outside of warging their own wolves. Bran has gone into Hodor, and Arya has entered different cats, but that's the only ones that I remember off the top of my head.

[WildBlood]

What's your evidence in the context of the book that they aren't on the level of being magical?

Again... the wiki:

A direwolf is a close relative of the wolf, but larger and stronger. A grey direwolf in a white field is the banner of House Stark. They are named after the real world direwolves, Pleistocene megafauna which were larger than modern wolves (but not as large as portrayed in the books). According to GRRM direwolves are an extinct animal Beyond the Wall, as they are a very large and dangerous predator, and people have probably hunted them out. ^[1]

[Vuron]

Editing to remove my post.. No need to post the same answer...

[wolfmaid7]

You beat me to it....

And to further explain my post. You can't compare the direwolves to dragons in this context because of the quote above. The Stark direwolves were "made" for the Starks, so their being able to warg them is almost 2nd nature and no real feat. There's is more of a magical bond than having to wrestle control like Varamyr. There is no effort to them going into their wolves. With a few exceptions, we don't know the Stark's abilities outside of warging their own wolves. Bran has gone into Hodor, and Arya has entered different cats, but that's the only ones that I remember off the top of my head.

Firstly,there are two types of magic at work here,natural and worked.What the Starks have with the DW and what some Targs have with Dragons constitutes natural magic. What V sixkins have is natural magic it wasn't taught it as a skill. The Starks are naturally werewolves in this world it and they are magical because they are one in the same.

The fact that they do it so easily is one of the proof because they are their DW.V sixskins is not any of his animals he just wears them.

[Bran The Burner]

There seems to be a general misconception of the comparative strength of different skinchangers. And as a consequence, this leads to a misjudgement regarding what the limits of "warging" or skinchanging could potentially be.

Firstly, Varamyr is our benchmark. He claims that he is the strongest skinchanger among the wildlings. This makes some readers claim that he is a powerful warg and that his capability should serve as an indication of what skinchangers can generally achieve.

In my view this is incorrect.

Varamyr is the strongest warg out of maybe a dozen or so wargs that exist among the wildlings, who in turn number maybe 100,000 people in total. And he is largely self taught, excluding the bits of primitive superstition and oral tradition that Haggon managed to impart to him. Haggon himself was an unwashed savage living in a hovel in the ground, who didn't know even the basic theoretical lore behind his abilities.

In short, Varamyr is probably not even a powerful skinchanger, compared to what existed in the Age of Heroes. He is merely the remnant of a remnant that retains a shred of ability in this day and age.

If there are a dozen skinchangers among the wildlings, there should be hundreds of people with latent skinchanging ability among the First Men in the North.

Now we come to the Stark children. They are clearly something incredibly special. 6 siblings born to the ancient founding House of the North, from the line of Bran the Builder himself, and all the symbolism that goes along with that. And all of them powerful wargs. Clearly they are likely to be far more representative of the type of skinchangers that existed in ancient times.

If 1 person in 1000 can be a skinchanger, that means that even loosely applied, there should have been thousands of skinchangers in the North in ancient times. And I would wager that the Stark children's Gift as as strong as any that existed back then.

In short, Jon or Arya will dwarf Varamyr's strength once they master their full abilities. Arya is already warging into her wolf across the Narrow Sea, and warging into other animals as well, without any training whatsoever. As for who is more powerful between Arya and Jon, that is impossible to say, but I would argue that Arya's talent is certainly more developed than Jon's at this point in time, given the fact that she was warging into a random cat at will.

And then we come to Bran. His talents are a thousand times more rare than that of an ordinary skinchanger. He is likely exponentially more powerful than even his siblings.

So to conclude, if Varamyr can only partially take over a wildling women, while in a weakened, desperate state, then Jon or Arya will likely be far more capable of this feat, if they were trained in the full lore of skinchanging - by Bran perhaps.

And Bran, in turn, is on an entirely different level altogether. Even if normal skinchangers cannot take over a dragon, I am certain that a greenseer will be able to do things normal skinchangers cannot even imagine.

So the most likely person to warg a dragon is not Jon. It is in fact Bran.

I completely agree with you.

Of course until GRRM rules out or confirms something we can't be sure, but from what we've seen so far Bran would be the most capable without a doubt to skinchange a dragon, For crying out loud he was able to do that to a human without any training (yes Hodor has a simple mind, but that simple mind is a thousand times more intelligent than any animal, magical or not, and probably also has more willpower).

And I don't think Bran will be limited to skinchanging Hodor, if he refrains from doing that it will be for a moral reason not incapacity. The fact that Varamyr tried to skinchange that wildling woman proves that it was a possibility even for him, and he admits Jon is probably more powerful than him, even though Jon had little practice and no training. So if Varamyr could (at least theoretically), Jon would also be able and so would Bran who's in a different league altogether. So even if skinchanging a dragon is impossible he could still skinchange the dragonrider and force him/her to ride his/her dragon into a cliff or against his/her own army.

Edit to comment about the North population, being sparsely populated doesn't mean small population, the Arabian peninsula is almost entirely a desert but still had a population of more than 2 million people 600 hundred years ago in an area half the size of the North.