Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
 
  • Post
  • Reply
sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
The Greeks lacked fossil fuels; it was the portability, availability, and energy density of coal that made wide adoption of the steam engine possible.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Not all armor is a full suit of plate. Even in Westeros only Knights would have full plate armor, most archers and foot would be lucky for a helm and some mail. Jorah does tell Dany that the Dothroki have no experience in and likely not the patience for siege warfare as practiced in Westeros and thus would likely be unable to take even the smallest castle.

When Barristan kills Khrazz in ADWD he notes that Khrazz (a pit fighter) is not used to fighting people in armor, but he is wearing his full Kingsguard plate at the time.

sunday at work fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Mar 26, 2013

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Even if he can match the five years it took to write Dance, HBO is either going to have to get a draft of Winds before it is published or start writing their own material in 2016.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

WastedJoker posted:

Who will finish this series of books when GRRM inevitably dies of a heart attack before finishing?

Sanderson?
Tad Williams?
Patrick Rothfuss?

HBO

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

WhenInRome posted:

Guys, what are you talking about, GRRM can totally finish 2 books in 3 years while under intense pressure from fans and his publisher

I doubt he has 3 years. Given how far the show has taken some characters, how well some plot lines have been truncated, and how poorly Feast and Dance were edited (and how poorly Winds and Dream would be edited if they were ever going to be published) I wouldn't be surprised if the show only lasts two more seasons. They could easily cram what's left of the good parts of Feast and Dance into a season with a good chunk of Winds. That leaves them season six to condense what's left of Winds and Dream.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
That's it then. No chance - at all - the books finish before the show. None. It's over. We are going to find out how it all ends on the show. Did the publisher realize that was what they were saying? They would have been better off saying nothing at all.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Anyone who thinks GRRM has any say over what HBO does with their hundred million dollar media property probably also thinks the books will be finished one day.

sunday at work fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Jan 30, 2015

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
He likes to pass it off as the "hardest thing he's ever written" but the Red Wedding was the only real conclusion he ever planned. He may have had a vague idea of where everyone is supposed to ultimately end up from the beginning but it's pretty clear that after he blew his wad at The Twins and there were no more tropes left to subvert he started flailing around with no real idea of how to get to an ending.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Fog Tripper posted:

lol

How many novels has Terry Pratchett churned out since AFFC?

It's been three or four since he found out he was dying of particularly agressive Alzheimer's.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
This is pathetic. Really just simply pathetic. No matter what "twist" (like twists are some mark of quality writing) he comes up with the show is going to finish the big story notes and broad strokes of the world before him and no one is going to care that he decided to cut off someone elses dick or whatever.

sunday at work fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Apr 3, 2015

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

mind the walrus posted:

It's not even that there isn't truth to the phrase, it's that it's such an obvious crutch and cop-out for loving up the ending of a story and has been for multiple series within my lifetime alone.

I've heard it in reference to:

The Sopranos
The X-Files
BSG
Y: The Last Man
LOST
Mass Effect 3
Final Fantasy IX

and those are the big ones.

and very soon Game of Thrones will be on that list too.

Oh god I had completely forgotten about Y: The Last Man. It's possibly the worst of the bunch and the best case I can think of subsequently realizing the "journey" was actually kind of poo poo.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Thunder Moose posted:

With the show seeming to divert more and more from the source material - it will be interesting to see if they arrive at the same conclusion or not. I imagine the endings will be similar if not bang on - but with some of the changes I see it becoming harder and harder to do.

"Divert" in this case being doing his editors job and cutting a bunch of pointless crap with no real effect on the ultimate end.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Junkenstein posted:

Here's the thing. Not playing an important part in the conclusion of Dragons Vs White Walkers or whatever, or gaining some throne doesn't mean the character or plot arc amounts to nothing or is pointless. People seem to be looking at things the show is dropping and going 'well, guess I wasted my time enjoying reading about Strong Belwas then'.

That's not to say that some plots in Feats and Dance weren't pretty bad, or that GRUM shouldn't really be adding all these new players at this stage of the game, but just because the show has probably given away the fact that Aegon won't be involved in the end game doesn't mean it's not worth reading about my exiled bro Jon Con invading Westeros and taking back as much land as he can before he turns into The Thing, or Victarion's viking adventures.

Here's the thing, a decent editor would have cut a bunch of pointless crap and had the series done by now.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
It's like he found a way to make it worse than just not finishing the series. The end is going to be delivered by a couple of incompetent TV hacks, who despite knowing whatever broad strokes he had in mind six years ago clearly aren't capable of holding this thing together. By the time the end rolls around not even the show watchers are going to care anymore.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Jojen knows his part in things has been played. He had his moment and it consisted of him getting a real player into place. He is sad about this and is probably going to give up on life.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

rejutka posted:

Did not understand, googled. Marbling, lots of talk and graphs and blah about abundant (lesser or greater) marbling. Whut?

Marbling, the amount of fat and how it is distributed through the cut.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
The Watch is what would happen to any nobel order of defenders of the realm if they faced no real threat for thousands of years. They have stagnated and are focused on the small potatos they actually face.

John gets shanked because he announces, explicitly, that he is going to use the watch to get involved in politics south of the wall which is strictly against policy.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

emanresu tnuocca posted:

That whole 'nobody recognizes Jeyne isn't Arya' thing is a bit weird, it's kinda like the book tries to handwave it away but it's been like 2 or 3 years at most since Arya left Winterfell and until the fake wedding, and if nobody truly cares the whole thing is a complete farce anyway cause why even bother to pretend it's Arya if nobody truly gives a poo poo about it. And yeah, given that Mance took note of Jon and remembered his appearance it's very likely he also took a good look at the rest of the Stark children and he'd surely it's not the same girl.

Dunno, maybe you're right about Mance having some ulterior motive, many people suspect he's behind the writing of the pink letter and if that's true it could be speculated that his ultimate goal was always to get the wildlings to amass at Winterfell where they could take the castle and then they're pretty much all set for the winter and have effectively won themselves a choice swath of land.

What would be the timeline for that plan? Was he originally going to take Winterfell from the Stark's? How? The Boltons haven't had the castle for very long for him to be drawing plans around the current occupants. The wildings were moving tworad the wall before John joined the watch. Mance couldn't have hoped to take Winterfell befor the War ended as it did.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

A Typical Goon posted:

His original plan had him breaking the Nights Watch and moving through the wall with his army, that obviously changed when Stannis broke his army and captured him. His new plan would be what he was trying to accomplish after he reached Winterfell and realized that 'Arya' that he had been sent to rescue by Jon was really an imposter, why does he still steal Jeyne from Ramsay and why does he have the spear wives murder random people before the rescue? Did he really not recognize Arya and just get captured again? That be pretty lame but I guess possible.

I guess I figured his original plan was something to do with magic / the Others. Even if he had realized the Watch was weak and thought to end them with a unified Wildling army it's doubtful he could have taken Winterfell against the Starks and their Bannermen prior to the devestation of the War of the Five Kings.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

computer parts posted:

http://www.avclub.com/article/hbo-might-showtime-game-thrones-potential-eight-se-223137

Basically the suits want it but it's unclear as of now.

I give it 50/50 odds of an 8th season and pretty near certain for a prequel if GRRM is the only guy that really needs to say yes.

That article makes it sound like the network would give them more seasons, not that more are actually happening. The show runners have been fairly open about not wanting more than seven.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Krinkle posted:

I feel like I've answered this guy's exact question four times now. Yes the journey is worth it and more interesting than the destination.

Which is good since there is no destination.

Also the journey ends in a field of poo poo after floundering for about a thousand pages.

Edit: make that more like 1,500 pages.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Gianthogweed posted:

I'd laugh so hard if next season is just stuff they left out of the already published books so that GRRM can catch up and they can pad it out 9 or 10 seasons.

At the rate D&D are going they'll be lucky to have an audience for season 7 let alone 8 9 or 10.

At this point HBO's best move is to quietly hire some ghost writters to make sure seasons 6 and 7 don't completely suck and go out on as high a note as possible before the whole thing just whimpers out.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

TommyGun85 posted:

whatever, I guess its "cooler" to fight with a gigantic magic sword. gently caress me, right?

Yep, and yep.

It's a fantasy story and he has a magic ancestral sword. Even if it was something like his dad's watch that he only wears on special occasions, this is literally the special occasion for your dad's magic sword. If Ned was ever going to throw down with Ice that was the time.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

Invicta{HOG}, M.D. posted:

I can see where much of it would be but I'm not seeing how Bran "escapes" without someone to carry him.

Into the tree network somehow?

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."

TommyGun85 posted:

Im confused about all the show events for Dany.

I cant remember when or why she lost her dothraki the first time, but I guess she has them back so no progress there...

why would the dothraki worship her now after she basically just destroyed their cultural customs and burnt down their sacred city?

why would she once again lead the dothraki just because she is immune to fire. they already knew this. they already knew she had dragons. all of this already happened 5 years ago. wouldnt another khal-in-the-making just shank her and take control?

what did jorah and daario do? did they serve any purpose?

does it matter that she has all these dothraki again? there is no mereen siege to break and it seema tyrion solved that problem with the other slave cities and they burnt her ships in the harbour so still no going to westeros

It means all that stuff in the middle was pointless and she should have just started burning stuff with dragons from the get go. Drogo dies, she wanders the sea for a few years while the dragons grow up, and she's right where she needs to be no fuss and no knot: a leader in her own right with the fantasy equivalent of nukes backing her up.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
All it would have taken to make the course of events make sense was a decent sense of time and scale. Start with the Stark kids a little older and just have the war play out over the 5+ years it actually would take; no gap needed just a few lines here and there about how this campaign or that march took so and so months. It's the kind of thing a decent editor (the other thing he needed) could have kept track of.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Maybe Bronn just wanted to get rid of the dragon so he wouldn't get burned to death by the dragon.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Feast and Dance aren't awful books, their problem is they are unresolved middle entries in a series that probably won't be finished.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
A content spanning medieval war could have easily lasted five or more years. The Wars of the Rose's lasted 32 years. He didn't need a time jump he just needed to acknowledge the passage of time in the text and everyone could have been as old as needed.

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
Even the "good" royalty will start a war that kills your family if they get a notion that they are more important than they already think they are.

Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

sunday at work
Apr 6, 2011

"Man is the animal that thinks something is wrong."
In the book's original timeline Columbus leads a new crusade to capture the Holy Land which leaves Europe weakened and eventually overrun by the Aztecs.

The Aztec conquest of Europe and the European conquest of the Americas (orchestrated by an alternate Pastwatch who send Columbus a vision that convinces him to sail west instead of leading a crusade) both lead to a future of environmental exploitation and collapse.

The Pastwatch characters that the book is about avert that future collapse by innoculating the Aztecs against European diseases and accelerating their metallurgy so they can meet Columbus on equal terms and they all live happily ever after together.

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
  • Post
  • Reply