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pthighs posted:Yeah, I mean Henry VIII was able to defy the Pope, supposedly God's representative on earth, and create his own new church, and he got away with it because he had enough power. England didn’t “get away” with it they dealt with an attempted invasion by the superpower of the age, a break in the Personal Union, serious civil wars, a revolution, and then a long and violent insurgency. They just were lucky to be an island that was hard to invade. The Protestants on the continent were a bit less lucky. Also I would like to note that the 1500s was very not Medieval and the political power of the Pope was no longer what it was. Shimrra Jamaane fucked around with this message at 02:44 on Nov 9, 2021 |
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Nov 9, 2021 02:42
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the westerosi have already neutered their pope is the thing. the high septon ain't poo poo, literally everyone thinks the faith militant is a bad idea and the largest kingdom of the seven kingdoms doesn't even follow the faith of the seven. i think people don't really understand which era grrm was looking to portray very well. asoiaf doesn't take place in the local equivalent of like, the 800s, it's much closer to the early 1400s. everyone is running around in plate, faith-based norms are beginning to break down and war is getting bloodier and bloodier by the decade as the nobility becomes increasingly untouchable in their extremely good armor and as they start fielding larger and larger armies.
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Nov 9, 2021 04:14
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There's no evidence of faith-based norms -ever- meaning poo poo in Westeros. Targs banged their siblings 300 years back, ironborn slaughtered each other at holy moots thousands of year back, Baelor was making kids into High Septons.
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Nov 9, 2021 04:22
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Sephyr posted:It's been open season on the Freys ever since the red wedding happened in the books, so that aspect doesn't bother me. The Riverlands are too devastated and weak from losing the war for the local nobles to openly revolt, but it's kinda clear that the moment they lose their hostages (which Jaine Lannister requested) and there's an excuse, they'll be eaten alive. Everyone in and near the Riverlands hated the Freys before the Red Wedding and afterwards they just have it as confirmation that their dislike of the Freys was justified because they're untrustworthy, backstabbing poo poo. I'm pretty sure one of the main reasons the Lannisters want the hostages is because their ideal situation is they get Edmund's son in their care, kill off the Tullys and Freys one way or another, and raise the child, a Tully+Frey offspring, as a Lannister puppet who'd eventually be the lord of the Riverlands. Jazerus posted:the westerosi have already neutered their pope is the thing. the high septon ain't poo poo, literally everyone thinks the faith militant is a bad idea and the largest kingdom of the seven kingdoms doesn't even follow the faith of the seven. Westeros has crossbows. Crossbows will gently caress up someone even if they're in full plate.
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Nov 9, 2021 05:16
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:England didn’t “get away” with it they dealt with an attempted invasion by the superpower of the age, a break in the Personal Union, serious civil wars, a revolution, and then a long and violent insurgency. They just were lucky to be an island that was hard to invade. The Protestants on the continent were a bit less lucky. Realism is quite another problem, there was nowhere near as much murder and rape and general ruthlessness in medieval times as there is in the books. The open disdain for and otherwise zero contact with the citizenry that seems to be the norm in Westeros is also pretty unrealistic, Dany's situation in Slavers Bay where she's constantly answering petitions and negotiating with various factions is closer to the mark. Generally speaking GRRM seems to imagine medieval politics as mostly a telenovela about who slept with whose wife. The role of material reality is constantly paid lip service to (Kings Landing runs out of bread, peasants dead, no corn for winter) but then the Reach rushes in with their superior agricultural science and apparently just has enough food for everyone in the world. Tbf that's probably a consequence of the mid-20th-century history books GRRM read as a kid ,which probably did portray history mostly in terms of personal decisions of individual nobles, not to mention LotR and other models.
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Nov 9, 2021 07:10
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Evil Fluffy posted:
They really won't. Good plate armour is really tough against even a straight hit, and are angled over vital points to make such a strike unlikely. You might punch through with a powerful Crossbow at extremely close range* with an older thinner plate/design. But a good 15th century harness from one of the skilled Italian manufacturers would be functionally invulnerable to bolts and arrows**. They just don't have the energy to punch through the steel. *Also worth noting. Because they're chunkier than arrows, bolts loose speed and power even more quickly than arrows. ** Joints may be weaker, as are back plates obviously. I'm thinking more stand-up fight here. Deptfordx fucked around with this message at 17:54 on Nov 9, 2021 |
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Nov 9, 2021 17:50
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yeah crossbows aren't guns, and they aren't better at anything than a regular bow really - but they are easy to use, so you can drum up a squad of crossbowmen without training them from childhood. a knight in full plate doesn't want to get close to archers and crossbowmen because they will be able to aim at the armor's joints, but once the knight is too far away for that to be practical, they are effectively invincible to ranged fire. people in full plate are only afraid of two things: enough blunt force to crumple their plates, and getting knocked down by a group of dudes that can hold them down and stab through the joints
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Nov 9, 2021 18:03
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Remember how it seemed cool that the armour actually worked in S1 then by the end it's standard medieval hollywood staple stabbing straight through plate.
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Nov 9, 2021 21:59
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the amount of Hollywood Bullshit was steadily increasing as the series went on, until there was nothing but Hollywood Bullshit (and not even, like, the good kind of Hollywood Bullshit)
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Nov 9, 2021 22:07
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nurmie posted:the amount of Hollywood Bullshit was steadily increasing as the series went on, until there was nothing but Hollywood Bullshit (and not even, like, the good kind of Hollywood Bullshit) Yeah, they should've got an Errol Flynn type to be Euron and fought like that, would've been awesome.
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Nov 9, 2021 22:12
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Remember how it seemed cool that the armour actually worked in S1 then by the end it's standard medieval hollywood staple stabbing straight through plate. Yeah the way Jorah Mormont completely no-sells being hit in the side with a Dothraki Arakh while wearing proper armour was great.
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Nov 10, 2021 00:04
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Deptfordx posted:Yeah the way Jorah Mormont completely no-sells being hit in the side with a Dothraki Arakh while wearing proper armour was great. Mongolians without bows is so stupid.
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Nov 10, 2021 00:26
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So which store has the best preorder bonus for Winds of Winter?
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Nov 10, 2021 00:37
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Barnes and Noble.
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Nov 10, 2021 02:06
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eXXon posted:So which store has the best preorder bonus for Winds of Winter? When the last book came out Borders still existed.
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Nov 10, 2021 05:23
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Remember how it seemed cool that the armour actually worked in S1 then by the end it's standard medieval hollywood staple stabbing straight through plate. And in the same season Bronn kills a knight in full armor because he doesn't "fight with honor". Season 1 is a land of contrasts.
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Nov 10, 2021 13:30
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didn't bronn basically just make the guy spend a lot of energy to exhaust himself and then push him out of a window in the books or am i misremembering? i recall that seeming like the way you'd go to fight someone you can't really hurt with your weapons but who's wearing several kilos of metal on their body
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Nov 10, 2021 14:13
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V. Illych L. posted:didn't bronn basically just make the guy spend a lot of energy to exhaust himself and then push him out of a window in the books or am i misremembering? i recall that seeming like the way you'd go to fight someone you can't really hurt with your weapons but who's wearing several kilos of metal on their body Pretty much. The dude's wearing a ton of armor and is using Jon Arryn's fancy sword at Lysa's request, which he's never used and isn't meant for this. Bronn just evades him until he's exhausted, then knocks a statue over onto him and kills him while he's pinned beneath it. IIRC, in the show, Bronn gets a lot more shots in because they don't trust the viewer to realize he's winning by tiring him out. (To be fair, GRRM isn't exactly subtle in the books, either; Catelyn knows exactly what's going to happen, because she remembers when Brandon showed up in full armor for his duel with Littlefinger, saw that Littlefinger would be a lot more mobile, and immediately stripped down before the fight.)
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Nov 10, 2021 14:43
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Yeah I mean, armor is not a super power, both of those scenes were very good and didn't contradict each other at all, Ser Egen is forced to fight in full regalia against a guy who intends to wear him out, Jorah fights against a guy who wants to go through him as quickly as possible. Those were good scenes. The first season is so good. There's also Khal Drogo's bad rear end fight. God damnit I will not rewatch the first season goons, you can't make me.
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Nov 10, 2021 14:54
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iirc there was also some Vale politicking that affected the Bronn fight Ser Vardis was aging and only a Pretty Good fighter, Lysa could have called upon someone more formidable like Lyn Corbray or a Royce, but didn't want to show favor to any of the major Vale houses while they were all jockeying for influence with her. So she insisted on having a household retainer champion her in the trial despite the better options available. granted you don't get any of that context in the show
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Nov 10, 2021 15:15
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emanresu tnuocca posted:Yeah I mean, armor is not a super power, both of those scenes were very good and didn't contradict each other at all, Ser Egen is forced to fight in full regalia against a guy who intends to wear him out, Jorah fights against a guy who wants to go through him as quickly as possible. Those were good scenes. The first season is so good. There's also Khal Drogo's bad rear end fight. God damnit I will not rewatch the first season goons, you can't make me. I don't think I'll ever rewatch any of the show again, even though parts of it were quite good. The latter seasons just ruined it too thoroughly for me. I will read the book if he ever releases it, if only to see what he changes from the show.
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Nov 10, 2021 16:00
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Jazerus posted:yeah crossbows aren't guns, Funnily enough, early firearms could not reliably penetrate good quality plate armor either. The word "bulletproof" comes from armourers shooting a breastplate they made so they could show the dent instead of a hole to their customer to demonstrate the armor was up to snuff. Then again, they aimed where the armor was thickest and not from point blank range. I also have some vague recollections there being a distinction between "pistolproof" and "musketproof".
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Nov 10, 2021 17:30
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Ginette Reno posted:I don't think I'll ever rewatch any of the show again, even though parts of it were quite good. The latter seasons just ruined it too thoroughly for me. Yeah I haven't watched a single minute of GoT since the finale aired, I used to obsessively watch every episode multiple times (barring the last season), these things are sad for different reasons I guess.
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Nov 10, 2021 18:09
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Warden posted:Funnily enough, early firearms could not reliably penetrate good quality plate armor either. The word "bulletproof" comes from armourers shooting a breastplate they made so they could show the dent instead of a hole to their customer to demonstrate the armor was up to snuff. I think one bullet or bolt isn't generally going to take down an armored knight. The problem comes when you're facing an army of hundreds of conscripts, each of whom has a musket or crossbow. That's why knights were phased out as a military unit. In a one on one armored knight vs musket conscript fight, I'd be mildly inclined to bet on the knight, other factors being equal.
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Nov 10, 2021 18:15
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pidan posted:I think one bullet or bolt isn't generally going to take down an armored knight. The problem comes when you're facing an army of hundreds of conscripts, each of whom has a musket or crossbow. That's why knights were phased out as a military unit. I think it had more to do with cost tbh. Training and equipping a knight takes years. Learning to shoot a musket is pretty trivial compared to learning how to ride a horse, in armor, use a lance, use a sword from horseback, use a shield, fight in armor, etc.. Likewise a full set of platemail armor and barding for a horse cost way more than a musket and some balls. TBH I'm pretty sure like 50 knights could easily take down 200+ musketeers, though there is an actual 30 years war historian on SA we could probably just ask them.
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Nov 10, 2021 18:44
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Lancers were only phased out in ww1.
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Nov 10, 2021 19:22
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Turn of the century lancers weren't medieval knights If we're talking armor (which we have been) then by the 1600s most of the "heavy cavalry" were guys you'd have considered light/medium cavalry a century or two before
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Nov 10, 2021 20:38
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pseudanonymous posted:I think it had more to do with cost tbh. Training and equipping a knight takes years. Learning to shoot a musket is pretty trivial compared to learning how to ride a horse, in armor, use a lance, use a sword from horseback, use a shield, fight in armor, etc.. 200 men with muskets would slaughter 50 knights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjs4-u5lO60&t=20s
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Nov 11, 2021 00:10
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depends on what they roll for initiative
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Nov 11, 2021 00:25
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i deeply love Cersei's dysfunctional supporting cast from King's Landing (kettleblacks, myrish swamp, and all) and think those were some of the most regrettable omissions from the show HBO thought I didn't want to see Aurane Waters tricking Cersei into building him a pirate fleet, or Taena wandering around being the most obvious honeypot in the history of espionage, or Cersei attempting to micromanage the Stokeworth succession crisis but HBO was wrong!
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Nov 11, 2021 00:32
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Whizzing Wizard posted:200 men with muskets would slaughter 50 knights at fifteen meters they'd better hope they hit them all or they are absolutely, 100% dead meat PupsOfWar posted:i deeply love Cersei's dysfunctional supporting cast from King's Landing (kettleblacks, myrish swamp, and all) and think those were some of the most regrettable omissions from the show cersei being an incredibly inept political operator in king's landing is the best part of latter ASOIAF, this is correct
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Nov 11, 2021 01:05
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It's something ACOUP points out, but yeah, the fact that basically no one in Westeros believes in their own religion is loving wild. Like, yeah, we can bring up examples like certain aforementioned kings and poo poo who pretty clearly seemed to be playing realpolitik with religion, but basically other than the actual clergy we see, pretty much every single lord in Westeros seems to have a very (post)modern 'lol religion is nonsense made up to keep the masses in line.' It would be fine for some of the lords to be like that, but it's pretty 'unrealistic' that basically other than arguably the Starks, none of the nobility actually take their faith seriously and are more irreligious than your average in-name-only modern American Christian. EDIT: And while I agree the world GRRM portrays is much more akin to the Early Modern period than the Medieval period, that's not what he's trying to do. Again, ACOUP has a great bit on it, but he's a lot like how Victorian and Renaissance writers were; all of his criticisms on the barbarous middle ages are actually criticisms of modernity. The sort of warfare and atrocities we see in ASOIAF are generally unheard of in the Middle Ages with the exception of religious wars (and even then there is arguments to be made that wanton slaughter was somewhat abnormal; note that the writers of chronicles about the Crusades are generally shocked and often say stuff like 'you may not believe what I am about to tell you' when reporting atrocities, which implicitly states that even their medieval audiences would have been shocked by the level of brutality) but are the hallmark of wars in the Early Modern period and beyond. Like everything Martin is saying about how horrible things were 'back then' is actually about how horrible things are today, not back then. Which could be fine since, you know, all art is political and Martin is clearly trying to make a statement and an allegory. But that then falls apart when he also tries to use appeals to realism and 'how things were back then' to excuse some of his more problematic elements. Martin claims to be depicting the middle ages whenever it benefits him. RoboChrist 9000 fucked around with this message at 01:44 on Nov 11, 2021 |
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Nov 11, 2021 01:40
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pidan posted:I think one bullet or bolt isn't generally going to take down an armored knight. The problem comes when you're facing an army of hundreds of conscripts, each of whom has a musket or crossbow. That's why knights were phased out as a military unit. It defends on your definition of 'take down'. I imagine even if it fails to penetrate, a solid hit would likely stun you, drop you to your knees or even topple you from your horse (if it was not also shot out from under you), and while you are in the grass catching your breath it's considerable easier for one of the conscripts to just stick a knife through your visor.
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Nov 11, 2021 02:45
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I've actually been watching the first two seasons to see if I was right about certain actors' performances, and I have a few thoughts: -Everyone mentioned Djawadi's score as one of the few bright spots of the last seasons, and I feel weird about that. While those late-run songs were good, there's a lot of weirdness to how those pieces were used. There were a lot of Zack Snyder-esque music video moments in the later seasons (Cersei Sept scene, Battle of Winterfell, etc.) that weren't in the earliest seasons, and his majestic, sweeping arrangements don't really exist as much early on. I specifically remember the Dragon Pit episode where there were specific songs created for when specific people were on screen just walking. There's a lot more accentuating ambience in S1/S2 of the show. -The costume design is way better. I remember the costumes getting the same late-run praise and I remember not agreeing at the time, probably because the early seasons, people wear clothes, not costumes. I wish I could bother to go and get the interviews with the woman who handled those designs, because I remember her saying really funny, dumb things about the symbolism of each individual outfit. -Holy poo poo the actor who played Balon owns. What a thoroughly enjoyable performance. Harry Lloyd was also great as Viserys. -I remember people talking about Littlefinger's accent changing over time and while on my first viewing I noticed him talking more and more like a straight-up villain as time went on, I did not remember his accent changing so starkly. It's bizarre to go back to S1/S2 and see him talk like a normal person instead of like the Irish Batman he eventually becomes. -There are a lot more establishing shots in the early seasons that show you where you are and what's happening, versus the later seasons where it will just cut to characters saying what's happening, where they are, what they are going to do next, etc. -You can really tell how many actors were done by the end of the show. Varys' actor has so much fun and is so varied early on, compared to just looking tired and around Season 5. I think he had an idea that they were going to cut Aegon and that his character would lose all of the complexity that he tried to put into it. -Performances in general are way more enthusiastic. There are moments like when Tyrion says "Yes, well, I believe the Hand of the King is welcome at the Small Council" and you can see each of the actors react in-character at the right words at the right moment, and it feels so much more natural. -Of course the dialogue is better. One of the reasons why I drop watching shows is when I can see the writers just giving up on internal consistency and are willing to make their characters look stupid so they can manufacture drama. What kept me going with GoT on my first watch was how few times those gaps existed and characters shared and interpreted information in believable ways. -There is one big dark spot to the early seasons, and it's the sexposition. I really don't remember it being this bad. It's actually incredibly laughable how many scenes have really awkward nudity or sex in both the foreground and backdrop. I completely forgot about the scene where Littlefinger wipes jizz off of one of his workers then has her immediately start slurping on the face of one of his customers.
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Nov 11, 2021 02:49
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V. Illych L. posted:cersei being an incredibly inept political operator in king's landing is the best part of latter ASOIAF, this is correct Cersei's Continuous Mistake is by far the best part of AFFC and ADWD.
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Nov 11, 2021 05:17
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I always felt that in the books it becomes very...loose, about just who is managing house Lannister's affairs, and how, once Tywin bites it. Handling its vassals, managing Casterly rock and such. Cersei barely thinks about it, given her maniacal focus on the crown and her kids. She bumps Kevan off, and I think names a nobody castellan at some point, but she's never seen receiving an update or a raven about house troops, standing, etc. It's a bit weird how the Rock and the westerlands are a storytelling void in the book. No chapter takes place there. We know that Robb Stark took some castles and did some pillaging, and that's it. Even in the show they tried to make a plot out of it, implying that the Lannister gold mines had all dried out and the control of the crown was their last gambit. Nothing ever came of it, and it didn't really match the story until that point (other than Tywin refusing to forgive debts and pay for stuff), but it was at least something. Well, and then they just had the entire castle people and garrison gently caress off, with the army oddly happy that their homeland and families were captured. It's not like having your land occupied by enemies was ever a big factor earlier in the story or anything. Sephyr fucked around with this message at 11:43 on Nov 11, 2021 |
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Nov 11, 2021 11:37
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Mad Hamish posted:Cersei's Continuous Mistake is by far the best part of AFFC and ADWD. One of the worst sins of the TV show is how all of that basically falls off a cliff in the latter seasons, leaving nothing to Cersei but sitting in a tower drinking wine. It's like without the books to crib from they forgot how consequences work. Book Ned Stark: "We owe the Iron Bank how much?!" Book Littlefinger: "The Iron Bank will have its due." Book Cersei: "Pfft! What are they gonna do, send me an angry letter?" .... TV Show: They sent an angry letter.
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Nov 11, 2021 14:03
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Old Kentucky Shark posted:One of the worst sins of the TV show is how all of that basically falls off a cliff in the latter seasons, leaving nothing to Cersei but sitting in a tower drinking wine. It's like without the books to crib from they forgot how consequences work. "Isn't Braavos formed by former slaves and completely opposed to slavery in all its forms?" "Yup." "Hasn't Braavos gone to war with Pentos about thirty times to end slavery in Pentos?" "Sure." "Why did the Iron Bank back Cersei?" "Because Daenerys was hurting slavers' profits." edit: also, lol at GRRM outliving lowtax
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Nov 11, 2021 14:20
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pseudanonymous posted:TBH I'm pretty sure like 50 knights could easily take down 200+ musketeers, though there is an actual 30 years war historian on SA we could probably just ask them. This kind of thing happened sometimes during the fighting in the Spanish Netherlands, as the 30-Years-War also saw heavy fighting in the independence struggle of the Netherlands. As long as the musketeers had pikemen holding formation to prevent cavalry from running them down, the cavalry lost. But there were also some bad battles where the Spanish mercenaries absolutely decimated and massacred musketeers. What even the best armored soldier couldn't defeat was water, however. The northern parts of the Netherlands achieved independence mostly on the Dutch realizing they could just open their dikes and drown approaching armies
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Nov 11, 2021 14:52
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Sephyr posted:I always felt that in the books it becomes very...loose, about just who is managing house Lannister's affairs, and how, once Tywin bites it. Handling its vassals, managing Casterly rock and such. Cersei barely thinks about it, given her maniacal focus on the crown and her kids. She bumps Kevan off, and I think names a nobody castellan at some point, but she's never seen receiving an update or a raven about house troops, standing, etc. I thought it was pretty clear Kevan had stepped into the Tywin void, in terms of managing the Lannisters' household troops and maintaining relations with the bannermen. Cersei may technically be Lady of Casterly Rock right now (I think?) but Kevan's the guy all the Westerlands vassals know and trust. Between that and the main Lannister army being put under Jaime's authority, i think that accounts for most of the Westerlands forces outside of their home turf Of course, Kevan is dead now, but we haven't seen any King's Landing chapter since then PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 15:20 on Nov 11, 2021 |
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Nov 11, 2021 15:15
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