Originally Posted by Discuss Thrower:
The "wtf where are the scorpions?" thing is an unfortunate side effect of "writers typically suck at scale & numbers" thing.
For Westerosis to plausibly forget a usable dragon countermeasure would need about another 100 years of history to elapse between Danaerys crossing the sea and the death of the last dragon in King's Landing.
In fairness, i think it's about 80 years. There's a pretty big gap in time between this period and Dany.
I think the biggest issue is still that even if you don't use 'em on dragons, wouldn't you use them on ships? Blast that sucker into the side of a ship's hull and that's ballgame. Or as an anti-siege weapon? I mean any offensive against a walled city is going to have siege towers, no? Stick a scorpion bolt through the legs of one of those things and watch it come tumbling down.
Dragons or no dragons, I feel like the scorpion wouldn't go completely extinct. I mean think about the massive deck guns on the USS Missouri and other Iowa class battleships. No, we have no real use for them anymore, but during Desert Storm we kinda did - we started using them due to their range and punching power to soften shore targets before amphibious landings (IIRC).
We don't ever completely lose the utility of any specialized weapon. At worst, we simply re-purpose it. Or adapt it.
EDIT: Appears to be about 150 years. The Dance of Dragons is about 150AC, (little before that, but the last dragon dies around 150 AC) the War of the Five Kings is about 300 AC. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Dunerdr:
Setting up bastards and married off cousins to ride dragons. I assume this is the start of the dragons downfall. This could open up dragons with loyalty to their own houses. Is this where dragons start killing off all dragons until there are none left?
Also come on there has to be a wild dragon somewhere in the wild right? They came from the wild. Surely not every single wild dragon was tamed. I assume they stole a clutch of eggs to start. Surely the mothers of those dragons had more.
One of the most famous dragons in this story is called The Cannibal and it is a wild dragon.
And, I guess Bran sees visions of dragons in Asshai in A Game of Thrones. Now that we know the nature of his visions, it’s possible that he was seeing into the past, though.
Idk, in GoT, the maesters making the wildfire talk about how much more successful they had been recently at creating it, claiming that the dragons being back in the world increased the magic. So I sort of like to assume there were none living until Daenerys’ three hatched. [Reply]
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
In fairness, i think it's about 80 years. There's a pretty big gap in time between this period and Dany.
I think the biggest issue is still that even if you don't use 'em on dragons, wouldn't you use them on ships? Blast that sucker into the side of a ship's hull and that's ballgame. Or as an anti-siege weapon? I mean any offensive against a walled city is going to have siege towers, no? Stick a scorpion bolt through the legs of one of those things and watch it come tumbling down.
Dragons or no dragons, I feel like the scorpion wouldn't go completely extinct. I mean think about the massive deck guns on the USS Missouri and other Iowa class battleships. No, we have no real use for them anymore, but during Desert Storm we kinda did - we started using them due to their range and punching power to soften shore targets before amphibious landings (IIRC).
We don't ever completely lose the utility of any specialized weapon. At worst, we simply re-purpose it. Or adapt it.
EDIT: Appears to be about 150 years. The Dance of Dragons is about 150AC, (little before that, but the last dragon dies around 150 AC) the War of the Five Kings is about 300 AC.
Originally Posted by DJ's left nut:
Having forced my way through the conclusion to the Dune series with Kevin Anderson and Brian Herbert....I think I'll pass.
I never read Wheel of Time but I hear that Sanderson did well enough with those. I just think it's so rare. Even reading the "Tom Clancy With..." books that guys like Mark Greaney co-authored with him is simply jarring. And the "Tom Clancy's..." books that came after he died are worse still. And those don't have anywhere near the world-building that stuff like ASOIAF and Dune have had.
Sanderson did a good job finishing up WOT. The change in voice is obvious, but the story continued as it should have from a feel standpoint. I think it helped that Sanderson was a huge fan of the series and is a damn good writer in his own right. [Reply]
That would expose Aemond. Vhagar is powerful but Aemond is still just a dude. A fight with Vhagar vs Syrax and Caraxes very likely ends up with Aemond dead, even if Vhagar survives.
Plus there are other riderless dragons living on Dragonstone. If Vermithor decided to join the fight, Vhagar would quickly be overwhelmed. And if that happens, the Greens would have no large dragons left since it doesn’t appear they’re going to be showing Halaena’s dragon. [Reply]