[Zsych]

Unfortunately I have no appreciation for people's suffering. I like to see achievements only
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[Linwenilid]

I'd find that pretty boring. Not to say that I enjoy people suffering, but it's the stories of people struggling through the hard times to come out victorious that really get my attention, instead of simply "hey, look at all the cool things happening to me while I sit here smiling pretty".

Of course, the "coming out victorious" part is still far away in this series, and each entanglement keeps me wondering over and over about how are they going to solve it...

[Zsych]

Struggle should lead to success, not just be struggle. Like in GoT, Robb wins a bunch of victories, but how he does it, you don't see. The few decisions you do see however...

( Show Spoiler )

Getting killed for randomly marrying some girl when you had bigger responsibilities, and things were generally going your way...

He should've been raised from the dead so he could get run through again. Idiot.


Although that old fool king could've just killed Rob's wife too, and then later brought up the marriage pact again at some later date... Would've been the more practical choice.

The old fool was also lacking in brains for not taking advantage of his position as king to get good looking women so that he wouldn't have this problem of having bad looking and retarded children...

[Linwenilid]

Originally Posted by Zsych To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Struggle should lead to success, not just be struggle. Like in GoT, Robb wins a bunch of victories, but how he does it, you don't see. The few decisions you do see however... ( Show Spoiler ) Getting killed for randomly marrying some girl when you had bigger responsibilities, and things were generally going your way... He should've been raised from the dead so he could get run through again. Idiot. ... although the old man could've just killed his wife too, and then later brought up the marriage pact again... Would've been the more practical choice. ... although the old fool was obviously not taking advantage of his position as king to get good looking women, so that he wouldn't have bad looking children...

The thing is, it's not always the case, and that's what makes it real. You work hard everyday to get that promotion and one day, a drunk driver rides you over with their car. Things like that happen every day in real life. What I like about this books is that those tiny little things that in reality appear to be random, make sense:

( Show Spoiler )

Tywin dying at the hands of his mad-with-rage son, Robb (and nobody else, for that matter) not realizing how treacherous and evil the Freys really were, and countless other examples.

As for the matter of struggle that does render some fruit, Tyrion's chain comes to mind: he managed to keep King's Landing safe for long enough, with the odds against him. Also, take Arya: a powerless nine-years-old outsmarting an all-powerful thirty-something (Cersei) and making her own way in a violence-ridden land. And there's also Varys and Littlefinger, two men with practically no military or monetary power but with minds so sharp that they've remained unscathed in spite of being in the middle of things. They may not be heroes in the conventional sense, but they surely are worthy of admiration.

And there's also Daenerys. I don't care what some people say, she has military smarts and her plots have mostly rendered the fruits she expected: free slaves, a proper seat for her to be Queen, homage, etc. The fact that those small victories were trumped by subsequent failures in government does not make them any less important; it shows (at least to me) that her talent lies in the conquest, not the ruling.

*draws long breath*

In short: yes, Robb lost the battle in bed, and was an idiot. But even if you do everything right, sometimes things don't come out the way they're supposed to. Take Ned (again): struggling to do the right thing got him a head shorter.

[Zsych]

Competence is about good training and experience. Look at most of the greater heroes in human history and they actually are pretty impressive.

But as you say, they are all kids playing bigger games.