Quiet, Monday-Morning Napoleon.
May 1, 2019 1:19 PM Subscribe
A US Army War College instructor analyses the Battle of Winterfell.
Most armchair analysis of the battle thus far, particularly on social media, has concentrated on the mistakes made by Team Alive, to the exclusion both of a careful account of Team Dead’s errors and of an appreciation for why Team Alive made the decisions it did. Here, using expertise developed through study and instruction at the United States Army War College, we examine with care how Team Alive overcame cultural and organizational impediments to develop and carry out the plan that defeated Team Dead.
Well, in either case, TV and movies really are shite at making tactical decisions. This is endlessly frustrating to veterans, who are largely pedants of the worst order. This varies from the annoying "those weren't the right boots worn at Battle of Stumblefuck" to the more acceptable, "who the fuck puts trebuchet outside of the castle???"
Speaking from my personal experience as an ex-grunt suffering from minor to mild pedantry.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 1:57 PM on May 1, 2019 [17 favorites]
Speaking from my personal experience as an ex-grunt suffering from minor to mild pedantry.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 1:57 PM on May 1, 2019 [17 favorites]
On the other hand, "Tits and dragons."
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 1:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 1:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
In case anyone's interested and missed it, here's MeFi's FanFare thread on the episode (almost 700 comments!)
posted by exogenous at 2:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by exogenous at 2:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [5 favorites]
skewed had an interesting comment on this in the FanFare thread:
Really getting in this to beanplate it -- they could have set up some scenario where the Dothraki weren't going out blind, but were drawn into rushing out to deal with a limited force of the undead, perhaps a thinly distributed bunch that look like a quick and decisive victory for Team Living. There's enough visibility to know that archers can't reach that far, and the enemy is too spread out to make sense of using the catapults and the limited supply of fiery rocks or whatever they had.
So the Dothraki riders rush out, and once they make quick work of what looks to be the first of the first wave of the undead, the density of the enemy increases slowly, so instead of hitting a wall of undead (which makes it feel like they ran their horses into a brick wall, instead of defeatable enemies), they're surrounded after a first, optimistic sense winning. All within sight of the castle, but too far for archers, and where the catapults would likely hit a number of Dothraki, making them hesitate to use those. Then you'd feel this pang of wanting the other troops and units to do more, but realizing they'd just be killing off Dothraki, not helping them. And there you have real emotional complexity.
Hollywood, MeMail me -- I'd be happy to do some script editing. :)
posted by filthy light thief at 2:52 PM on May 1, 2019 [13 favorites]
The battleplan makes no sense strategically for the same reason that legal dramas don't make legal sense and medical dramas don't make medical sense. The writers are aiming for compelling drama, and they seriously do not give a fuck if their use of light cavalry or heavy infantry makes sense in the context of medieval military history. Why did the dothraki all die in a charge that had no chance of succeeding? Because someone at the writer's table had the idea of setting all their swords on fire and then seeing them all go out, and thought that would be a cool shot that people would talk about. It was!My rebuttal would be that making something look cool but make no logical sense is something of a shock and awe offense -- it works for a while, but then it loses its effect. This makes me think of a much-repeated lesson from Better Call Saul's former editor, Kelley Dixon: pay attention in English class. Narrative is very important, and don't take shortcuts or rely on cheap tricks for emotional play, because they don't have lasting impact.
Really getting in this to beanplate it -- they could have set up some scenario where the Dothraki weren't going out blind, but were drawn into rushing out to deal with a limited force of the undead, perhaps a thinly distributed bunch that look like a quick and decisive victory for Team Living. There's enough visibility to know that archers can't reach that far, and the enemy is too spread out to make sense of using the catapults and the limited supply of fiery rocks or whatever they had.
So the Dothraki riders rush out, and once they make quick work of what looks to be the first of the first wave of the undead, the density of the enemy increases slowly, so instead of hitting a wall of undead (which makes it feel like they ran their horses into a brick wall, instead of defeatable enemies), they're surrounded after a first, optimistic sense winning. All within sight of the castle, but too far for archers, and where the catapults would likely hit a number of Dothraki, making them hesitate to use those. Then you'd feel this pang of wanting the other troops and units to do more, but realizing they'd just be killing off Dothraki, not helping them. And there you have real emotional complexity.
Hollywood, MeMail me -- I'd be happy to do some script editing. :)
posted by filthy light thief at 2:52 PM on May 1, 2019 [13 favorites]
Also, shows hire lawyers, engineers, and weapons experts, to make sure scenes are written and look realistic. Banking on the visual dazzle reads as cheap to me.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:54 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by filthy light thief at 2:54 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
From filthy light thief's link: GoT tactics are "Confront your enemy head on—usually in some nicely arrayed lines—and hack at them until no one’s left alive or someone has won."
I enjoy the tactical nitpicking, but historically, there's good precedent for the above strategy: the Charge of the Light Brigade; the first battles of the US Civil War; most of Alexander's battles. Except for Alexander, it generally fails. But it's how inexperienced generals fight.
(I only follow GoT from afar, so I don't know if is what was intended. But I don't think Dany has really had much experience fighting a large force comparable to her own?)
posted by zompist at 3:05 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
I enjoy the tactical nitpicking, but historically, there's good precedent for the above strategy: the Charge of the Light Brigade; the first battles of the US Civil War; most of Alexander's battles. Except for Alexander, it generally fails. But it's how inexperienced generals fight.
(I only follow GoT from afar, so I don't know if is what was intended. But I don't think Dany has really had much experience fighting a large force comparable to her own?)
posted by zompist at 3:05 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
Spoilers ahoy, obviously.
I think the initial cavalry charge was appropriate for the era. In the pseudo-medieval timeframe, heavy cavalary, i.e. mounted knights were a decisive weapon - the shock and awe of the charge by highly trained and well equipped knights could easily break unprepared infantry in short order - as we saw at the tail end of the battle of the bastards. Thus the development of the counter tactics, such as knight vs knight, substantial archers with a ground advantage and organised infantry formations with polearms - also all seen in battle of the bastards, that wouldn't be expected from zombies. So from the Westerosi view, a frontal charge against disorganised infantry would have been the most effective use of their cavalry and maybe even break through to some white walkers. Dothraki again would have been used to the devastating effect of even a light cavalry charge against unarmoured, unfortified infantry in open formation. Their other skills, including scouting and as skirmishing horse archers weren't available due to it being *really* dark, and with the unknown size of the horde, flanking at night was also practically unavailable. And we've heard since the beginning how legendary their ferocity is on the charge.
Presumably the plan was to smash a portion of the advancing horde using their speed and surprise, then fall back to draw them onto the prepared infantry. As we saw terrifyingly with the winking out of the lit swords, they instead were unprepared for the sheer aggression and fearlessness nature of the undead and even the Unsullied, unparalleled heavy infantry, were nearly overwhelmed in short order.
Having the trebuchets in front and the cheval de frise *behind* the heavy infantry though... I would have expected better of Jamie and Tyrion Lannister.
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 3:05 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
I think the initial cavalry charge was appropriate for the era. In the pseudo-medieval timeframe, heavy cavalary, i.e. mounted knights were a decisive weapon - the shock and awe of the charge by highly trained and well equipped knights could easily break unprepared infantry in short order - as we saw at the tail end of the battle of the bastards. Thus the development of the counter tactics, such as knight vs knight, substantial archers with a ground advantage and organised infantry formations with polearms - also all seen in battle of the bastards, that wouldn't be expected from zombies. So from the Westerosi view, a frontal charge against disorganised infantry would have been the most effective use of their cavalry and maybe even break through to some white walkers. Dothraki again would have been used to the devastating effect of even a light cavalry charge against unarmoured, unfortified infantry in open formation. Their other skills, including scouting and as skirmishing horse archers weren't available due to it being *really* dark, and with the unknown size of the horde, flanking at night was also practically unavailable. And we've heard since the beginning how legendary their ferocity is on the charge.
Presumably the plan was to smash a portion of the advancing horde using their speed and surprise, then fall back to draw them onto the prepared infantry. As we saw terrifyingly with the winking out of the lit swords, they instead were unprepared for the sheer aggression and fearlessness nature of the undead and even the Unsullied, unparalleled heavy infantry, were nearly overwhelmed in short order.
Having the trebuchets in front and the cheval de frise *behind* the heavy infantry though... I would have expected better of Jamie and Tyrion Lannister.
posted by Absolutely No You-Know-What at 3:05 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
Also, shows hire lawyers, engineers, and weapons experts, to make sure scenes are written and look realistic
LOL, good one FLT!
GoT was never "good" about their battles and I've just been eyeroll after the first season. It isn't what the show's about.
That said, cavalry are notorious for going rogue (probably absorbing xeno- testosterone through horse urine), I totally expect a bunch of Dothraki in a totally alien environment confronting an entirely alien enemy would just go berserk, especially after magic lady gave them all flaming arakhs.
The articles have great points on how they (all) bollocks-ed it up wrt deploying the dragons.
As far as "subverting" fantasy tropes go, I was disappointed that Team Alive essentially snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and was bailed out by The Plucky Hero at the last moment.
Subversion would have the leadership of Team Alive come up with a wily plan on defeating the dead that could have been workshopped over at AskMe.
posted by porpoise at 3:27 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
LOL, good one FLT!
GoT was never "good" about their battles and I've just been eyeroll after the first season. It isn't what the show's about.
That said, cavalry are notorious for going rogue (probably absorbing xeno- testosterone through horse urine), I totally expect a bunch of Dothraki in a totally alien environment confronting an entirely alien enemy would just go berserk, especially after magic lady gave them all flaming arakhs.
The articles have great points on how they (all) bollocks-ed it up wrt deploying the dragons.
As far as "subverting" fantasy tropes go, I was disappointed that Team Alive essentially snatched defeat from the jaws of victory and was bailed out by The Plucky Hero at the last moment.
Subversion would have the leadership of Team Alive come up with a wily plan on defeating the dead that could have been workshopped over at AskMe.
posted by porpoise at 3:27 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
The major problem of a cavalry charge against an infantry that won't panic, is that a horse will not charge into a massed rank of troops. They just won't because they see it as a wall. Even the best and most amazing cavalry horse will only hit those non-panicing troops if it is dead. Either the Dothraki had horses that don't do that, like ours do, or they were wasted from the start.
The other thing I have learnt from years of teaching ancient military campaigns (unwillingly, I should say) is that you stick your most experienced troops at the back in infantry, not just to protect your commander, but because it stops inexperience troops having anywhere to flee to should they so want to. They get stuck in the middle, and the second most experienced go in front. Well that and no one can, no matter how well trained and fit, really fight with any sort of energy in armour for more than about 20 minutes, so all the knights would have been toast very fast unless they could cycle fresh troops to the front.
I don't care, because it's far more exciting to see the commander fight on the front on screen and have horses smashing into serried ranks, but if we're nit-picking, might as well do it properly.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 3:39 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
The other thing I have learnt from years of teaching ancient military campaigns (unwillingly, I should say) is that you stick your most experienced troops at the back in infantry, not just to protect your commander, but because it stops inexperience troops having anywhere to flee to should they so want to. They get stuck in the middle, and the second most experienced go in front. Well that and no one can, no matter how well trained and fit, really fight with any sort of energy in armour for more than about 20 minutes, so all the knights would have been toast very fast unless they could cycle fresh troops to the front.
I don't care, because it's far more exciting to see the commander fight on the front on screen and have horses smashing into serried ranks, but if we're nit-picking, might as well do it properly.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 3:39 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
Well that and no one can, no matter how well trained and fit, really fight with any sort of energy in armour for more than about 20 minutes, so
well, it was cold. So can we give them maybe thirty minutes?
posted by philip-random at 3:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
well, it was cold. So can we give them maybe thirty minutes?
posted by philip-random at 3:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
Also, shows hire lawyers, engineers, and weapons experts, to make sure scenes are written and look realistic. Banking on the visual dazzle reads as cheap to me.
OTOH, have you ever seen what lawyers, engineers and weapons experts actually do during most of their working time? There's good reason to seek the expertise of specialists when depicting specialized activities. There's frequently better reason to not heed the actual practices of specialists.
It's a visual medium. If you can't convey all your point in a way that will hold the eyes, particularly with a fantasy show, you've failed.
posted by 2N2222 at 4:03 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
OTOH, have you ever seen what lawyers, engineers and weapons experts actually do during most of their working time? There's good reason to seek the expertise of specialists when depicting specialized activities. There's frequently better reason to not heed the actual practices of specialists.
It's a visual medium. If you can't convey all your point in a way that will hold the eyes, particularly with a fantasy show, you've failed.
posted by 2N2222 at 4:03 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
The thing about medieval battle tactics is that they count on both sides being living humans. Team Living's tactics would have been okay if they'd been up against a foe who felt emotions or got tired. Or didn't out-number them like a bazillion to one (and grow in number at every death). It's kind of hard to know what tactics would work under those circumstances because that's not a situation that has ever occurred in real life.
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
The views expressed here are the personal views of Farley and do not necessarily reflect the official views of the Department of Defense, the U.S. Army, or the Army War College on the Battle of Winterfell.
Good to know.
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:22 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
Good to know.
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:22 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
The battle commanders in GoT all seemed mostly incompetent besides people like Robb and Tywin (esp Robb), maybe Stannis (who made a lot of weird blunders based outside of our logic), and maybe Tyrion. Stannis vs Bolton’s forces was a complete mess due to his own breakdown, and Battle of the Bastards was going to be a total massacre until the Vale came in. Mance Rayder and the free folk seemed to have a good grasp on their battles especially due to the cohesion of a bunch of disparate elements and their knowledge of the land they were battling in.
So idk most those ppl seemed rly bad at their jobs.
posted by gucci mane at 4:56 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
So idk most those ppl seemed rly bad at their jobs.
posted by gucci mane at 4:56 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
mostly incompetent besides people like Robb and Tywin (esp Robb)
[wanda] "If you've built a critical alliance upon the promise of a dynastic marriage, but decide that you really want to bang someone else and like nobody understands that you are IIIN LUUUURRVE just go ahead and marry her instead, sure" is NOT the central message of Sun Tzu! [/wanda]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:02 PM on May 1, 2019 [5 favorites]
[wanda] "If you've built a critical alliance upon the promise of a dynastic marriage, but decide that you really want to bang someone else and like nobody understands that you are IIIN LUUUURRVE just go ahead and marry her instead, sure" is NOT the central message of Sun Tzu! [/wanda]
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:02 PM on May 1, 2019 [5 favorites]
He had some critical military victories though! He captured the brother of the king twice, was it? He used a fake force against the enemy and then used his main force to destroy their forces at a critical juncture. Who else had major strategic victories like that? The other people all seemed to have more networks available to them for strategy and backstabbing, such as the Freys, or Stannis had Melisandre (which wasn’t entirely a good idea but could have been! And nobody else had somebody like that!)
posted by gucci mane at 5:22 PM on May 1, 2019
posted by gucci mane at 5:22 PM on May 1, 2019
Actually, I have my terminology mixed up. Robb was a great tactician, he won a lot of battles, but he was a terrible strategist against an enemy that had lots of resources available to them.
posted by gucci mane at 5:23 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by gucci mane at 5:23 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
Here's what I want to know. What was the plan for the Dothraki had Melisandre not shown up? They clearly weren't expecting her, and thus weren't counting on her fire-sword spell.
Were the dothraki just going to charge without any dragon glass or flame?
(Was there some other plan, that was abandoned when they saw realized they had fire-swords?)
That was such lazy writing!
posted by oddman at 5:43 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
Were the dothraki just going to charge without any dragon glass or flame?
(Was there some other plan, that was abandoned when they saw realized they had fire-swords?)
That was such lazy writing!
posted by oddman at 5:43 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
"Confront your enemy head on—usually in some nicely arrayed lines—and hack at them until no one’s left alive or someone has won."
In real life, it was extremely difficult to do anything else.
Moving troops in close formation is trying to do a marching band routine while people try to kill you. Seemingly simple maneuvers like rotating a unit to face the flank take discipline and practice. The Romans could move and reorient units like we do in a video game, but the strategos of a Greek city state had relatively to do after the battle started, because once the troops were committed he had very little control.
Wildling refugees and Northern conscripts shouldn't be able to follow commands more complex than "stand here" and "charge."
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 5:49 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
In real life, it was extremely difficult to do anything else.
Moving troops in close formation is trying to do a marching band routine while people try to kill you. Seemingly simple maneuvers like rotating a unit to face the flank take discipline and practice. The Romans could move and reorient units like we do in a video game, but the strategos of a Greek city state had relatively to do after the battle started, because once the troops were committed he had very little control.
Wildling refugees and Northern conscripts shouldn't be able to follow commands more complex than "stand here" and "charge."
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 5:49 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
The audience knows a great deal more about The Dead than The Living do. Some have seen them in hordes North of the wall, in skirmishes surrounding the Wight capture party, but had very little ability to gather intelligence on the size or composition (or willingness to risk high value assets like dragons while also inventing several centuries of aerial reconnaissance tactics when you've already lost one in an unexpected way).
That means - yeah - all those military commanders haven't seen The Dead as an army. Jon had, as had Jorah and a few others but Jamie hasn't, and Tyrion has seen the threat but not the army in an army-on-army fight.
So what I'm saying is: they fought it like a force with a mixture of experience and insight, incomplete intelligence, and a mixture of motivations in their own ranks.
So I'm forgiving some dumb tactics that seem to be based on expectations of a living army. At least they did have some fire trenches, though clearly not enough. And (I guess) obsidian heads or burning arrows. (Ask me why they weren't raining obsidian head arrows from minute one though. Range and weather, I imagine.)
But I think the fire option was obvious - The Living didn't take into enough account the Night King's ability to bring gale-force winds and ultimately punch through the fire line.
When I consider why Dany wasn't just raining constant fucking dragon fire on the lines from the moment they got a whiff of The Dead... I started to get all "speed of plot" but then considered again she's afraid to lose the dragons - they're not just assets, they're her kids, and she wasn't sure if she went out she'd come back because she knew one ice dragon was out there waiting.
Finally - the entire attack was a bit of a ruse to make sure the Night King ended up with Bran. Would he have come anyway? Maybe, but maybe he would have just hung back and let his army be slaughtered with dragon fire then fallen back and reanimated the dead Living without ever exposing himself.
Was it perfect? Nah. But I think the analyses aren't taking the full issue of asymmetric information and the tactic of "kill the magic leader" that was actually part of the plan, not a deus ex machina.
posted by abulafa at 6:02 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
That means - yeah - all those military commanders haven't seen The Dead as an army. Jon had, as had Jorah and a few others but Jamie hasn't, and Tyrion has seen the threat but not the army in an army-on-army fight.
So what I'm saying is: they fought it like a force with a mixture of experience and insight, incomplete intelligence, and a mixture of motivations in their own ranks.
So I'm forgiving some dumb tactics that seem to be based on expectations of a living army. At least they did have some fire trenches, though clearly not enough. And (I guess) obsidian heads or burning arrows. (Ask me why they weren't raining obsidian head arrows from minute one though. Range and weather, I imagine.)
But I think the fire option was obvious - The Living didn't take into enough account the Night King's ability to bring gale-force winds and ultimately punch through the fire line.
When I consider why Dany wasn't just raining constant fucking dragon fire on the lines from the moment they got a whiff of The Dead... I started to get all "speed of plot" but then considered again she's afraid to lose the dragons - they're not just assets, they're her kids, and she wasn't sure if she went out she'd come back because she knew one ice dragon was out there waiting.
Finally - the entire attack was a bit of a ruse to make sure the Night King ended up with Bran. Would he have come anyway? Maybe, but maybe he would have just hung back and let his army be slaughtered with dragon fire then fallen back and reanimated the dead Living without ever exposing himself.
Was it perfect? Nah. But I think the analyses aren't taking the full issue of asymmetric information and the tactic of "kill the magic leader" that was actually part of the plan, not a deus ex machina.
posted by abulafa at 6:02 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
Seemingly simple maneuvers like rotating a unit to face the flank take discipline and practice. The Romans could move and reorient units like we do in a video game, but the strategos of a Greek city state had relatively to do after the battle started, because once the troops were committed he had very little control.
Even Romans couldn't do this, at least, not once the battle had joined. Even Caesar, who likes to play up his role as the amazing commander who inspires, was pretty clear that once things got involved you had very little control over your army: you more or less hoped the centurions would keep their unit together and people would come back to the standards to rally and things worked out. Mostly they won by concentrating on cycling new troops to the front, so the enemy kept hitting fresh soldiers, and that was complicated enough that we're not sure how they managed it.
I must be the only person who liked the dragons whizzing around in the air. I figured they shot them fighting in the air mainly because they wanted contrast with the fight on the ground, sort of like with the fighting around Gondor in Lord of the Rings, and that's why Dany wasn't just doing scorching the dead all the time. It would have been a bit tedious to watch. Plus once the two armies mixed, you'd have ended up killing your own people as well as the dead, and I don't think that they had many people to spare. (Same for the reason why they had to stop the artillery and arrows at some point.)
posted by lesbiassparrow at 6:26 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
Even Romans couldn't do this, at least, not once the battle had joined. Even Caesar, who likes to play up his role as the amazing commander who inspires, was pretty clear that once things got involved you had very little control over your army: you more or less hoped the centurions would keep their unit together and people would come back to the standards to rally and things worked out. Mostly they won by concentrating on cycling new troops to the front, so the enemy kept hitting fresh soldiers, and that was complicated enough that we're not sure how they managed it.
I must be the only person who liked the dragons whizzing around in the air. I figured they shot them fighting in the air mainly because they wanted contrast with the fight on the ground, sort of like with the fighting around Gondor in Lord of the Rings, and that's why Dany wasn't just doing scorching the dead all the time. It would have been a bit tedious to watch. Plus once the two armies mixed, you'd have ended up killing your own people as well as the dead, and I don't think that they had many people to spare. (Same for the reason why they had to stop the artillery and arrows at some point.)
posted by lesbiassparrow at 6:26 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
Reindeer circle to elude predators.
posted by clavdivs at 6:45 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by clavdivs at 6:45 PM on May 1, 2019 [1 favorite]
Meanwhile, the first person who invents tactics, any tactics, in the MCU will conquer the universe.
posted by praemunire at 6:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [9 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 6:58 PM on May 1, 2019 [9 favorites]
And someone probably should have taken note of the fact that the crypts contained dead people.
Understatement of the century.
posted by MikeKD at 7:11 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
Understatement of the century.
posted by MikeKD at 7:11 PM on May 1, 2019 [7 favorites]
I don’t understand the crypts thing AT ALL. Jon and multiple others know the dead can rise from the night king and they didn’t say shit. Wtf is that?!
posted by gucci mane at 7:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by gucci mane at 7:12 PM on May 1, 2019 [2 favorites]
“Let’s go ahead and put my sister along with our main advisers in this extremely dangerous, closed off space where there are tons of corpses that can rise up. And with no weapons.”
posted by gucci mane at 7:13 PM on May 1, 2019
posted by gucci mane at 7:13 PM on May 1, 2019
Moving troops in close formation is trying to do a marching band routine while people try to kill you.
Certainly, which is why you had to be extremely careful with the levers you did have, such as positioning and the timing of those charges. E.g. Marathon, where Miltiades waited no less than nine days before choosing the perfect moment to charge. There's also Cannae, where Hannibal made very effective use of positioning, his more mobile cavalry, and simple commands for the infantry (fall back until the cavalry could provide an encirclement).
(Also FWIW the Spartans were able to do some more complicated maneuvers while fighting, but they were professional soldiers.)
posted by zompist at 7:29 PM on May 1, 2019
Certainly, which is why you had to be extremely careful with the levers you did have, such as positioning and the timing of those charges. E.g. Marathon, where Miltiades waited no less than nine days before choosing the perfect moment to charge. There's also Cannae, where Hannibal made very effective use of positioning, his more mobile cavalry, and simple commands for the infantry (fall back until the cavalry could provide an encirclement).
(Also FWIW the Spartans were able to do some more complicated maneuvers while fighting, but they were professional soldiers.)
posted by zompist at 7:29 PM on May 1, 2019
How to defeat Cersei: Go for The Neck
Isn't the easier strategy just to use the dragons to kill anyone who approaches, and then hole up somewhere for a few weeks while Arya finishes everyone off. Seems like this is the simplest way to deal with it. She wanted to do this anyway before she decided to go to Winterfell first for the Stark family reunion.
posted by jmauro at 7:34 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
Isn't the easier strategy just to use the dragons to kill anyone who approaches, and then hole up somewhere for a few weeks while Arya finishes everyone off. Seems like this is the simplest way to deal with it. She wanted to do this anyway before she decided to go to Winterfell first for the Stark family reunion.
posted by jmauro at 7:34 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
This analysis was really interesting. It made a very good point: a lot of post-episode analysis have recommended tactics that work due to the enemy's fear. However, Team Dead has no fear, therefore those tactics won't work. The flaming moat was a really good concept, but again, since Team Dead has no feelings, they'll just throw themselves on that flaming grenade.
Wildfire would have been a game-changer. It's unfortunate the Starks didn't keep some stashed in the crypt.
posted by rednikki at 7:36 PM on May 1, 2019
Wildfire would have been a game-changer. It's unfortunate the Starks didn't keep some stashed in the crypt.
posted by rednikki at 7:36 PM on May 1, 2019
The worst part of losing the Dothraki is they would have been hella effective against the Lannister army. If Dan Carlin's taught us anything, it's that knights are almost useless when it comes to fighting horse archers.
posted by panama joe at 8:23 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by panama joe at 8:23 PM on May 1, 2019 [3 favorites]
Yeah, Team Alive had a bunch of overwhelming disadvantages going in. The need to minimize casualties (so the Night King couldn't reanimate them), even if they had properly understood that, would've suggested going for a siege, but a siege in the dead of winter when your ginormous army doesn't even fit inside your castle and the other side literally doesn't eat, sleep or freeze to death is an absolute non-starter.
The best use of the Dothraki would've been as horse archers, doing hit-and-runs from the flanks, rather than as cavalry, but even if they had tried for that strategy, the low visibility from the dark of night would've made it pretty ineffective even before the magical blizzard rolled in; once the blizzard hit the Dothraki would've been just as screwed as they were.
I'm also fairly willing to forgive the putting the women and kids in the crypts thing, because there are a lot of unknowns about the Night King's reanimation abilities - what's the range, is it blocked by walls/line of sight, how fresh/intact does the corpse need to be for reanimation to work. And judging by how overrun the castle got, there really wasn't anywhere else to put the women and kids that would've worked out better. You can argue that they should've preemptively destroyed all the Stark corpses as a precaution but given the sentimental importance of the Stark ancestors to the locals, I can see making the judgement call that the possibility of the Night King being able to raise the very-long-dead even from well outside of the crypt was less of a danger than the loss to Stark/Stark bannermen morale from burning all those ancestors would've been. Might've been good to at least put a couple guards down there, or better-arm the women and children, if supplies made that possible. Davos probably should've been down there for one thing, and if anybody had bothered to explain to the Hound just how much fire Team Alive's plan involved he probably could've been convinced to chill down there and drink as well, and I'm pretty sure having just The Hound down there would've made the reanimated Starks a non-issue. Of course, Arya could've died without the Hound to tank for her at crucial points.
On that note, a lot of peoples' hot takes on "how the battle went wrong" and "how the battle plan was stupid" seem to overlook the most crucial part of all: the entire plan was basically, stall until you can hit the Night King with a direct shot of firebreath from a dragon. That was it. That was the plan. And I mean, it's a pretty tactically sound plan - hit the primary target with your biggest, most powerful weapon. As far as that goes - they did execute the plan, eventually. Dany got a clean shot at the Night King with Drogon. Direct hit. It didn't work. At that point, no matter how good their plan had been, the plan was over. There was no Plan B. If they'd been more coordinated, better organized, minimized casualties better and prevented being so thoroughly overrun - well, they might've tried to do some kind of fighting retreat southwards, and all gotten slowly murdered by an untiring army of pursuers. Assuming Bran is in fact on Team Alive, in his own creepy-ass way, he may have directly or indirectly encouraged the battle plan to be shit so that things would play out this way, instead. And since he was by far their best source of intel on the Night King they'd be inclined to give him a lot of weight when it came to battle planning.
Trebuchets outside the infantry line though, yeah I got nothing, that was just dumb as hell. Even if Bran came up with that, somebody like Varys or Tyrion should've been like, "No, that's dumb, Bran."
posted by mstokes650 at 9:46 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
The best use of the Dothraki would've been as horse archers, doing hit-and-runs from the flanks, rather than as cavalry, but even if they had tried for that strategy, the low visibility from the dark of night would've made it pretty ineffective even before the magical blizzard rolled in; once the blizzard hit the Dothraki would've been just as screwed as they were.
I'm also fairly willing to forgive the putting the women and kids in the crypts thing, because there are a lot of unknowns about the Night King's reanimation abilities - what's the range, is it blocked by walls/line of sight, how fresh/intact does the corpse need to be for reanimation to work. And judging by how overrun the castle got, there really wasn't anywhere else to put the women and kids that would've worked out better. You can argue that they should've preemptively destroyed all the Stark corpses as a precaution but given the sentimental importance of the Stark ancestors to the locals, I can see making the judgement call that the possibility of the Night King being able to raise the very-long-dead even from well outside of the crypt was less of a danger than the loss to Stark/Stark bannermen morale from burning all those ancestors would've been. Might've been good to at least put a couple guards down there, or better-arm the women and children, if supplies made that possible. Davos probably should've been down there for one thing, and if anybody had bothered to explain to the Hound just how much fire Team Alive's plan involved he probably could've been convinced to chill down there and drink as well, and I'm pretty sure having just The Hound down there would've made the reanimated Starks a non-issue. Of course, Arya could've died without the Hound to tank for her at crucial points.
On that note, a lot of peoples' hot takes on "how the battle went wrong" and "how the battle plan was stupid" seem to overlook the most crucial part of all: the entire plan was basically, stall until you can hit the Night King with a direct shot of firebreath from a dragon. That was it. That was the plan. And I mean, it's a pretty tactically sound plan - hit the primary target with your biggest, most powerful weapon. As far as that goes - they did execute the plan, eventually. Dany got a clean shot at the Night King with Drogon. Direct hit. It didn't work. At that point, no matter how good their plan had been, the plan was over. There was no Plan B. If they'd been more coordinated, better organized, minimized casualties better and prevented being so thoroughly overrun - well, they might've tried to do some kind of fighting retreat southwards, and all gotten slowly murdered by an untiring army of pursuers. Assuming Bran is in fact on Team Alive, in his own creepy-ass way, he may have directly or indirectly encouraged the battle plan to be shit so that things would play out this way, instead. And since he was by far their best source of intel on the Night King they'd be inclined to give him a lot of weight when it came to battle planning.
Trebuchets outside the infantry line though, yeah I got nothing, that was just dumb as hell. Even if Bran came up with that, somebody like Varys or Tyrion should've been like, "No, that's dumb, Bran."
posted by mstokes650 at 9:46 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
Okay, now on to the real question: would the Battle of Winterfell have gone better or worse if the army of the dead was composed of mouse wights, assuming the total mass of the army remained unchanged (i.e., each human-sized wight was replaced with 3000 mouse wights)? Discuss.
posted by dephlogisticated at 10:19 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
posted by dephlogisticated at 10:19 PM on May 1, 2019 [10 favorites]
I like how the tone of the dissections has tended more towards "these are the mistakes the commanders made" rather than "the showrunners don't know anything about history." I think there's a really good case for the second one (or more precisely that they don't care) and maybe fewer people are framing it that way because it's so obvious this time.
As a member of "why fight in the field when a castle is behind you" school, Farley makes points that are in retrospect blindingly obvious. I was picturing the sieges of Vienna or Malta or Rhodes (or Helm's Deep or Gondor.) But the dead don't starve or get dysentery or lose a battle of attrition. Really bad idea. Happy that no one thinks the trebuchets in front of the infantry made a lick of sense as that was one of my other complaints.
Interpreting the cavalry charge as an attempt to strike at the leadership is a clever ploy*. That means they tried the one winning move (kill the Night King) at least four times: Dothraki cavalry charge, dragon incineration, Jon Snow single charge, and Arya Stark surgical strike.
I only disagree on his assessment of Jon Snow's dragon strike which he thought was too risky. Even if they knew the Night King was immune at the time, taking out all the White Walkers early would have had a big impact. And the dead who de-animate that way crumble so aren't available for another round.
*Alternative theory: Sansa Stark argued for it in council, knowing it would remove a weapon from Dany in the follow up and force her to rely more on northern allies.
posted by mark k at 10:40 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
As a member of "why fight in the field when a castle is behind you" school, Farley makes points that are in retrospect blindingly obvious. I was picturing the sieges of Vienna or Malta or Rhodes (or Helm's Deep or Gondor.) But the dead don't starve or get dysentery or lose a battle of attrition. Really bad idea. Happy that no one thinks the trebuchets in front of the infantry made a lick of sense as that was one of my other complaints.
Interpreting the cavalry charge as an attempt to strike at the leadership is a clever ploy*. That means they tried the one winning move (kill the Night King) at least four times: Dothraki cavalry charge, dragon incineration, Jon Snow single charge, and Arya Stark surgical strike.
I only disagree on his assessment of Jon Snow's dragon strike which he thought was too risky. Even if they knew the Night King was immune at the time, taking out all the White Walkers early would have had a big impact. And the dead who de-animate that way crumble so aren't available for another round.
*Alternative theory: Sansa Stark argued for it in council, knowing it would remove a weapon from Dany in the follow up and force her to rely more on northern allies.
posted by mark k at 10:40 PM on May 1, 2019 [4 favorites]
Finally - the entire attack was a bit of a ruse to make sure the Night King ended up with Bran.
This was my understanding. Thus the point was not to 'win' the battle on the field, the whole spectacle was a ruse to get the Night King to visit Bran by the special tree, whereupon one of the guys with the arrows would shoot him. At least, that was how I understood it.
(This neutralized a lot of TeamDead's advantages - specifically not needing to eat. Though the Dothraki death charge does seem a bit of a mistake - did they think they would be able to kill all the zombies right then and there with their flaming swords? I don't know if that's a reasonable assumption on the Dothraki's part or not but it was how I understood why they ran off - they were super-badasses, they'd clean it all up themselves. (I haven't watched much of this show, tbh)
Could Dany's dragon have picked up the Night King and chomped him in two? It doesn't really matter, the big fire business should have done it, reasonably, but does the Night King have defense against getting bitten in half? Did anyone in Winterfell know one way or the other? This is a real pickle in the whole shouting match - How much did Team Alive really know about their opponent anyway? (Like, the reason for the Crypt mistake was, I thought, the assumption that the Night King could only re-animate corpses he or his minions had killed.)
Going from the above first assumption, that the point was to get the Night King to the tree, could they have done that quicker/better with fewer casualties (or was this, even, not the principle objective but a side-benefit?)
posted by From Bklyn at 1:08 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
This was my understanding. Thus the point was not to 'win' the battle on the field, the whole spectacle was a ruse to get the Night King to visit Bran by the special tree, whereupon one of the guys with the arrows would shoot him. At least, that was how I understood it.
(This neutralized a lot of TeamDead's advantages - specifically not needing to eat. Though the Dothraki death charge does seem a bit of a mistake - did they think they would be able to kill all the zombies right then and there with their flaming swords? I don't know if that's a reasonable assumption on the Dothraki's part or not but it was how I understood why they ran off - they were super-badasses, they'd clean it all up themselves. (I haven't watched much of this show, tbh)
Could Dany's dragon have picked up the Night King and chomped him in two? It doesn't really matter, the big fire business should have done it, reasonably, but does the Night King have defense against getting bitten in half? Did anyone in Winterfell know one way or the other? This is a real pickle in the whole shouting match - How much did Team Alive really know about their opponent anyway? (Like, the reason for the Crypt mistake was, I thought, the assumption that the Night King could only re-animate corpses he or his minions had killed.)
Going from the above first assumption, that the point was to get the Night King to the tree, could they have done that quicker/better with fewer casualties (or was this, even, not the principle objective but a side-benefit?)
posted by From Bklyn at 1:08 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
I admire the She-Ra reboot approach (Season 2, Episode 4) of going all-in on the complete lack of coherent strategy. They eventually just admit it, own it, and proceed.
posted by kyrademon at 2:32 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by kyrademon at 2:32 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
Kingkiller Chronicle showrunner John Rogers: “Precis: Jon Snow & Daenerys Targaryen Intentionally Pursued Sub-Optimal Tactics in Order to Expose Lyanna Mormont to Fatal Risk Thereby Eliminating Their Most Capable Political Rival in the North. In this paper I will -- 1/438”
And “I am heartened to see Jon Snow keeping the fine royal military tradition alive of
"feed the colonials into the grinder first, in descending order of brown-ness". My hope is that this is the Dothrakis Gallipoli, and it motivates them to declare independence.”
posted by Doktor Zed at 6:05 AM on May 2, 2019 [13 favorites]
And “I am heartened to see Jon Snow keeping the fine royal military tradition alive of
"feed the colonials into the grinder first, in descending order of brown-ness". My hope is that this is the Dothrakis Gallipoli, and it motivates them to declare independence.”
posted by Doktor Zed at 6:05 AM on May 2, 2019 [13 favorites]
This destruction of the cav squadron leaves the allied forces without their reconnaissance assets.
And what would the recon have ever reported back that would have been useful?
Describe the composition of the enemy troops? It's a tidal wave of undead.
How many? It's a tidal wave of undead.
What are their positions: It's a tidal wave of undead.
This was already known. The only thing that surprised me was that they didn't have dothraki scouts updating them on when exactly the dead would arrive.
posted by srboisvert at 7:27 AM on May 2, 2019 [5 favorites]
And what would the recon have ever reported back that would have been useful?
Describe the composition of the enemy troops? It's a tidal wave of undead.
How many? It's a tidal wave of undead.
What are their positions: It's a tidal wave of undead.
This was already known. The only thing that surprised me was that they didn't have dothraki scouts updating them on when exactly the dead would arrive.
posted by srboisvert at 7:27 AM on May 2, 2019 [5 favorites]
> I'm also fairly willing to forgive the putting the women and kids in the crypts thing, because there are a lot of unknowns about the Night King's reanimation abilities - what's the range, is it blocked by walls/line of sight, how fresh/intact does the corpse need to be for reanimation to work. And judging by how overrun the castle got, there really wasn't anywhere else to put the women and kids that would've worked out better. You can argue that they should've preemptively destroyed all the Stark corpses as a precaution but given the sentimental importance of the Stark ancestors to the locals, I can see making the judgement call that the possibility of the Night King being able to raise the very-long-dead even from well outside of the crypt was less of a danger than the loss to Stark/Stark bannermen morale from burning all those ancestors would've been
Burning the Important Stark Ancestor Skeletons is worse for morale among the locals than the locals losing vast numbers of their men and boys in a bloodbath? I mean, yes, that is an arguably realistic viewpoint, sociologically speaking, but still a needlessly dumb tactical move.
A better leadership decision would have been for Sansa and Jon to take charge of a dignified preemptive ancestor-burning ceremony. Lyanna would have championed it and rallied the bannermen to regard it as the North honorably taking care of their own.
posted by desuetude at 8:14 AM on May 2, 2019
Burning the Important Stark Ancestor Skeletons is worse for morale among the locals than the locals losing vast numbers of their men and boys in a bloodbath? I mean, yes, that is an arguably realistic viewpoint, sociologically speaking, but still a needlessly dumb tactical move.
A better leadership decision would have been for Sansa and Jon to take charge of a dignified preemptive ancestor-burning ceremony. Lyanna would have championed it and rallied the bannermen to regard it as the North honorably taking care of their own.
posted by desuetude at 8:14 AM on May 2, 2019
> This was my understanding. Thus the point was not to 'win' the battle on the field, the whole spectacle was a ruse to get the Night King to visit Bran by the special tree, whereupon one of the guys with the arrows would shoot him. At least, that was how I understood it.
The Dothraki could have been handy there, hmm? I realize that this show is not going to give the hero's moment to a random brown person/centaur, but setting up Theon for his Very Important Doomed Martyrdom Moment could have been more interesting with Dothraki support than watching a small band of Theon's people pace around the tree and jump at shadows.
posted by desuetude at 8:36 AM on May 2, 2019
The Dothraki could have been handy there, hmm? I realize that this show is not going to give the hero's moment to a random brown person/centaur, but setting up Theon for his Very Important Doomed Martyrdom Moment could have been more interesting with Dothraki support than watching a small band of Theon's people pace around the tree and jump at shadows.
posted by desuetude at 8:36 AM on May 2, 2019
Meanwhile, the first person who invents tactics, any tactics, in the MCU will conquer the universe.
If memory serves me correctly, during the Secret Wars crossover mini-series, the typical instruction given by Captain America, supposedly one of the best tacticians among the Marvel heroes, was "Hit 'em hard and fast, people!"
posted by Gelatin at 8:48 AM on May 2, 2019 [1 favorite]
If memory serves me correctly, during the Secret Wars crossover mini-series, the typical instruction given by Captain America, supposedly one of the best tacticians among the Marvel heroes, was "Hit 'em hard and fast, people!"
posted by Gelatin at 8:48 AM on May 2, 2019 [1 favorite]
“Let’s go ahead and put my sister along with our main advisers in this extremely dangerous, closed off space where there are tons of corpses that can rise up. And with no weapons.”
To be fair, they are skeletons in a stone box. It seems like it'd take a bit for them to scritch their way through.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:57 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
To be fair, they are skeletons in a stone box. It seems like it'd take a bit for them to scritch their way through.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:57 AM on May 2, 2019 [2 favorites]
in case nobody's made the point yet, I think it's fair to point out that the average Game Of Thrones viewer is magnitudes more zombie savvy than even the savviest Game Of Thrones character.
posted by philip-random at 11:54 AM on May 2, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by philip-random at 11:54 AM on May 2, 2019 [5 favorites]
magnitudes more zombie savvyBut GoT wights are not regular zombies, right? They're fast, and at least nominally clever (see careful searching of the library), and they use at least simple weapons.
GoT wights also lack the "will infect you with a bite and then you're fucked" weapon, which is nice, and they suffer from that critical "cut the strings and they fall to pieces" problem. They have a weird weakness to dragonglass and dragonsteel.
That's no zombie tradition I know of, unless it's maybe 28 Days Later (who weren't actually undead, so it's not quite a fit there, either).
tl;dr is that they're their own thing, really, aren't they?
posted by uberchet at 12:58 PM on May 2, 2019
I don't think it's that the wights are independently clever so much as that they are controlled by a central mainframe (or mainframes if we're assuming all White Walkers have the ability to control wights).
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:05 PM on May 2, 2019
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:05 PM on May 2, 2019
The other thing I have learnt from years of teaching ancient military campaigns (unwillingly, I should say) is that you stick your most experienced troops at the back in infantry, not just to protect your commander, but because it stops inexperience troops having anywhere to flee to should they so want to.
Wait... triarii form behind hastati so that the hastati can't run away? Why did this never occur to me before.
Meanwhile, the first person who invents tactics, any tactics, in the MCU will conquer the universe.
Yeah I saw Endgame after GoT and imagine my shock and surprise when Winterfell contained only the second worst army tactic I saw this week. It's interesting that you don't see as much griping about it though. But that could be because I read the GoT threads and not the Avengers threads.
posted by Justinian at 3:26 AM on May 3, 2019 [1 favorite]
Wait... triarii form behind hastati so that the hastati can't run away? Why did this never occur to me before.
Meanwhile, the first person who invents tactics, any tactics, in the MCU will conquer the universe.
Yeah I saw Endgame after GoT and imagine my shock and surprise when Winterfell contained only the second worst army tactic I saw this week. It's interesting that you don't see as much griping about it though. But that could be because I read the GoT threads and not the Avengers threads.
posted by Justinian at 3:26 AM on May 3, 2019 [1 favorite]
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posted by filthy light thief at 1:24 PM on May 1, 2019 [12 favorites]