Live From DC: The Asha Fragment and the Battle of Ice w/TreytheExplainer

[@2020foodreviews]

From an emotional perspective the battle of ice is the biggest battle. Because we’re invested in Stannis, we hate the Boltons, we want to see Winterfell returned to the Starks, and we want to discover the validity of the pink letter.

[@barrone71]

🦌👑❤️‍🔥

[@theJuulJournal]

Do we want the Starks to reclaim power though? They kind of suck

[@masonrockwood7732]

​@@theJuulJournalThey do kind of suck, i hope it's a benevolent northern coalition headed by Manderly that assumes power.

[@dylanberry9468]

@@masonrockwood7732tyrion is going to rule as king of winter and hills through sansa

[@isaachunt6694]

@@theJuulJournal why do the starks suck?

[@picklejarmonsterfanboy9367]

The Kingsmoot needs a surprise winner. After Jon decides to leave, ol' Cotter Pyke says, f*ck-it, we ball. "Iron Men, I have seen the Others and the squishers, and I tell you there is only one solution. We need to build a wall. Nobody knows walls better than I do. We are gonna build a sea-wall around the Islands, and we're gonna make the Mallisters pay for it."

[@jwc7215]

Character investment is far more important than spectical. Battle of Ice has fhe most investment from the audience, making it the most interesting to the audience.

[@rafabichels8148]

it seens very important that Asha uses her name after Theon telling her to remember it

[@LarthV]

On Mors Crowfood's death: His death does only imply him being dead - not most of the green boys. I could come up with a whole number of cases were it would be only him and a perhaps a handful that are killed: They were routed, and he was killed because his horse died and he was unable to flee, he was guarding their rear and sacrificed himself while they were routed and dispersed into the snow, he was killed in some sort of single combat, he had a stroke ... Personally, knowing George, I would put my bets on the "accidental" death, where he was just unable to get away with the others for whatever reason. That is, if George actually would decide to keep that idea in the final version.

[@connorandrews8517]

2:14:00 - the idea of the white walkers using ships also fits with mother moles vision of ships arriving at Hardhome to carry them south. Also with Cotter Pykes letter to Jon talking of dead things in the water.

[@baerververgaert1308]

The battle of ice has tons going on! Each side has uncertain allies. The Boltons in the Manderly's, and Stannis in the Wildlings and Northern lords like the Umbers. Several characters are planning vengeance on other lords. There is an assymmetry in needs between both sides. Stannis has to desperately win this battle, but the Boltons don't really. There is no reason to believe that the battle won't be a bloody mess. Betrayal during the battle. Wildling ambitions and battle traditions clashing with Westerosi tradition. Think of it like this. Something that might happen. - Stannis tries to pull off some crazy strategic move. - Some Manderly tries to go after the Freys - The Bolton soldiers turn on Manderly soldiers driving them into Stannis' trap - Wildlings raid across frozen over sections of the lake - Wildling leaders kill captured lords in order to win lands for themselves or their tribes - Umber's forces might turn on the Wildlings I think this battle can be a great mess as some of the battles from the Sengoku Jidai combined with military strategies from the Great Northern war.

[@masonrockwood7732]

I think it was wild Preston said the battle of fire is more interesting, just blatantly untrue. It also contradicts much of what Preston himself used to say circa 2017 when he started prepping for winter.

[@nont18411]

@@masonrockwood7732 Preston: “George RR Martin is very old now. He kinda forgot what he wrote in the story.” Also Preston:

[@LarthV]

On the realm disintegrating: Note that this was actually a thing in real life. In most medieval kingdoms with the explicit exception of England after the Conquest, the king never had the power to pressure his vassals into staying by mere brute force. For example, both France and Germany/HRE had incredibly powerful feudal lords for a long time, and in both HRE and Anglo-Saxon England the countries _were_ created from unifying different independent kingdoms. Nonetheless, there was never any significant attempt to split away from these entities. And why should they? Remember that there was no nationalism in those days, and so they did not really feel like being Northumbrians/Aquitanians/Bavarians/... that were oppressed by the kingdom and needed to be independent. If anything, such happened in Spain, when it was reunited and split multiple times, but that was simply by split inheritance among brothers and reconquest some time later...

[@LarthV]

On Big Walder's fate: In case he does survive, it would make some sense for Stannis to keep him as hostage - having your own Frey that is malleable enough to be convinced that supporting you can prompt him from inheritance position 63 to position 1 might come in handy...

[@kyleholmes8230]

What a fun stream. Good luck with the move Preston. I hope everything goes well!

[@KRistian87283]

The morbius intro 😭😂😂😂😂

[@soter8253]

Bro *just* got here. Here’s “THE ROGUE PRINCE”!

[@VMohdude-]

Is this your first stream in years?

[@ninoalagic4557]

About them holes...do the holes refreeze in couple of day so that the ice is the same thickness as it was before i.e. freezeng for months? If not, I imagine digging so many holes would compromise frozen lake structural integrity even if they refreeze

[@BreggyFolk]

Preston, the Battle on the Ice is not really part of Russian-Finnish history, although one could say it was all part of the broader struggle for control of the Baltics. The lake in question (Lake Chudskoye / Lake Peipus) is on the Russian-Estonian border and the sides facing off on the lake in 1242 were the Teutonic Order (including Livonian / German and Danish plus conscripts from the local Estonian population) and the allied Novgorod-Vladimir forces (including the mounted druzhina, mounted archers and local militia). The battle was one of the many skirmishes of the era focused on the Baltic lands that eastern, western or nordic colonizers were trying to subjugate with the indigenous population caught in the middle. The true, if boring, reason for these conflicts was the control over the lucrative sea trade routes. Of course, this particular battle was turned into something way more grandiose in the Soviet historiography, ending up one of the top battles of all times according to the present-day Russian history books. The most interesting part is this: if George has indeed been influenced by the descriptions of the Battle on the Ice and is going to use it in the book, will it be based on the heavily fictionalized version presented in the iconic Eisenstein film (made on the brink of WWII) or the real historical accounts containing much less spectacular descriptions of the battle? Historians tend to agree that Knyaz Alexander’s victory was based on his clever tactics, namely the pincer move and definitely not on a plan to have the “knights in heavy armor sink under the broken ice” (no such thing is mentioned in any of the historical sources describing the battle). But that wouldn’t make for a dramatic story for George, would it? :D

[@maxmercer1931]

The Battle of Ice should take inspiration from John Carpenter's The Thing. Tycho Nestoris should be the alien

[@JimRFF]

28:30 re: the "rushing together" bit... rushing as a verb is really emblematic, in my mind at least, of moving water -- a rushing river, floodwater rushing through a canyon, water rushing around someone's head/ears when they fall in unexpectedly, etc -- so perhaps the unfinished section was not actually the *beginning* of the battle, but the middle/end *when the ice begins to break* and "they rushed together" could mean men, horses, ice, and water falling into the breaking lake, or perhaps the chaos and confusion of the ice breaking allows Stannis to rush in and force the Frey forces into the now-broken ice water, somewhat like Hannibal did to the Romans at Lake Trasimine (no frozen lake in that battle though, just regular drowning haha)

[@Mj_Jetson]

52:25 *Osha Theory* - TTB orchestrated Osha's near-capture of Bran so that she would take him north of the Wall as a hostage for Mance, where Coldhands would've stolen him and taken him to BR. Since the plan didn't work, so TTB had to resort to more and more extreme Plans B, sacrificing Robb, the Winterfell garrison, etc. Osha is a vestige of that previous plan (perhaps a meta moment here, with all the vestiges of various plans that GRRM abandoned?)

[@dannylonglegs69]

Love it

[@arvaakuka8568]

If any section of Stannis' army is going to collapse, it would be the southeners, right? They are not used to winter warfare, and the northeners have higher morale since they want revenge on the Freys and trying to rescue Arya. This has all been established. So if the majority of the zealous R'hollr followers die, Stannis sacrificing Shireen will make even less sense. It has to be Melisandre doing that as a reaction to the Pink letter, thinking that Stannis is already dead.

[@yanverb7673]

Not sure about that. If northeners flee they have places to go. Where would the southeners flee? It's take Winterfell or die for them.

[@arvaakuka8568]

@@yanverb7673 Where would the northeners flee without horses during a snow storm? They would get hunted down by Ramsay.

[@LarthV]

On Asha's foot: Consider a sprain or a ligament stretch. Both can hurt _awfully_ but would probably heal by themselves.

[@alanpennie8013]

GRRM is the right age to have been very impressed by *Alexander Nevsky* when he watched it at his film club. It really is a very cool movie. The puppet episode of Angel is worth treasuring because of how much Spike enjoyed the transmogrification.

[@danielkoegler7773]

Love when Trey comes on ❤

[@dr4d1s]

I agree, he seems like a sweetheart and a genuinely nice person. He is a total 180° from that redteamreview guy who comes across as an edgy asshat.

[@dailylog4344]

It took me way too long to realise he had a jumper hanging off his back, I thought he had super hairy arms lol

[@masonrockwood7732]

​@@dr4d1sInb4 Redteam @'s you with 5 comments callling you a retard for not liking him. That dude lives on the internet.

[@danielkoegler7773]

@@dr4d1s I love how educated the conversations between Preston and Trey are. They really know their shit.

[@dr4d1s]

@@danielkoegler7773 I totally agree. They have great chemistry as well. I was even interested in Roman history they were discussing when I am typically not. I will have to look up more streams that they have done together.

[@Nosraceroom]

I wonder if the "rushing together" is kind of a reverse of the Green Fork, with one part of the army charging forward while everyone else feigns collapse. If Asha is ahorse, maybe it's just the 60 cavalry rushing into the Freys to engage/bait them while the rest of the army begins strategically retreating to the lake. Perhaps Asha is there because Stannis needs someone to lead who's both experienced and somewhat expendable.

[@TheHellyeahmen]

"battle of ice has the most interest just because it's Stannis" Accurate + based

[@matthewheywood8532]

Big difference between a few ice fishermen on a lake and an army charging over it

[@raucousreg9064]

Big difference between a hole freezing over and a hole freezing over enough to take the weight of a galloping armoured heavy horse and rider.

[@matthewheywood8532]

@@raucousreg9064 that too cutting a ton of holes weakens the ice on the lake and then an army charging over would fall through

[@umwha]

41:00 - I like that description because, as Eldric Stoneskin pointed out, it compares the basalt block to toys - comparing god to a child - and this references of Children of the Forest are like gods, and this destruction was wrought by the Children.

[@vpapako]

Make Trey a permanent guest in this show, like your Arianna Huffington.

[@nilen435]

The line"They rushed together like", I always assumed it was about the freys and their forces. I had never thought until you said it that it could be Stannis forces going forward. 🤔

[@masonrockwood7732]

"They rushed together like zorses and aurochs"?

[@dailylog4344]

Agreed, it's for more likely just another line of setup for the battle that's about to begin.

[@TheKrostiman]

What I think George thinks is smart: Stannis is sacrificing he’s least reliable soldiers. By letting them rush forwards on the ice, the big concentration of allies and horsed enemies will make the ice collapse.

[@adashofbitter]

If it were fake and joke, GRRM would have written something like “Arya’s head was severed on a pike”.

[@CupNoodles42]

Even if ice fishing the lake doesn't necessarily make it any weaker (and as you say, maybe George just doesn't know how it works), Stannis still has options. I kinda like the idea of paralleling the battles of Fire and Steel to have a surprise intervention of catapults change the course of the battle. A few hastily constructed mangonels could hurl a few boulders onto the ice at an opportune moment (Napoleon 2023 style), breaking it up and stopping at least a section of the charging cavalry. Also the fishing holes could perhaps be used to set up anti-cavalry stakes. Digging in frozen ground would be incredibly difficult, making some ice holes could be a simpler option.

[@mhg424]

I think they are spear fishing, not with a hook. Those holes are much larger

[@memeaficionado]

Not much of a fisherman myself so I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure in the cold fish stay far deeper, meaning you couldn't really spearfish. it'd have to be with hooks or something.

[@barrry9]

Re: the Others in the fanfic, could always try to combine the different ways they get through? A group goes via the bridge of skulls (drawing the Watch's attention), another goes through Gorran's Way, doubling back on themselves and creating wights along the way. The 2 groups converge on the Wall, whilst the rest of the WW army launch a surprise attack on the northern side of the Wall - basically attacking the Watch on both sides. Or something like that ;)

[@KonguZya]

I didn't even recognize Abubakar Salim in the show. The voice sounded spot on for Bayek, but he just looks so different than he did even a couple years ago.

[@memeaficionado]

On Varys's time as Rugen, doesn't the head underjailer (Longwaters was his name i think) talk about how Rugen could be gone for days or weeks and it was fine because they had so few prisoners? I get your point that it is a long con and still lots of effort for Varys, but i dont think its as bad as you guys implied. If Varys had to spend say 3-5 nights a month as Rugen, that sounds fairly doable for someone as good at mummery as he

[@LamontTruthSeeker-gb8jb]

I read Fire and Blood and TWOIAF multiple times before I ever got into AGOT. F and B is my favorite book in the whole saga.

[@luisferreira544]

About the rushing together line, maybe the Manderlys are charging the Freys?

[@jamestolliver7413]

I'm curious how Trey and Preston feel about the singularity that started the universe

[@13RadTV]

I’m happy that the small battle is the one we care about. Just like we don’t all love blockbusters with millions of dollars of special effects. We like heart. And we like to zoom in.

[@Hiyabirdie]

Everytime I watch the first season I'm just gonna be focused on Viserys' neck everytime he's on screen

[@jghreloaded]

The Napoleon movie has artillery breaking through the ice at the battle of Austerlitz but historically that didn’t happen

[@alanpennie8013]

When life conflicts with the legend you film the legend.

[@jah2113]

Could be thoughts or feelings that Asha is experiencing "rushing together"

[@wademarshall2364]

3:04:00 Actually a super valid point, and I believe that most scientists would probably agree. Most of the time these predictions are more exercises in testing the limits of our own knowledge

[@dailylog4344]

"Rushing together" analysis was a bit over the top imo. The sentence wasnt finish but its discussed as though it was finished. Coild very simply be something along the lines of "they rushed together to form a line" you know, prep befire a charge or prep before a battle etc. Doesnt have to be, both armies rush together to meet

[@Temperancefp]

To the physics aspect, think that even if we advance enough electromagnetism is still gonna exist, it’s not like it’s gonna disappear and we never speak of it again. And particularly when we come across a new theory like general relativity it’s not like the old theory just doesn’t apply and gets forgotten, general relativity doesn’t invalidate newtons laws, it just extend it to other extreme circumstances. That’s the whole point of invariance in physics. The laws of the universe seem to not change no matter where you’re a if you have the same conditions

[@scromtar4235]

For the Others coming across the wall I think it should be from a couple locations. The nights watch thinks they are coming through Castle Black or Shadow Tower. There is a huge battle and it looks like the Nights Watch is going to win. A larger force emerges from Gornes way and the nights watch is flanked. GRRM likes his last min army to show up and change the battle

[@saranonimus9211]

Aaaaargh noooo....Amadeus was *never intended* to be taken as biographical, but the subtlety of its purpose was lost, and people write it off as bad history. In Amadeus, Mozart and Salieri are characters, plain and simple, in a story about genius and jealousy. This is why a film about the character Salieri being called Amadeus is so brutally apt.

[@nobodycareswhatithink]

I just realized that big and little Walder are a Blackwood and a brakken. Very interesting.

[@FlimsyPickles]

Preston please use a cough drop oh my god

[@dailylog4344]

Would it kill him to mute the mic when he goes into coughing fits? It's the most obnoxious shit

[@iliaponomarev1624]

> the show kinda goes against the book in the "we don't know what actually happened" sense I suddenly realized that the show in Season 2 was actually trying really hard to recreate the spirit of the book.

[@aurick861]

Rivers....rush together?

[@hughmoore2143]

I’m pretty sure that Stannis is the valonqar. The question is about Cercei and Robert’s children. The valonqar makes as much sense as his brother as it does hers.

[@magister343]

House Qoherys is probably Valyrian, but they are also extinct by the time of HotD (although they left a lot of bastards behind).

[@randomchannel9473]

There's a decent way to make kingmaker make sense: around Egg's time as king, Tansell too tall makes a propoganda play/puppet show to promote Dunk as hand of the king and kingsgaurd commander. It became so popular that no one questions the depiction and it's just absorbed into public memory, especially anyone who would have seen the play and internalised it back before the fall of the targaryens. If it depicted the baratheons in a negative light because they didn't do shit during the dance, no one would perform it while robert was king. If it was written by a dornish person dorne may have kept performing it from time to time out of pride.

[@matthewheywood8532]

What happens in the battle of ice is the north remembers and turns on the boltons and freys

[@rampantrambling]

What if the epilogue of dream (assuming the night king is real) is the night king getting his own chapter that recounts his death from his perspective and hes a tragic character trying to save his culture lol, and we only get an insight into others culture after they've all been killed and the story has moved past them.

[@barrone71]

The reason Bron should’ve received The Twins was because he kept complaining about not getting his castle so The Twins would’ve been him getting 2 castles. Also The Twins is profitable bc it’s a toll road but it’s not the historical top castle in the river lands unlike High garden in the Reach.

[@randomantagonist8620]

I agree with this. The twins if I am not mistaken are one of the wealthiest houses in the riverlands, even more than Riverrun I think, also, they can field more men than almost all other riverland houses as well, them also being a relatively new house compared to all the other houses makes it a more acceptable reward to a upjumped cutthroat like Bronn, the choice for Bronn to get Highgarden in the show is kinda stupid because the entire reach would be up in arms and start another war over him being made lord of such an ancient and storied castle

[@iliaponomarev1624]

I'm wondering if Borros Blount is one of the knights beaten by the Knight of the Laughing Tree.

[@jamestolliver7413]

Um in college I learned in a history class that the pyramids were build by corvet labor, that is taxation by forced labor. I haven't read ancient Egyptian texts and this could just be a historical hypothesis but I think there was hard evidence for this. Also if you think of an agrarian society, unemployment would not be as much of a problem as today. Perhaps for artisans and engineers? 🤔

[@debodatta7398]

1:49:11 exactly so much ancient roman history is based off the telling's of comedy writers lmao

[@SHARKVADERS]

PJ IS BACK FOMOS

[@masonrockwood7732]

Lame

[@iliaponomarev1624]

> Big Walder killing Little Walder disproved Not really. It only proves that if it was actually Big Walder, he miscalculated quite dramatically.

[@Don11037]

are those maps beyond the wall cannon?

[@dr4d1s]

You should have this guy on more often. He seems like a genuinely nice person and intelligent to boot. He is a total 180° from that redteamreview guy who comes across as an edgy, unintelligent, asshat. Edit - I just realized that it's TreytheExplainer. I thought the voice sounded familiar. His name wasn't in the stream title when I was watching live last night.

[@alanpennie8013]

Trey won't like it if you badmouth RTR. They're buddies.

[@dr4d1s]

@@alanpennie8013 I hate to be blunt about it but it doesn't matter to me. I don't know these people.

[@OfficialRedTeamReview]

@@dr4d1s i agree with you Cody, sick of that other guy.

[@dr4d1s]

@@OfficialRedTeamReview I am glad we are in agreeance.

[@OfficialRedTeamReview]

@@dr4d1s 🤝

[@iliaponomarev1624]

I don't understand this "Theon can nullify the Kingsmoot" misconception. How is it supposed to go? Asha comes to Pyke with Theon, everyone is like "OK, so let's redo the Kingsmoot then" and everyone sails to Old Wyk to redo the moot, where Asha wins? Well, this "legal precedent" isn't really a precedent, it's just a justification for a coup. Also, it's not like Theon's absense changed anything for the fates of Asha or Victarion. They lost anyway. The only thing that can be done is to run Theon against Euron. And, well, the biggest elephant in the room, I don't really see Euron being all legalistic and cooperative about all that. And even if he is, I don't see how he can lose the moot after an epic victory in the Battle of Blood and Reach plunder.

[@hughmoore2143]

The heat death of the universe just feels obvious to me. The rate of entropy always increases within a closed system. The only way that there wouldn’t be a heat death of the universe is if the universe isn’t a closed system. I suppose that’s possible. Meh. Never mind.

[@wobh688]

Isn't Stannis paling around with with a fire witch? Could she melt the ice with "magic" somehow?

[@memeaficionado]

She isn't with Stannis, she's still at the wall.

[@limbus66]

we kind of see wights at the end of the varamyr prologue too

[@5210smile]

The lack of hair ages too

[@carl-henrikfelth3985]

Might be. If only we had some example of a man without hair to compare with a man with long hair...

[@5210smile]

@@carl-henrikfelth3985 hehe🤪 I meant the Addam actor, and we have pics with hair, but I see the joke

[@wisdommanari6701]

A character watching something is not a chapter.... Uh isn't a certain captain of the guard literally called The Watcher?

[@vpapako]

When you said "he's gonna start eating dogs to get assimilated into the culture" you meant Barristan ang Giskari culture because they eat dogs but I thought you were talking about Trump and Xhinese culture as they also eat dogs.

[@nickfinan6031]

The Pyramids were just ancient Keynesianism?!

[@profoundpronoun4712]

❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

[@satrmleo]

Only two comments?

[@hughmoore2143]

My head cannon is that Rob’s will calls for Cat to marry Jon Snow (why she talks about the trap he laid for her). Jon will be raised as an Ice Wight. The song of fire ace ice could be about their marriage.

[@baab4229]

I don't like F&B as a standalone book and I don't like it as an ASOIAF book either. I appreciate the worldbuilding but it's just a bunch of boring Targ throne struggles. I get that GRRM is obsessed with the Targaryens and doesn't care nearly as much about his other characters but I don't share that fascination with him.

[@iliaponomarev1624]

> Helaena's suicide Dreamfyre is killed in the riot, Helaena stops having her dreams and offs herself.

[@umwha]

Trey is lovely, but whenever i see him I always think of that time he honestly tried to state that historical people acknowledged 'nonbinary' people and had a concept of gender identities.

[@nilen435]

Remenber that this is a fantasy world and there is alot that is not like in the real world. Whos to say that gold do not have a lower meltingpoint or that ice freeze more slowly or that bastards is different from nonbastards in the story.🙂

[@dailylog4344]

Yes, the melting point of gold is a particularly stupid argument to make when it's in a story that has magic, dragons and resurrections lol its like..

[@Mj_Jetson]

3:31:20 With Nymeria dying, I could really see that as a darkest hour for Arya. Arya gets abandoned, possibly hunted by the Faceless Men (kinda like in the show, except a thousand times better in a million different ways) and as she takes her first steps to reclaiming her identity, she gets a dream of dying as Nymeria. The guilt, the despair, the trauma (as if Arya's story wasn't dark and depressing enough!)... yeah, I could see GRRM writing that.

[@edel5223]

1:35:44 idea, maybe the magnetic field up in the north messes up the white walkers sense of direction 💨

[@shayanlostflash]

2:23:00 but asha deep down don't like to be part of war so she's still not in her element or true herself

[@heloizemilano2734]

1:34:15 maybe WW are looking for something to wake up the allegeled dragon inside the wall before striking. (isn't some zombie dragon in George's plans?)

[@13RadTV]

I’m happy that the small battle is the one we care about. Just like we don’t all love blockbusters with millions of dollars of special effects. We like heart. And we like to zoom in.

[@Temperancefp]

To the physics aspect, think that even if we advance enough electromagnetism is still gonna exist, it’s not like it’s gonna disappear and we never speak of it again. And particularly when we come across a new theory like general relativity it’s not like the old theory just doesn’t apply and gets forgotten, general relativity doesn’t invalidate newtons laws, it just extend it to other extreme circumstances. That’s the whole point of invariance in physics. The laws of the universe seem to not change no matter where you’re a if you have the same conditions