What if Gawyn didn't go off to fight Demandred?

[Awakened]

Could the forces of Light still have won if Gawyn hadn't gone off to fight Demandred? Min's viewing made it sound like he had a choice given to him by the Pattern to do the right thing, but afterward it looked as if the Wheel hinged on him screwing up.

[jack of shadows]

@awakened,

 

"could the forces of light still have won if gawyn hadn't gone off to fight demandred?"

seriously? gawyn's duel with demandred was...inconsequential.

in the grand scheme of things this duel changed absolutely nothing.

[Awakened]

@awakened,

 

"could the forces of light still have won if gawyn hadn't gone off to fight demandred?"

seriously? gawyn's duel with demandred was...inconsequential.

in the grand scheme of things this duel changed absolutely nothing.

It drove Egwene to her suicidal last stand that killed all of the Sharans, or so I recall.

[jack of shadows]

that's one way to look at it,according to you,the duel itself was irrelevant,

only its outcome mattered,in other words,gawyn was predestined to lose.

well..don't expect me to shed any tears for gawyn*grinning*.

[Awakened]

I'm pretty sure Gawyn is no one's favorite. I'm only wondering if his death is really as pointless as it seems on the surface.

[Sabio]

She bonded another so she could still fight, had Gawyn lived it wouldn't of chagnged anything.  She would of been despertae and suddenly came up with her magical weave.  Only difference would of been is she would of had to of released him from the bond before she did it.  I sort of took his death as a way for BS to make fans happy, GAwyn doing something stupid and getting killed because of it.

[Awakened]

Then what of the viewing? If I remember correctly in Min's viewing Gawyn had two choices, he could have submitted to her or kill her, which was represented as either kneeling to her or breaking her neck.

[Orderofolde]

Then what of the viewing? If I remember correctly in Min's viewing Gawyn had two choices, he could have submitted to her or kill her, which was represented as either kneeling to her or breaking her neck.

Yes it didn't have anything to do with the last battle, it was his indecision of not choosing a side and the choice he had to make, and he chose Egwene.  

[Orderofolde]

The duel was rigged.  Gawyn was wearing at least 2-3 of the Bloodrings which made him move unnaturally fast with weaves masking and aiding him.  Not to mention the Warder Bond aiding him as well.  Demandred fought without augmentation.  Holding the OP or even the TP wouldn't have given a master swordsman the edge to counter someone moving that fast.  Remember, Demandred couldn't even him him with weaves or a rock in the beginning.  So how does someone who defeated two of the best Warder swordsmen who is double augmented fail to kill someone moving slower?  The whole thing wasn't written well enough to convince me he gets defeated.  The only way to defeat a Blood Knife is to do so blindly where you don't rely on your eyes and can hear their movement.  Then suddenly Demandred can strike faster than Gawyn even with the lure to draw him in to not only shove a blade in and then out?

 

I suppose it was meant to be, so that Galad would be angered enough to go and face him, and finally Lan.  There was good which came from each duel, in that the massive devastation he was doing to the armies of light was interrupted bringing moments of relief.  Gawyn, Galad, Logain, the occasional Dragon's Egg, and finally Lan won out. 

[Sabio]

BS even said gawyn wasn't as good as Gawyn thought he was.  There was even a hint that some luck was involved in his beating the Hammer.  Gawyn wasn't one of the best, Demandred was a true master swordsman.  Dem also recoinzed the device Gawyn was using not to mention there is no proof that using more than one of the rings at a time made you even better then just using one.  BS even said the rings won't make a good swordsman great or a great swordsman a master, it might make one faster and harder to see but it doesn't make your sword ability any better.  Gawyn sort of bought into his own hype.

 

Galad wanting revenge and thinking he was one of the best with a sword made sense, Lan and Logain made sense.  I think long term it was good for Logain to get humbled like that.  Gawyn's fight made no sense to me.  I understand Gawyn's feeling that he was a prince yet here he is playing such a small role and not doing much mindset.  But his going after Demandred made little sense to me, especially using rings he knew would kill him.  

[jack of shadows]

Demandred summed gawyn nicely,

When demandred found out that galad had a fox medallion,he said to him"surely you don't think that its going to keep you from meeting the same fate as your pathetic brother?the dead one i mean".

Demandred was decent enough to point out that he didn't consider rand pathetic, only gawyn(this made me laugh so hard).

[Sabio]

Which makes sense, as he thought Rand was LTT.  Dem knew LTT was pretty good with the sword.  Yeah was funny to see the dead Gawyn get mocked like that.

[solarz]

BS even said gawyn wasn't as good as Gawyn thought he was.  There was even a hint that some luck was involved in his beating the Hammer.  Gawyn wasn't one of the best, Demandred was a true master swordsman.  Dem also recoinzed the device Gawyn was using not to mention there is no proof that using more than one of the rings at a time made you even better then just using one.  BS even said the rings won't make a good swordsman great or a great swordsman a master, it might make one faster and harder to see but it doesn't make your sword ability any better.  Gawyn sort of bought into his own hype.

 

Galad wanting revenge and thinking he was one of the best with a sword made sense, Lan and Logain made sense.  I think long term it was good for Logain to get humbled like that.  Gawyn's fight made no sense to me.  I understand Gawyn's feeling that he was a prince yet here he is playing such a small role and not doing much mindset.  But his going after Demandred made little sense to me, especially using rings he knew would kill him.  

 

Precision beats power, timing beats speed. The difference between a novice and a master swordsman is that the master controls the timing, the tempo, of the fight.

[randsc]

An excellent question.  This was not handled well, IMO.

 

It is seldom satisfying, and may even be offensive, when something horrible happening to a character is treated as noting more than fodder for the character development of another character.

 

An example of this is in Game of Thrones, where the show was criticized, correctly in my opinion, for viewing Sansa's rape primarily through Reek's eyes, and treating it as something that impacts Reek, when obviously the impact on Sansa is far greater.

 

Something of the same happens here.

 

Nothing about Gawyn's death matters, except that it spurs Egwene's actions.

[jack of shadows]

@sabio,

 

"especially using rings he knew would kill him".

 

gawyn already used the rings to save egwene from the sharans,

so he was dying even before his duel with demandred.

[wotfan4472]

That is true. Gawyn could easily have died while Egwene was recovering between fighting. That would have been catastrophic. I think Demandred would have hit harder had that happened.