Let's Talk About Battles!

[Harad the White]

30 minutes ago, danweasel said:

Hardly an expert, but real world desperate charges (that failed) include:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickett's_Charge

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Waterloo#Attack_of_the_Imperial_Guard

 

and maybe more risky than desperate, but:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Trafalgar

The Waterloo wiki is really interesting. There was a 1970 movie called "Waterloo." It's got Rod Steiger, but I don't know anything about it. It's not a meme. Something as described in wiki might make a good modern movie with drones flying overhead to capture the action from a Seachan eye's view. 

[MasterAblar]

6 minutes ago, Harad the White said:

Going forward a bit is Henry V at Agincourt. Desperate? Or just a far superior, yet smaller force.  Also not desperate, but epic, Kursk, the biggest cavalry (tank) battle of WW2.

 

Agincourt didn't have much desperation, just a lot of stupidity on one side and cleverness on the other. I'm thinking like the battle at the end of KoD where the Band smashes those mercenaries or whatever going after Tuon.

[MasterAblar]

3 minutes ago, Harad the White said:

The Waterloo wiki is really interesting. There was a 1970 movie called "Waterloo." It's got Rod Steiger, but I don't know anything about it. It's not a meme. Something as described in wiki might make a good modern movie with drones flying overhead to capture the action from a Seachan eye's view. 

 

I love that Waterloo movie. Like all historical movies its accuracy is mediocre for the most part but it looks absolutely amazing.

[Gothic Flame]

Every charge against Fort Wagner during the US Civil War was a total loss. (They made a movie about the 2nd desperate charge depicting the first African-American regiment going against it ("Glory")

[Harad the White]

1 minute ago, MasterAblar said:

I love that Waterloo movie. Like all historical movies its accuracy is mediocre for the most part but it looks absolutely amazing.

And how do the battle scenes look?

[Harad the White]

1 minute ago, Gothic Flame said:

Every charge against Fort Wagner during the US Civil War was a total loss. (They made a movie about the 2nd desperate charge depicting the first African-American regiment going against it ("Glory")

An excellent movie, but a bummer. I suppose that's the way a racist might feel about Gettysburg ?

[Scarloc99]

1 hour ago, DojoToad said:

They had some badass battles in LotR and Hobbit.  Hopefully WoT does better at Falme than they did at the attempted Logain breakout.

If you watch the way the Logain fight was put together and edited you can see the heady hand of Covid all over it. With the exception of a charge of extras at the start the Actors are all spaced out with no more then 3 close together at any one time. 

[Scarloc99]

12 minutes ago, Harad the White said:

The Waterloo wiki is really interesting. There was a 1970 movie called "Waterloo." It's got Rod Steiger, but I don't know anything about it. It's not a meme. Something as described in wiki might make a good modern movie with drones flying overhead to capture the action from a Seachan eye's view. 

The Sharp TV series depicted the naploeonic wars, Sean bean in a role that doesn’t kill him lol 

[DaddyFinn]

If I remember correctly, the battle of Malden was almost lost before

Spoiler

Zen-Rand appeared and decimated the Shadowspawn army?

 

Edited November 30, 2021 by DaddyFinn
Book spoiler tag

[MasterAblar]

9 minutes ago, Harad the White said:

And how do the battle scenes look?

 

Like they were from Soviet Union movie from the 70s. The sheer scale makes it look realistic but obviously it's fairly "clean" overall, at least from what I remember.

 

Most of what I remember is the music and the marching, which on it's own made it pretty cool to me. I imagine most people would find it boring.

[MasterAblar]

2 minutes ago, DaddyFinn said:

If I remember correctly, the battle of Malden was almost lost before

  Hide contents

Zen-Rand appeared and decimated the Shadowspawn army?

 

 

Battle of Maradon but yes. Technically they pushed back the initial force that had taken the city, but would have been crushed by the second if Rand hadn't dropped a meteor on them basically.

[Harad the White]

12 minutes ago, MasterAblar said:

Most of what I remember is the music and the marching,

1812 Overture?

 

Grrrr. Not available on Netflix.

 

Cinematic Randomness sez,

Straight forward, yet eloquent dialogue gives context and enables the viewer to easily understand the circumstances which lead to Napoleon’s final bid for “power and glory”, to quote one of the film’s several taglines. We also spend significant time with our two leads. Rod Steiger steps into the boots of Napoleon with an accent by way of New York,

?

But gives it ****

Edited November 30, 2021 by Harad the White

[MasterAblar]

13 minutes ago, Harad the White said:

1812 Overture?

 

Grrrr. Not available on Netflix.

 

The whole movie is actually on youtube in french. No idea how to get the full version in english though. My parents still have an old VHS of it.

Edited November 30, 2021 by MasterAblar

[Harad the White]

1 minute ago, MasterAblar said:

No idea how to get the full version in english

blu ray from oxfordshire ?

[AdamA]

19 minutes ago, Sir_Charrid said:

If you watch the way the Logain fight was put together and edited you can see the heady hand of Covid all over it. With the exception of a charge of extras at the start the Actors are all spaced out with no more then 3 close together at any one time. 

That arguably could have been intentional. It's not what you expect out of medieval soldiers, who tended to mass tightly to make spears and shields more effective, but it was what they trained us to do when moving as an infantry platoon in modern day. Keep at least 10m separation between individuals, which prevents landmines and three-round rifle bursts from killing more than one person at a time. It could be an adaptation to fighting Aes Sedai that can create similar small explosions. Similarly, keep 50m separation between infantry squads or humvees when mounted and then up to 81mm mortars can't take out more than one squad at a time. We actually aimed for 100m separation between tanks.

[Elder_Haman]

2 minutes ago, AdamA said:

That arguably could have been intentional. It's not what you expect out of medieval soldiers, who tended to mass tightly to make spears and shields more effective, but it was what they trained us to do when moving as an infantry platoon in modern day. Keep at least 10m separation between individuals, which prevents landmines and three-round rifle bursts from killing more than one person at a time. It could be an adaptation to fighting Aes Sedai that can create similar small explosions. Similarly, keep 50m separation between infantry squads or humvees when mounted and then up to 81mm mortars can't take out more than one squad at a time. We actually aimed for 100m separation between tanks.

I get what you're saying about modern tactics. But I will be sad if we lose that part of the books - the slow change in tactics forced by channelers becoming ubiquitous on the battlefield. Arguably, the Dragonsworn shouldn't be sophisticated enough to employ these tactics in this battle.

[Jaysen Gore]

My comments on the big battle set pieces, spoiled, because they are major plot points for the series:

 

Spoiler

 - Falme - the EF5 in smoke running around town. More of an Cap in New York Avengers feel than a real battle. A charge from the Whitecloak Stuntmen company, and they disappear in the fog of war.

- the split of the Tower; platoon level and individual combat, since most of the Tower Guard didn't participate. 

- The Couladin battle can mostly be skirmish / platoon level from Mat's POV, since it's  forested area. Another Vietnam reference fight from RJ.

 - Dumai's Wells  - lots of smoke hidden FX people in Cadin'sor encircling a smaller group of real people before the dome is lifted, and strawberry jam covering the real people after.

-  The War for the Tower - again, no massive armies. A strike force of a couple hundred, and the Power. But it doesn't need the Massive FX engine. And depending on budget, it could all be real people.

The Battles of the Four Fronts - theses need to seem overwhelming, and are the biggest daylight battles in the open. Closest in spirit to GoT's BotB, and probably where the budget in season 8 really goes.

Merrilor - this is so broken up into vignettes and personal set pieces that I don't think they need the massive (TM) engine for that one. Just the same 300 people in 20 different costumes. And it's at night, so that's a big advantage

Shayol Ghul - this is company level stuff, mainly. FX will be focused on the shadowspawn, so keep the real people to a manageable number

 

So there you have it - it's really just Wells and Four Fronts that need to have prolonged views of thousands of people. Everything else can be masked relatively easily, and within story, without looking cheap.

 

It does make me wonder if the Younglings are going to make any kind of an appearance, though, since they're more useless to the plot than their leader is.

[Frenata]

58 minutes ago, Jaysen Gore said:

It does make me wonder if the Younglings are going to make any kind of an appearance, though, since they're more useless to the plot than their leader is.

 

??

 

Painful but true.

[Scarloc99]

2 hours ago, AdamA said:

That arguably could have been intentional. It's not what you expect out of medieval soldiers, who tended to mass tightly to make spears and shields more effective, but it was what they trained us to do when moving as an infantry platoon in modern day. Keep at least 10m separation between individuals, which prevents landmines and three-round rifle bursts from killing more than one person at a time. It could be an adaptation to fighting Aes Sedai that can create similar small explosions. Similarly, keep 50m separation between infantry squads or humvees when mounted and then up to 81mm mortars can't take out more than one squad at a time. We actually aimed for 100m separation between tanks.

I think it was more the limited number of actors allowed on set, if you slow down frame by frame I think there are probably just 2-3 distinct stuntmen playing all those soldiers being killed. 

[Guire]

We need this at Tarwins gap.  So they hopefully went to Mongolia for filming so they had hundreds of expert horsemen.

[A Memory Of Why]

9 hours ago, Harad the White said:

Battles

The big battle scenes in both GoT and LoTR/Hobbit are the standards for fantasy battles. Gandalf's charge at Helm's Deep, Rohan's charge at Minas Tirith, The Vale's charge at the Battle of Bastards are all classics. I am sensing a pattern here--charges when all is nearly lost. Where might they be in WoT?

 

LOL, Weiramon has entered the chat!! ?

 

Other than what's already been mentioned:

• KOD - Rands cabin scene 
• KOD - Malden
• KOD - Matt's fight at the end
• TOM - Perrin saving the whitecloaks

We could also see some off screen battles like attacking Sammael's fortifications, blood snow, expanded Couladin battle, etc.

[chri5]

10 hours ago, danweasel said:

 

• Dumai's Wells

There is no other chapter in the book that I am looking forward to seeing on-screen more than this. Easily the most memorable part of the entire series.

 

Even more than when Nynaeve helped Rand do all of that cleansing that one day. 

[chri5]

1 hour ago, A Memory Of Why said:

 

LOL, Weiramon has entered the chat!! ?

???

 

It’s been years since I read the series, and I’m on a listen right now into book4. You’ve reminded me of the comedy of Weiramon, unintentional as it may have been. 

[DojoToad]

On 11/30/2021 at 4:07 PM, Sir_Charrid said:

I think it was more the limited number of actors allowed on set, if you slow down frame by frame I think there are probably just 2-3 distinct stuntmen playing all those soldiers being killed. 

$10 million an episode doesn't go as far as it used to...

[Daenelia]

52 minutes ago, DojoToad said:

$10 million an episode doesn't go as far as it used to...

Inflation. It's real. It's dangerous.

 

Or maybe ... this production pays actual fair wages to all the crew. ?