Mat has a fair bit of travelling to do...

[Aredeis]

Fine word it however you want.  The important part of this to me is the last line anyway.  That was the only real point i was making.  I dont like the taveren argument though, it's just deus ex machina, you can literally use it to argue that almost any outlandish thing might happen.  It might even be an applicable argument, I just don't prefer it.  How's Hawkwing's seige of Tar Valon looking?  Taveren don't alway win.  There isnt anything to convince me that they wouldnt both be idiots to go to war with each other at that juncture.  IF this where normal times and the LB wasnt literally already starting, then sure.  However it's anything but normal times.

 

As for your question, I don't really understand, do you mean when the ppl in the 2R sent away the tax collectors?  That's would be an act of defiance, but hardly political mauneuvering between Perrin and Elayne, which is what i thought we were talking about.  Especially when as you point out, it's something Perrin didnt know about until Elayne told him. 

 

I wasn't really into the who had more military might part of this discussion, more the reality of the situation.  i agree with Suttree that Elayne has more military force but I don't think it's by as much as he does. 

Edited December 13, 2012 by Aredeis

[Jak o' the Shadows]

@Herid - it's possible someone remembers that Mat is arguably the best General they have and go to look for him early.  It may be a bit of an unnecessary complication, but it would help seal his importance among the gathered armies.  Or more likely they go to pick him up at noon :)

 

 

just curious - I'm not debating that Mat is a good General, but besides the Band, and whoever may have encountered the Band - knows this tidbit of knowledge?

 

Only Bashere knows who Mat is....

 

Byrne does not, or did I miss that section of whatever book?  Is Bashere going to convince everyone?  I suppose Bashere is the leader of Rands immediate forces, but the other Borderlanders have no clue.  

 

Doesn't Rand know that Mat is now a military genius?  Wasn't he there with Lan and Rhuarc in the Waste when Mat plans to invade Cairhein in like 10s when it took those other military guys the better part of a week to come up with more or less the same thing?

 

Really, at the end of the day this is going to come down to Rand 'organizing' people (as he states) according to his will.  As long as Rand wants Mat in command, Mat will be in command.

 

Not sure if that's what he wants though.  But I'd love to see it.  Mat at the helm, bunch of great captains in charge of separate armies fighting all over the place, all reporting to Mat.

[darvickers]

I would like to put my two cents in about how Mat can get to FOM early. Remember Rand and Perrin both can see where Mat is at anytime they want. It would be easy for them to know that Mat is not in the TOG anymore, and can go get him at anytime. Most likely Perrin though.I wonder if he can be seen in visions while he is in the tower. I would think not.

Edited December 14, 2012 by dar13vick

[BFG]

@Aredeis - I actually agree that they would both be idiots to start a battle now, but I don't see why if they're both idiots if it happened then the onus is on Elayne for retaliating, surely it would be on Perrin for starting it (and he did, willingly or otherwise). (on rereading it came across as mean, so I'm sorry!)

 

Yet Perrin now claims lordship over 2R, that means that he's responsible for their actions to Elayne, so when they sent away tax collectors then it was an act of defiance and possibly secesion. Elayne has to respond to this. If Perrin had known what they'd do he would have stopped it, but he's still responsible for it.

 

I'm also not so sure of the military might of Elayne. Yes she has the largest standing army, but how many of them are trained? Whereas a large number of Perrins are now arming themselves and training. The 2R bowmen are accounted a good military force by Tylee (? Seanchan commander) and she knows what she's talking about, so I don't think it's a case of peasents trained by peasents in the way that that implies. The 2R men now have more military experience then many 'trained' soldiers - I'd count the three battles they've been in (2R, Shaido, WC rescue) to be worth more than most border skirmishes.

 

 

Apologies again for the previous post.

[Suttree]

@BFG

 

Perinn has 4000 trained 2Rs men(3 battles doesn't not necesarily make one better than full time life long soldiers. Although they prob have unique skills). Add to that 1,900 Troops from Mayene/Ghealdean.

 

Andor has anywhere from 20,000-35,000 lifers(conservative).

 

After that when you start talking about levies Andor has around 120,000.

 

Perrin has around 70,000(somebody's guess earlier in thread) refugees.

Edited December 14, 2012 by Suttree

[BFG]

Thanks Sutt - May disagree to an extent about the worth of the 3 (actually 4) battles, but it is mostly speculation and I'll admit right now that my memory for the numbers (or ability to work them out) is pretty poor.

 

But the first battle is in the 2R, and actually seems like a series of smaller battles until the 'big push'. Of them all, this seems to be the closest to how I imagine border raids, although against tougher opponents (although it's likely I'm underestimating the size and ferocity of border-raids, I assume that in recent years there hasn't been any major pushes into Andor (but I may be wrong).

 

Second battle against 70,000(?) Shaido, now the 2R didn't seem to do much of the fighting, that was mostly the Ashaman, but the 2R saw and participated in some very large scale fighting here.

 

Third was against the remnants of the Shaido (20,000) again they had help from damane and other channelers, but they still stood up to a charge of a significant number of men (and women).

 

Fourth was against the Trollocs, again I have no idea what the size of this attack was, but this time they had little help from channelers (I remember they provided light, but there were only a few at this stage (compared to previously)). Anyway, this attack also sounded pretty big.

 

Bearing in mind that until recently 5000 was considered a large army, Perrins army (as a whole) have more experience of 'large' battles. I'm sure that the older members of Elaynes army had experience in the Aiel wars, which I presume had larger armies, but presumably most will have retired. And both trollocs and Shaido are considered tougher than your average opponent.

 

Based on this I count the 2R men to be an above experienced army despite the lack of official training.

 

Additionally Perrins army will have more experience of fighting together as a group than Elaynes (especially if the levies are mixed in with a backbone of trained soldiers.

 

 

Realistically neither side would ever have let it come to fighting, and overall I think both sides came out of the negotiation pretty well, Elayne would win any fight if it had come down to it, but not easily.

[Suttree]

Lets say I agree with the training(and you make some good points) it still doesn't come close to making up for the number difference of the trained core for both armies.

[BFG]

Competely agree that Elayne would win any sort of fight

 

...Elayne would win any fight if it had come down to it, but not easily.

[Suttree]

My bad, had spaced on that. Must have misconstrued where you were going in post 54.

[BFG]

honestly not sure where I was going either :), just seen peasents supplemented by peasents a couple of times (either here or in the Elayne thread) and didn't feel that was really a good way of describing the situation (again, not necessarily in response to you).

 

Elayne wins on troops (as she's pretty much guaranteed their support), I don't see Ghealdin (and probably not Mayene) sticking with Perrin if he fought against Andor, and I believe that would take out most (if not all) of his cavalry, which puts him at a severe disadvantage. I suspect the refugees would stay with him, as they've pretty much chosen on an individual level to stay with him. But that leaves Perrin with his 4000 (very good) 2R men and 70,000 refugees (with limited experience in battle - I don't recall them fighting against the trollocs)

 

Against that I don't think Mat would allow Elayne to use the dragons, she had no channelers that would use the Power as a weapon (but then I believe Perrin is down to 2 Ashaman, so not a deciding factor), and per RJ gateways aren't the be-all and end-all in battles, although undeniably useful, but still has 30,000 experienced troops (if not against as tough opponents) and all the rest.

 

EDIT to add: I think Perrin is also at a disadvantage because of the proportion of inexperienced soldiers to experienced.

 

Perrins is roughly 1:17 experienced:unexperienced whereas (even taking the worst numbers for Elayne it stands at 1:7. This, as I understand it, makes Perrins troops a lot more likely to break.

Edited December 14, 2012 by BFG

[Aredeis]

@Aredeis - I actually agree that they would both be idiots to start a battle now, but I don't see why if they're both idiots if it happened then the onus is on Elayne for retaliating, surely it would be on Perrin for starting it (and he did, willingly or otherwise). (on rereading it came across as mean, so I'm sorry!)

 

Yet Perrin now claims lordship over 2R, that means that he's responsible for their actions to Elayne, so when they sent away tax collectors then it was an act of defiance and possibly secesion. Elayne has to respond to this. If Perrin had known what they'd do he would have stopped it, but he's still responsible for it

 

Your first two sentences seem to directly contridict one another.  And you seem focused on assigning blame to whoever flinched first like they are kids in the schoolyard.  Petty squabbling on the eve of the end of theworld=stupid, and it doesn't really matter who would have started it.

 

Or maybe I'm misunderstanding your point, that's possible too.

[shortkut]

You forgot to mention the battle at DW as experience for the 2R folks, not that it would change much... Did anyone mention that the WC are now part of perrin's army when calculating numbers? Just curious to see the total size of his army

[Suttree]

You forgot to mention the battle at DW as experience for the 2R folks, not that it would change much... Did anyone mention that the WC are now part of perrin's army when calculating numbers? Just curious to see the total size of his army

There are around 7,000 children under Galad. Think they weren't brought up in the conversation because Galad certainly wouldn't lead them against Elayne for a rebel cause.

Edited December 17, 2012 by Suttree

[KrisAnton]

IF Camelyn were to be destroyed, then I don't see Perrin beholding to Andor any more. It might not be a quick easy break, but I can see it happening after a generation. IF Elayne survives she will take resources from the other lands as a tax to rebuild Camelyn. That may not sit well with the other regions, seeing how they will be busy rebuilding themselves. Elayne also lacks the teeth to aggressively collect these funds because surely she will suffer many casualties at TG. I think eventually the 2R will become the power center in West Andor as Camelyn slips out of relevance. 

[Cheyboygan]

The discussion of who would win a battle between Perrin and Elayne's army is irrevelant because neither of them had any desire to fight that battle. Both knew the more important issue was getting their armies to Rand to fight the Last Battle.  Basically Perrin wanted the Two Rivers to maintain the *exact same relationship to Andor that had existed for several hundred years* with the exception that he would now be it's lord...primarily to ensure that Andor didn't try to infringe on the status quo.  Elayne wanted him to swear fealty in exchange for formalizing that lordship.  The only real obstacle was Elayne's arrogance getting in the way of a common sense agreement of exactly that (Perrin had no problem swearing fealty provided it didn't alter the defacto autonomy the Two Rivers had long enjoyed).  Fortunately Morgase was there to guide her daughter to a solution all parties could accept.   Of course after the Last Battle there could be some issues; Perrin/Faile now ruling Saldaea makes him an uncomfortably powerful vassal and Elayne desperately needs tax revenue to rebuild Caemlyn.  On the other hand both are going to be too busy in the short run for conflict between each other to rise to the front burner;   Elayne rebuilding Caemlyn and Perrin rebuilding Saldaea.  Elayne merging Andor-Cairhien and Perrin dealing with the vastly expanded population of the Two Rivers and how to manage governing both Saldea and the Two Rivers (unlike Andor-Cairhien they are unlikley to become a single entity).  Over the longer term I expect that Elayne would be tempted to try to bring the Two Rivers more firmly under her control, although I suspect that Faile is more open than Perrin to a dynastic marriage between one of their children and one of Elayne's that results in the joined line becoming High Lords of the Two Rivers (and perhaps Stewards of all Western Andor).