Battles (Full Spoilers)

[smileyman]

I really tried not to put too much attention to the battle plans. I know its hard, since half the book is pure war, but if you try to analize them you find yourself feeling cold with a book you are supposed to enjoy and wishing RJ was alive every 2-3 pages.

 

Now that I finished, I can think of so many flaws that I have to come here and cry out, I'm sorry you have to listen to me ;)

 

 

1. Androl and the super lava waygate. WTF? I mean, its a great idea for the Cairhien battle. Just one question. Why the hell dont they do the same at the last battle?!?

 

Because Androl's talent is being able to make Gates without having to have been there, and there's only one of him. 

 

 

4. The Seanchan Army part. Mat is a great general. I really want to believe it. But, why in the hell would he keep 1/4 of his army and 1000 damane to the very end of the battle???? Worst of all, why would he let HIS people die like meat, and preserve until the end the twisted society Seanchan is, letting them just finish the battle with a last sweep? At least use the damane, man!!!! Couldnt they have at least relieved the Aes Sedai when they were exhausted???

 

It's the element of surprise. He explained the strategy earlier with his card analogy. You can lose 99 hands in a row, but when the last hand comes up and you go all in you can win right there. Sending the Seanchan away would trick Demandred into over-extending his forces for the crushing blow. Once he's over-extended then you bring in the Seanchan. This sort of thing happens all the time in battles--it's called a reserve force, and is something that's pretty important to have. 

[Vardar]

In the 100 Years War Henry V invaded France and attacked the port town of Harfleur. After a somewhat lengthy siege the city fell Sept 22, which was late in the campaign season. Henry V's army was worn out, sick (dysentry had moved among the men), and low on food and supplies, so he decided that rather than go back to England after only one town he'd march north to the English town of Calais and get re-supplied there and then resume the campaign in the spring. 

 

Along his march the French army shadowed him. There had been a force gathered to relieve Harfleur before that town fell and other nobles and their retinues gathered along the way. Meanwhile a large contingent of men was being gathered to bring the English army to battle on terrain more favorable to the French. This, of course, was Agincourt. The distance from Harfleur to Agincourt is about 350 miles, more than twice the distance from Caemlyn to Braemlyn Wood.

 

Bad comparison, you're forgetting about Channelers. Also he had to leave the city or die, this is totally different. All they had to not do was attack, since retaking the city would have been difficult. Honestly once you got the Trollocs to the Plains, Archers and Channeling would have leveled them. Pounded them flat.

 

 

The second issue that keeps getting brought up is why Demandred was calling out for LTT (with a side issue being why he didn't just blast Galad, Gawyn, and Lan to pieces with the One Power or True Power. There's precedent there as well. In the same campaign as Agincourt, Henry V challenged the French Prince to single combat as a way to resolve the conflict. (He didn't challenge the French King directly because Charles VI was both physically ill and also suffered from some mental illness.)

 

Single combat is an important part of the chivalric and medieval cultures and there are more examples of contestants fighting duels in the midst of a battle. 

 

Yes I'm sure he was totally honorable slaying thousands of innocents to piss Rand off. The reason he was calling out for Rand was because he had the superior ground there and he knew it. He was taking the cowards way out. His full circle of 72, and his Sangreal, he knew he could beat Rand. There's no honor in that sir. 

 

 

 

The Aiel is by far the most egregious example. There is absolutely no way that a nation that size can even live in a place as barren as the Waste, much less thrive. Where's the water coming from to drink? Where are they getting their food? Where are the mines for the ore and the foundries to smelt that ore for the blacksmiths to make iron? Where are the forests of trees necessary to make the bows, spears and arrows of this vast nation of warriors?

 

Really? They said they live around the water sources in the desert. They grow food there as well. It was explained. There are mines in the desert, and also trading, trading, TRADING. I'll give you that's alot of wood to trade for spears and arrows, but they're not as big on Arrows as the two rivers. 

 

 

 

We know that there are less than 1000 total Aes Sedai, at least 1/3rd of whom will most likely never bond a Warder (the Red faction with Elaida). The other 2/3rds are composed of Aes Sedai who mostly are either already bonded to a Warder or don't want a Warder. As of TGH, there were only 40 Novices in the White Tower and only 8 or 9 of them will make Accepted. Why in the world do we need almost 1000 Younglings when maybe 3 or 4 Accepted are raised each year? It's not for protection and/or policing of Tar Valon--that's what the Tower Guard is for. 

 

1) Most don't make it thru the training. 

2) As an AS you'd want choice. If you're picking someone to remodel your kitchen, do you complain about your lack of choices? No. you  love it. Same rule applies. If you had 2 choices for a warder, you'd be pissed. The more choice, the better. 

 

 

 

The defense of the Two Rivers (even though it's my all time favorite section in the WoT) also bugs me, but that's just because of the arrow situation. It's like RJ said--yup, we've got unlimited arrows here. We'll have a scene or two showing men fletching arrows and what not, even though that wouldn't begin to cover the demand. An English longbowman was supposed to be able to fire 10-12 aimed (for a loose definition of aimed) per minute. The way that the defense of Two Rivers is described it would take millions of arrows to be able to beat off the Trolloc army.

 

The mountains of Mist have some of the most productive mines on their world. Also, everyone in the two rivers knows how to handle a bow. They all hunt. So it's obvious that every family had a stockpile of arrows. Perrin even mentioned it that most men make their own, and they had a fletched. If you hunt every day, of course you'd have hundreds of arrows personally stored at your house. Hell, I hunt, guess what? I have a lot of bullets stored, and I know where to buy more. 

 

 

 

Think of channelers as artillery on steroids. Just because you have artillery at a fight doesn't mean that the rest of the army is useless. 

 

The only time you wouldn't is if the attacks would be useless. Channelers are never useless unless they're being stopped by other channelers. 

 

I'm with Sutt here (And we never agree) I have to ask, did you read the other books?

[Vardar]

 

RJ made his magic system so superior that anyone having access was almost unbeatable compared to normal folk.Then he compounded this mistake by having large amounts of channelers in his series.Then when the LB came along poor Sanderson saw that these high no of channelers on the light side would make mince meat out of any no of trollcos.So he brought in a no of dreadlords from Shara and then promptly made 2/3 of the light channelers just disappear without any expanantion.!!

 

Curious how Jordan would have handled this same situation.For whatever his faults,Jordan would have thought up of something else to even the odds.

I don't necessarily disagree but the solution is very easy. Shara is as big as the Randland. They have been breeding channellers for the Light knows how long and they are battle-ready. They could easily counter however many channellers the Light had. The answer was not to make the existing channellers disappear, it was to balance the numbers. 400 was a ridiculuous number for Shara, and that is not even counting the Town.

 

 

Not without men. Remember they'd have virtually no male channelers. And they would have lost a lot of the females to the battle to take over their land. At most they'd counter the Seachan or the Aiel. At best. That still leaves White Tower, Black Tower, WindFinders, and The Kin, and one of those two aforementioned factions since they can't counter both. The shadow took roughly 20% or less from the WT and the BT and that's about it. 

[Morden]

 

 

RJ made his magic system so superior that anyone having access was almost unbeatable compared to normal folk.Then he compounded this mistake by having large amounts of channelers in his series.Then when the LB came along poor Sanderson saw that these high no of channelers on the light side would make mince meat out of any no of trollcos.So he brought in a no of dreadlords from Shara and then promptly made 2/3 of the light channelers just disappear without any expanantion.!!

 

Curious how Jordan would have handled this same situation.For whatever his faults,Jordan would have thought up of something else to even the odds.

I don't necessarily disagree but the solution is very easy. Shara is as big as the Randland. They have been breeding channellers for the Light knows how long and they are battle-ready. They could easily counter however many channellers the Light had. The answer was not to make the existing channellers disappear, it was to balance the numbers. 400 was a ridiculuous number for Shara, and that is not even counting the Town.

 

 

Not without men. Remember they'd have virtually no male channelers. And they would have lost a lot of the females to the battle to take over their land. At most they'd counter the Seachan or the Aiel. At best. That still leaves White Tower, Black Tower, WindFinders, and The Kin, and one of those two aforementioned factions since they can't counter both. The shadow took roughly 20% or less from the WT and the BT and that's about it. 

 Even if they didnt fully counter the Lights Channeller forces it would have been a bit better to explain the sudden change of the battle. If say 2000 fresh faced Ayyad popped up, then damned straight they would pound the hell out of a load of tired Light Channellers(AS/Damane/WO/Kin) who were using a rotating schedule to counter fatigue so didnt have everyone active and none were fresh nor at the same battlefield.

 

The Black Tower was explained away in a true to the previous books fashion... Unfortunately that was one of the few explanations that fits within the WoT. When channellers fight it is a massacre which is why most of the Asha'man didnt survive it, so they werent really a strategic asset overall so it would have been women vs women overall.

 

It made sense for the 400 Ayyad to trash the weakened White Tower forces when you add them with Sharan/Trolloc Armies. But surely when the army gathered at Merrilor then they would have every single Channeller at the FoM linked with every Kin/WO/Novice anyone who can channel a candle flame basically. a Circles members do not have to be present at the battle to give their strength, they could have been sitting in Mayene. 

 

Quite frankly reserving channellers for healing is an admirable sentiment assuming the world is guaranteed to live another day. But when you get to the level of problems when the Sharan's turned up with their force it should have been obvious that if they won, then keeping people alive using the Power would be less useful than keeping the world alive. They could have continued to administer herbs and such and care for the sick. Something which the Kin especially are noted for. So that alone would have been dozens of battery packs for the Aes Sedai to bring the pain to the Ayyad.

 

As for Mats tactics. He excelled more at hit and run raids and trickery in earlier books. They dont work when your enemy is reading your mail. Personally I think holding the Seanchan in reserve like he did was a colossal waste almost like he was trying to keep his wife happy by giving her an army she can invade everyone else with later. However the numbers we have accounted for were according to books 1-13. Book 14 did not have the same numbers available apparently the Seanchan had to deploy a lot of their forces to defending their borders against Farmers and Bandits and the hostile armies of nearby realms(Obviously someone other than their neighbours at FoM...).

 

Someone earlier in this thread mentioned that their rule wasnt secure when from everything we saw in books 11-13 said that they were probably more secure than any other realm in many respects even if that security was bought by the sword. They should have easily had a crazy amount troops available if they stripped all their garrisons down to skeleton crews.

[MasterAblar]

Yes I'm sure he was totally honorable slaying thousands of innocents to piss Rand off. The reason he was calling out for Rand was because he had the superior ground there and he knew it. He was taking the cowards way out. His full circle of 72, and his Sangreal, he knew he could beat Rand. There's no honor in that sir. 

 

Demandred gave his sangreal to Taim and made it clear when he did so that he would fight Rand without any unfair advantages, because afterall he wouldn't be proving himself superior if he was "cheating".

 

As for killing a bunch a people, well he's a Forsaken and it's the greatest battle of the age. Of course he's going to be killing people. If he can goad Rand into facing as well by doing so than good for him.

 

The Black Tower was explained away in a true to the previous books fashion... Unfortunately that was one of the few explanations that fits within the WoT. When channellers fight it is a massacre which is why most of the Asha'man didnt survive it, so they werent really a strategic asset overall so it would have been women vs women overall.

 

It didn't make any sense actually. Half the BT was sent out in KoD. That should have been around 400 Asha'man, every one of them loyal to Rand. And as for those at the BT, I don't recall it ever being said that a huge amount of Asha'man died there. Taim had 100 with him later on, which is probably slightly less than he should have had, but still fairly close. I don't see any evidence that "good" Asha'man were slaughtered at the BT. It seems to me that after Androl and Logain broke free, Taim took his men and got the hell out of there. So, unless there were a bunch Asha'man running around in all the battles and BS just didn't bother mentioning it, there's a whole lot of Asha'man who fell off the map at some point. There actually should have been more Asha'man than Egwene had Aes Sedai, considering how many AS have been lost throughout the books.

Edited January 18, 2013 by Master Ablar

[Morden]

 

The Black Tower was explained away in a true to the previous books fashion... Unfortunately that was one of the few explanations that fits within the WoT. When channellers fight it is a massacre which is why most of the Asha'man didnt survive it, so they werent really a strategic asset overall so it would have been women vs women overall.

It didn't make any sense actually. Half the BT was sent out in KoD. That should have been around 400 Asha'man, every one of them loyal to Rand. And as for those at the BT, I don't recall it ever being said that a huge amount of Asha'man died there. Taim had 100 with him later on, which is probably slightly less than he should have had, but still fairly close. I don't see any evidence that "good" Asha'man were slaughtered at the BT. It seems to me that after Androl and Logain broke free, Taim took his men and got the hell out of there. So, unless there were a bunch Asha'man running around in all the battles and BS just didn't bother mentioning it, there's a whole lot of Asha'man who fell off the map at some point. There actually should have been more Asha'man than Egwene had Aes Sedai, considering how many AS have been lost throughout the books.

Thats actually a superb point about the ones from KoD. Not actually sure what happened to those who went to the Borderlands to stem the trollocs either.

 

But it does say in the book somewhere that Logain and the surviving loyal Asha'man would be no use until they recovered and that most had perished in the battle, so it might well be that the ones who got slaughtered were the weaker/less well trained Asha'man who were still training. i.e the two rivers guys etc.

 

Either that or someone here said it and made it look convincing haha. I'll probably do a re-read soon but to be honest I dont think I can quite stomach dissecting the book if I read it too fresh.

 

If the KoD ones werent at the BT. then they were probably with the Wise Ones/Kin that were heating the water for the Grand Aiel Bath Appreciation week. Not sure where a lake big enough would be, but it must have been spectacular. Afterall Aiel are more afraid of water than the DO so their version of TG would be a big bath.

Edited January 18, 2013 by Morden

[Amandera]

 

RJ made his magic system so superior that anyone having access was almost unbeatable compared to normal folk.Then he compounded this mistake by having large amounts of channelers in his series.Then when the LB came along poor Sanderson saw that these high no of channelers on the light side would make mince meat out of any no of trollcos.So he brought in a no of dreadlords from Shara and then promptly made 2/3 of the light channelers just disappear without any expanantion.!!

 

Curious how Jordan would have handled this same situation.For whatever his faults,Jordan would have thought up of something else to even the odds.

I don't necessarily disagree but the solution is very easy. Shara is as big as the Randland. They have been breeding channellers for the Light knows how long and they are battle-ready. They could easily counter however many channellers the Light had. The answer was not to make the existing channellers disappear, it was to balance the numbers. 400 was a ridiculuous number for Shara, and that is not even counting the Town.

Not without men. Remember they'd have virtually no male channelers. And they would have lost a lot of the females to the battle to take over their land. At most they'd counter the Seachan or the Aiel. At best. That still leaves White Tower, Black Tower, WindFinders, and The Kin, and one of those two aforementioned factions since they can't counter both. The shadow took roughly 20% or less from the WT and the BT and that's about it. 

What difference does that make? There are no male channellers anywhere. And on top of that most female channellers of Light (AS, damane, Kin) very rarely get pregnant.

 

Plus, Shara does have male channellers. They are used as breeding stock for women who can channel then murdered. And there are strict rules for Ayyad. They keep their bloodlines absolutely pure.

[Vardar]

 Even if they didnt fully counter the Lights Channeller forces it would have been a bit better to explain the sudden change of the battle. If say 2000 fresh faced Ayyad popped up, then damned straight they would pound the hell out of a load of tired Light Channellers(AS/Damane/WO/Kin) who were using a rotating schedule to counter fatigue so didnt have everyone active and none were fresh nor at the same battlefield.

 

 

I agree, but that's only after the Light side channelers were nerfed. If it happened correctly, the full might of the WT, and a few thousand other channelers would have been there. 

 

 

 

Demandred gave his sangreal to Taim and made it clear when he did so that he would fight Rand without any unfair advantages, because afterall he wouldn't be proving himself superior if he was "cheating".

 

As for killing a bunch a people, well he's a Forsaken and it's the greatest battle of the age. Of course he's going to be killing people. If he can goad Rand into facing as well by doing so than good for him.

 

 

And how long was he there blowing people up before he made that arrangement? A good while. He gave Taim the item towards the end there. He called for Rand in a full circle, with the 2nd most powerful item of power made for men in existence. I'm sure he would have laid it down nicely if Rand had appeared. I mean he's not evil or anything. 

 

 

 

 

It didn't make any sense actually. Half the BT was sent out in KoD. That should have been around 400 Asha'man, every one of them loyal to Rand. And as for those at the BT, I don't recall it ever being said that a huge amount of Asha'man died there. Taim had 100 with him later on, which is probably slightly less than he should have had, but still fairly close. I don't see any evidence that "good" Asha'man were slaughtered at the BT. It seems to me that after Androl and Logain broke free, Taim took his men and got the hell out of there. So, unless there were a bunch Asha'man running around in all the battles and BS just didn't bother mentioning it, there's a whole lot of Asha'man who fell off the map at some point. There actually should have been more Asha'man than Egwene had Aes Sedai, considering how many AS have been lost throughout the books.

 

 

Where are you getting this 400 number from? Rand's Ashaman he had post Ebon Dar were sent back, he didn't send 400 with Ituralde, he only had about 10 with him, and I'd guess Ituralde had 30 or so, they had a unit, with 2 unit leaders. Couldn't be that many. Where is this 400 coming from?

[Vardar]

 

 

RJ made his magic system so superior that anyone having access was almost unbeatable compared to normal folk.Then he compounded this mistake by having large amounts of channelers in his series.Then when the LB came along poor Sanderson saw that these high no of channelers on the light side would make mince meat out of any no of trollcos.So he brought in a no of dreadlords from Shara and then promptly made 2/3 of the light channelers just disappear without any expanantion.!!

 

Curious how Jordan would have handled this same situation.For whatever his faults,Jordan would have thought up of something else to even the odds.

I don't necessarily disagree but the solution is very easy. Shara is as big as the Randland. They have been breeding channellers for the Light knows how long and they are battle-ready. They could easily counter however many channellers the Light had. The answer was not to make the existing channellers disappear, it was to balance the numbers. 400 was a ridiculuous number for Shara, and that is not even counting the Town.

Not without men. Remember they'd have virtually no male channelers. And they would have lost a lot of the females to the battle to take over their land. At most they'd counter the Seachan or the Aiel. At best. That still leaves White Tower, Black Tower, WindFinders, and The Kin, and one of those two aforementioned factions since they can't counter both. The shadow took roughly 20% or less from the WT and the BT and that's about it. 

What difference does that make? There are no male channellers anywhere. And on top of that most female channellers of Light (AS, damane, Kin) very rarely get pregnant.

 

Plus, Shara does have male channellers. They are used as breeding stock for women who can channel then murdered. And there are strict rules for Ayyad. They keep their bloodlines absolutely pure.

 

Yes they are killed. By no male channelers, I mean none who are trained. And only a few who would be of channeling age at the time Demandred took over. Since they're only used for breeding stock, and kept ignorant and treated as animals. Demandred would have to overcome years of that abuse in order to begin training, he wouldn't have had enough time to do it. Thus when they came, they'd have none, or nearly no male channelers, yet they brought some with them. Odd. 

[MasterAblar]

And how long was he there blowing people up before he made that arrangement? A good while. He gave Taim the item towards the end there. He called for Rand in a full circle, with the 2nd most powerful item of power made for men in existence. I'm sure he would have laid it down nicely if Rand had appeared. I mean he's not evil or anything. 

 

 

Honestly, I wouldn't be suprised if he did just that. Yes the dude is evil, but he's also dangerously obsessed with proving himself better than LTT/Rand. His hatred of LTT is what defines him. Look at how he dealt with Gawyn and Galad. He could have blasted them to pieces at any moment if he had wished to, or let his guard deal with them. But he didn't because what he wants more than anything else is to step out of LTT's shadow. Hiding behind a Sangreal wouldn't allow him to do that, unless Rand uses Callandor, which Demandred thought was very unlikely since he couldn't do so safely. If he called for Rand while in a full circle and with a Sangreal, it's because he was busy winning a battle, which he thought he was fighting against LTT, again going back to proving himself the best.

 

 

Where are you getting this 400 number from? Rand's Ashaman he had post Ebon Dar were sent back, he didn't send 400 with Ituralde, he only had about 10 with him, and I'd guess Ituralde had 30 or so, they had a unit, with 2 unit leaders. Couldn't be that many. Where is this 400 coming from?

 

In the Prologue of WH Toveine estimates there are 500 Asha'man at the BT. This is a 107 days after Taim arrives in Caemlyn. That's a rate of about 5 Asha'man recruited per day, which is even faster than the 3-4 Torval had claimed in PoD, when he reported there were 438 Asha'man at the BT.

 

Later in KoD Logain says he's sent nearly half the Asha'man out of the BT, and none of them loyal to Taim. This is 54 days after Toveine's estimation in WH. If we go with the 5 Asha'man per day recruitement rate, their numbers go up to 770, and it might even be higher than that since the more Asha'man there are, the more recruting parties there are. Using Torval's 3-4 per day, we're closer to 700. I'd estimate between 350 and 400 Asha'man would make up about half of what the BT had at the time. If the rate of recrutement kept on at the same pace, there should have been at least 1000 Asha'man by the beginning of aMoL (910 at the least, 1200 at the most).

 

And I believe Rand gave Ituralde 100 Asha'man in tGS.

[Estrecca]

Dunno if it has been commented, but was less than amused by the fact that the shadowspawn out from Caemlyn seemed to develop Jason style teleportation whenever they moved offscreen, which is a criticism towards that random trolloc force heading for Cairhien and the fact that the southern trolloc army showed up so damn fast.

 

Having armies cross huge rivers is a nightmarish undertaking for armies with logistical capabilities much more comprehensive than random shadowspawn hordes. The fact that they managed to do it twice (and in the case of the Erinin they have to have done it while opposed by artillery, archers, channelers and more in the other shore) stretched my suspension of disbelief. A lot.

 

Frankly, it'd have been just fine if they had just put a Dreadlord or two with the trollocs and have them get to the proximities of Cairhien through use of portal stones.

[LuisTherin]

 

I really tried not to put too much attention to the battle plans. I know its hard, since half the book is pure war, but if you try to analize them you find yourself feeling cold with a book you are supposed to enjoy and wishing RJ was alive every 2-3 pages.

 

Now that I finished, I can think of so many flaws that I have to come here and cry out, I'm sorry you have to listen to me ;)

 

 

1. Androl and the super lava waygate. WTF? I mean, its a great idea for the Cairhien battle. Just one question. Why the hell dont they do the same at the last battle?!?

 

Because Androl's talent is being able to make Gates without having to have been there, and there's only one of him. 

 

 

>>>4. The Seanchan Army part. Mat is a great general. I really want to believe it. But, why in the hell would he keep 1/4 of his army and 1000 damane to the very end of the battle???? Worst of all, why would he let HIS people die like meat, and preserve until the end the twisted society Seanchan is, letting them just finish the battle with a last sweep? At least use the damane, man!!!! Couldnt they have at least relieved the Aes Sedai when they were exhausted???

 

It's the element of surprise. He explained the strategy earlier with his card analogy. You can lose 99 hands in a row, but when the last hand comes up and you go all in you can win right there. Sending the Seanchan away would trick Demandred into over-extending his forces for the crushing blow. Once he's over-extended then you bring in the Seanchan. This sort of thing happens all the time in battles--it's called a reserve force, and is something that's pretty important to have. 

 

Dude, they spend half the book talking about how important it is for the Aes Sedai not to lose their position against the Ayyad, but he leaves them there to rot even if they are exhausted. Couldnt at least he use the damane to relieve them? That wouldnt be risking the Seanchan Army. Or the Wise Ones for that matter. If there were 400 Shaido Wise Ones who could channel, even if the other ELEVEN clans were much much smaller in size, shouldnt have their 2k+ Wise Ones made a difference? Nop, they're nowhere to be seen. 400 Ayyad and a few rogue Asha'man are enough to beat all the channelers of the Light. Where are the "around one thousand WindFinders" that were previously gathered in Tear after the Seanchan invasion? All of them taking turns with the Bowl of the Winds?

 

 

And about the lava Gate, Androl is one, but he can link with up to 72 other channelers. That is lava for a while, I would say. He doesnt even have to be close to the battle, where he could draw attention from Demandred. He can just open the it from say Caemlyn into the battlefield. No risk to hit anything but trollocs if you open it back enough, in such a big field.

Edited January 19, 2013 by LuisTherin

[papertiger]

I kept waiting for Demandred to open Gateways into outerspace around his attacking forces, sucking them out into nothingness.

 

Nothing says Forsaken more than using your advanced understanding of the world against a bunch of medieval rubes!

 

=============================

 

Also, couldn't Androl have just dumped lava onto the Shadowspawn/Demmy from a horizontal altitude gateway?

[LuisTherin]

I kept waiting for Demandred to open Gateways into outerspace around his attacking forces, sucking them out into nothingness.

 

Nothing says Forsaken more than using your advanced understanding of the world against a bunch of medieval rubes!

 

=============================

 

Also, couldn't Androl have just dumped lava onto the Shadowspawn/Demmy from a horizontal altitude gateway?

 

Good point! I mean, even if we forget the fact that they dont use this tactic at all at the Last Battle without reason, why doesnt he use a horizontal gateway when they show up at Cairhien to save Elayne's Army? I remember there is some vague explanation and it is implied that the gate has to to be vertical here, but that didnt seem a to be a problem when he saved Logain or flushed the Dreadlords back at the Black Tower.

[Amandera]

Yes they are killed. By no male channelers, I mean none who are trained. And only a few who would be of channeling age at the time Demandred took over. Since they're only used for breeding stock, and kept ignorant and treated as animals. Demandred would have to overcome years of that abuse in order to begin training, he wouldn't have had enough time to do it. Thus when they came, they'd have none, or nearly no male channelers, yet they brought some with them. Odd. 

This feels like we're arguing about two different things man. Yeah, it was extremely weird there were male Ayyad among them. I never said otherwise. But what does that have to do with what I'm saying? There are no male channellers anywhere until the BT. Why should the presence/absence of male channellers matter at all? They are on equal grounds.

 

Shara is as big as Randland + Waste. If we assume their population is the same as well, 400 is a ridiculuous number. If they have 50 million population in total, then they have 250.000 potential female channellers. How in the Light are they going to miss all of those people? Even the White Tower is better at recruiting and their recruiting until Egwene is practically nonexistent.

[balefired-ed2]

Reading this thread all the way through has made me want to create another discussion.

 

Mods, if you would be so kind, I would like a thread on the ways we as fans would change channeling to make this story better. Maybe call it "fixing channeling" or something more creative if that isn't enough for you.

 

I know people won't like to hear it, but channeling and the one power, one of the most integral parts of the series, turns into IMO one of the biggest weaknesses of the series at the end. It is simply too strong, too much.

 

Channeling being weaker, having fewer channelers, or having major restrictions on what individual channelers could do would have majorly helped WOT.

[LuisTherin]

Reading this thread all the way through has made me want to create another discussion.

 

Mods, if you would be so kind, I would like a thread on the ways we as fans would change channeling to make this story better. Maybe call it "fixing channeling" or something more creative if that isn't enough for you.

 

I know people won't like to hear it, but channeling and the one power, one of the most integral parts of the series, turns into IMO one of the biggest weaknesses of the series at the end. It is simply too strong, too much.

 

Channeling being weaker, having fewer channelers, or having major restrictions on what individual channelers could do would have majorly helped WOT.

 

I think it would have been ok if only the numbers were consistent. Same numbers on both sides, and ready to go. Channelers being nearly godlike is key to the series, if you ruin them there is no WoT anymore. What makes no sense is 400 Ayyad and a few Asha'man Dreadlords beating the 3000+ channelers of the Light there should have been plus a hundred dragons.

[Vardar]

 

And how long was he there blowing people up before he made that arrangement? A good while. He gave Taim the item towards the end there. He called for Rand in a full circle, with the 2nd most powerful item of power made for men in existence. I'm sure he would have laid it down nicely if Rand had appeared. I mean he's not evil or anything. 

 

Honestly, I wouldn't be suprised if he did just that. Yes the dude is evil, but he's also dangerously obsessed with proving himself better than LTT/Rand. His hatred of LTT is what defines him. Look at how he dealt with Gawyn and Galad. He could have blasted them to pieces at any moment if he had wished to, or let his guard deal with them. But he didn't because what he wants more than anything else is to step out of LTT's shadow. Hiding behind a Sangreal wouldn't allow him to do that, unless Rand uses Callandor, which Demandred thought was very unlikely since he couldn't do so safely. If he called for Rand while in a full circle and with a Sangreal, it's because he was busy winning a battle, which he thought he was fighting against LTT, again going back to proving himself the best.

 

> 

Where are you getting this 400 number from? Rand's Ashaman he had post Ebon Dar were sent back, he didn't send 400 with Ituralde, he only had about 10 with him, and I'd guess Ituralde had 30 or so, they had a unit, with 2 unit leaders. Couldn't be that many. Where is this 400 coming from?

In the Prologue of WH Toveine estimates there are 500 Asha'man at the BT. This is a 107 days after Taim arrives in Caemlyn. That's a rate of about 5 Asha'man recruited per day, which is even faster than the 3-4 Torval had claimed in PoD, when he reported there were 438 Asha'man at the BT.

 

Later in KoD Logain says he's sent nearly half the Asha'man out of the BT, and none of them loyal to Taim. This is 54 days after Toveine's estimation in WH. If we go with the 5 Asha'man per day recruitement rate, their numbers go up to 770, and it might even be higher than that since the more Asha'man there are, the more recruting parties there are. Using Torval's 3-4 per day, we're closer to 700. I'd estimate between 350 and 400 Asha'man would make up about half of what the BT had at the time. If the rate of recrutement kept on at the same pace, there should have been at least 1000 Asha'man by the beginning of aMoL (910 at the least, 1200 at the most).

 

And I believe Rand gave Ituralde 100 Asha'man in tGS.

 

 

The first part: I seriously doubt it. But we'll never know. So I'll agree to disagree here good sir. 

 

The second part. Hmm. I thought a lot of them were coming back and forth, mostly coming back. I know Itrulade didn't get 100, it had to be less than that. Rand's personal cadre of Ashaman was like 10 or less, when they came to Maradon, they thought they had to abandon it, if Itrulade had 100, he would have put up a much better defense! Much much better. I'll go back and look for numbers tho just to make sure. 

 

Are we sure Logain didn't mean those of the Rank Ashaman? Weren't nearly all the "Two Rivers Boys" still in the BT? I mean there were dozens or a hundred of them alone. I'm going to search thru KOD tho, thanks for the tip. I'll report back. 

[Vardar]

 

Yes they are killed. By no male channelers, I mean none who are trained. And only a few who would be of channeling age at the time Demandred took over. Since they're only used for breeding stock, and kept ignorant and treated as animals. Demandred would have to overcome years of that abuse in order to begin training, he wouldn't have had enough time to do it. Thus when they came, they'd have none, or nearly no male channelers, yet they brought some with them. Odd. 

This feels like we're arguing about two different things man. Yeah, it was extremely weird there were male Ayyad among them. I never said otherwise. But what does that have to do with what I'm saying? There are no male channellers anywhere until the BT. Why should the presence/absence of male channellers matter at all? They are on equal grounds.

 

Shara is as big as Randland + Waste. If we assume their population is the same as well, 400 is a ridiculuous number. If they have 50 million population in total, then they have 250.000 potential female channellers. How in the Light are they going to miss all of those people? Even the White Tower is better at recruiting and their recruiting until Egwene is practically nonexistent.

 

 

I guess we are. I'm just saying Randland has Male's because Rand specifically started recruiting them, and his Taveren nature drew so many, plus on this side, a lot of men knew they could channel because their dads died of it. In Shara, it wouldn't work like that. Anyway, yea you're right 400 is small, but we don't know if they only keep the woman who can spark or what? Plus, how many were lost in the hostile take over?

 

I think at most they would match the Aiel or Seanchan. I guess instead of having 11000 channelers battling it out at the end of the book, 8000 on one side, he just nerfed EVERYONE. 

[XXX]

Where are you getting this 400 number from? Rand's Ashaman he had post Ebon Dar were sent back, he didn't send 400 with Ituralde, he only had about 10 with him, and I'd guess Ituralde had 30 or so, they had a unit, with 2 unit leaders. Couldn't be that many. Where is this 400 coming from?

 

Logain took out half the Ash'aman to guard the borders against the Seachan, positioned at Illian,Arad Daman etc.

[nikios2099]

 

 

Yes they are killed. By no male channelers, I mean none who are trained. And only a few who would be of channeling age at the time Demandred took over. Since they're only used for breeding stock, and kept ignorant and treated as animals. Demandred would have to overcome years of that abuse in order to begin training, he wouldn't have had enough time to do it. Thus when they came, they'd have none, or nearly no male channelers, yet they brought some with them. Odd. 

This feels like we're arguing about two different things man. Yeah, it was extremely weird there were male Ayyad among them. I never said otherwise. But what does that have to do with what I'm saying? There are no male channellers anywhere until the BT. Why should the presence/absence of male channellers matter at all? They are on equal grounds.

 

Shara is as big as Randland + Waste. If we assume their population is the same as well, 400 is a ridiculuous number. If they have 50 million population in total, then they have 250.000 potential female channellers. How in the Light are they going to miss all of those people? Even the White Tower is better at recruiting and their recruiting until Egwene is practically nonexistent.

 

 

I guess we are. I'm just saying Randland has Male's because Rand specifically started recruiting them, and his Taveren nature drew so many, plus on this side, a lot of men knew they could channel because their dads died of it. In Shara, it wouldn't work like that. Anyway, yea you're right 400 is small, but we don't know if they only keep the woman who can spark or what? Plus, how many were lost in the hostile take over?

 

I think at most they would match the Aiel or Seanchan. I guess instead of having 11000 channelers battling it out at the end of the book, 8000 on one side, he just nerfed EVERYONE. 

 

Shara is a big land but they're fighting for the shadow and they cannot ignore it as they're on the same side as trollocs ...

 

i don't know how Demandred has succeeded in this but it has probably been a very difficult task with big losses on the way due to channelers ( and warriors ) fighting against this or flying away before the last battle ...

[MasterAblar]

The first part: I seriously doubt it. But we'll never know. So I'll agree to disagree here good sir.

 

Fair enough.

 

The second part. Hmm. I thought a lot of them were coming back and forth, mostly coming back. I know Itrulade didn't get 100, it had to be less than that. Rand's personal cadre of Ashaman was like 10 or less, when they came to Maradon, they thought they had to abandon it, if Itrulade had 100, he would have put up a much better defense! Much much better. I'll go back and look for numbers tho just to make sure.

 

Are we sure Logain didn't mean those of the Rank Ashaman? Weren't nearly all the "Two Rivers Boys" still in the BT? I mean there were dozens or a hundred of them alone. I'm going to search thru KOD tho, thanks for the tip. I'll report back.

 

Logain's exact words in KoD are:

 

"More than half the Black Tower is in Arad Doman and Illian. I sent all the men with bonded Aes Sedai except those here, as you ordered" (KoD, chapter 29)

 

A little later he also says:

 

"One thing pleased him [Taim] though: that I didn't take any of his cronies." (KoD, chapter 29)

 

 

In any case, most if not all the full Asha'man at the BT were Taim's men, apart from Logain, since Taim didn't promote anyone to the rank of Asha'man who wasn't loyal to him.

 

According to Tam, Taim brought 40 men back from the Two Rivers in PoD.

 

As for the number of Asha'man given to Ituralde, it was definitely 100:

 

"What could you do if I gave you a hundred men who could channel?" (tGS, chapter 10)

Edited January 19, 2013 by Master Ablar

[Agitel]

How many male channelers were with the Sharans? If Demandred recruited as he went along, put a stop to some of the Sharan practices, he could have taught them some weaves, and even set up his own "school" in Shara. He had access to darkfriend men who could channel from the west, no reason he couldn't have used some to help.

[Vardar]

How many male channelers were with the Sharans? If Demandred recruited as he went along, put a stop to some of the Sharan practices, he could have taught them some weaves, and even set up his own "school" in Shara. He had access to darkfriend men who could channel from the west, no reason he couldn't have used some to help.

The men would have to completely rehabilitated from animals in less than a year. Plus his selection would have been scarce given the ages left alive. That's a small group.

[Vardar]

 

The first part: I seriously doubt it. But we'll never know. So I'll agree to disagree here good sir.

 

Fair enough.

 

The second part. Hmm. I thought a lot of them were coming back and forth, mostly coming back. I know Itrulade didn't get 100, it had to be less than that. Rand's personal cadre of Ashaman was like 10 or less, when they came to Maradon, they thought they had to abandon it, if Itrulade had 100, he would have put up a much better defense! Much much better. I'll go back and look for numbers tho just to make sure.

 

Are we sure Logain didn't mean those of the Rank Ashaman? Weren't nearly all the "Two Rivers Boys" still in the BT? I mean there were dozens or a hundred of them alone. I'm going to search thru KOD tho, thanks for the tip. I'll report back.

 

Logain's exact words in KoD are:

 

"More than half the Black Tower is in Arad Doman and Illian. I sent all the men with bonded Aes Sedai except those here, as you ordered" (KoD, chapter 29)

 

A little later he also says:

 

"One thing pleased him [Taim] though: that I didn't take any of his cronies." (KoD, chapter 29)

 

 

In any case, most if not all the full Asha'man at the BT were Taim's men, apart from Logain, since Taim didn't promote anyone to the rank of Asha'man who wasn't loyal to him.

 

According to Tam, Taim brought 40 men back from the Two Rivers in PoD.

 

As for the number of Asha'man given to Ituralde, it was definitely 100:

 

"What could you do if I gave you a hundred men who could channel?" (tGS, chapter 10)

Then I'm kinda lost about Maradon and the numbers now look worse. The hell are all these Ashaman hiding. LAN only had 5. Wtf is that about.