Few points that other people have mentioned that I want to comment on

 

1. Tied off gateways: didn't RJ retconn them and pretend like it wasn't possible?

 

2. Sharan male channelers: men who can learn are not treated like animals. If most people from the BT are learners, why can the sharan men not be learners trained by demandred and westerners?

 

3. Numbers being off: I place more blame on team Jordan for letting this happen. It is not just RJ's legacy, but it is something they have worked on for so long that they should have cared more and noticed these things.

3a. It is better if you pretend that the missing people wiped each other out early on. It also explains how the seanchan took over in Avi's vision; everyone paid the butcher's bill except them

2) Actually, did they expand upon that? I was lead to believe that all men born in those channeler towns are treated like animals, but sure there are men born outside the town who can channeler, sparker or non sparker, but that's assuming Demandred had time to go testing. Sure, Taim could have done it but that's getting to a stretch  now. He was able to send scouting parties to a hostile country? One where they kill and enslave outsiders?

 

 

That's been the understanding, I assumed they came back, however it now begs the question, how did Maradon fall with 100 Ashaman? 

 

I think exhaustion is the only explanation. Dumai's Well was an all out assault to free Rand, not a prolonged defense. Channelers are highly effective, especially in the short term, but if you need them for a prolonged defense you're going to have to be rotating them, facing exhaustion, and attrition.

 

And not all Asha'man are as strong and talented as Rand or the named Asha'man. They can only do so much. I think Rand and the prominent Asha'man paint a distorted picture of how good they are in a fight. 

 

They are better than most at killing, but the Power of your average channeler, male or female, is not that great that 100 Asha'man would be able to hold back that amount of Shadowspawn. 

 

As Agitel said, Dumai's Wells was a unique situation, they only needed to kill with all their strength for a short amount of time against a fleeing foe with a fraction of the number. They didn't have to worry about anything but rescuing Rand. 

 

At Maradon, they weren't used just for killing. They were used for Healing, Travelling, scouting, relaying messages (via the beacons etc.) They were up against a force that outnumbered them vastly and were forced into a prolonged battle where they were on the defensive. The Shadowspawn were attacking, not fleeing like the Shaido, thus they had to protect themselves not just kill, which drains strength. 

 

I would say that I could agree that the Asha'man at Maradon didn't put up as much of a fight as you would expect, however, even if they had been written as good as realistically possible - without becoming totally overpowered - they still would have lost Maradon. 

I know they're not as strong, but still 100? Were there even 100 at Dumai Wells? Yes that's a different situation, but its' not like they rested after or anything, nor did they even seem exerted by what they did. Look what Eggy and her AS did against the trollocs. Yes they have san and angreal, but Maradon had walls that effectively funneled the monsters into one locations, making weaves more efffective, not to mention the battle before Maradon.

In fact, let's just back, before Itrulade was let into Maradon, recall the battle forcing the trollocs across the river, and how Itrulade was looked at funny by some officers for sending 1 channeler away to burn siege equipment, why would 1 matter if he had 100? No way he had 100, or it as forgotten at that point. 

I actually could care less (yes, that's how you use THAT phrase, lol) who Nakomi is. I NEVER cared. ... What works me up is the PRACTICE that Team Jordan has now taken in refusing to asnwer questions fans have. It is inexcusable. See my above post. It is sickening.

 

 

Fish

You could care less about who she is? So you do care some? 

 

 

 

 

I am sure glad I was reading and enjoying the book instead of counting every single person in the fighting.

I still enjoyed the book, but it's kinda hard to notice people missing when THE BATTLE FOR EXISTENCE ITSELF is looming. I mean, what people just said screw existence, I don't feel like going outside today? I don't get it.

Stop being silly Vards, why on earth would we hold the author accountable for details and continuity? ;)

Touche sir, touche. 

 

 

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.

Yeah, that was pretty much my reaction while reading the book. At least Maradon the Asha'man are shown in action fighting the trollocs. It's just that there are a huge amount of trollocs, too many for them to deal with.

 

But in aMoL they're not even mentioned. Logain shows up with 200 (according to Elayne), which is less than he should have had, but it's like 600-700 Asha'man just fell off the map at some point.

per my understanding Rand took a ton of channelers with him from the black tower somepoint around Knife of Dreams, I think.  

That's been the understanding, I assumed they came back, however it now begs the question, how did Maradon fall with 100 Ashaman? and why did Lan have 5 with him. 5? Really? The WT army had none (Except maybe the bonded ones, but I thought they were with Rand), Elayne's had none, Lan had 5, so Rand's army have 395 Ashaman with him? Really? I mean, if he was trying to remain hidden, why take that many. 

It's just a lot of stuff that does add up. I mean, I understand why it was done, as discussed a few pages back, the channeler numbers were out of control, they had to be taken in some, so that's how they did it. 

But Sutts, I'm going to a book signing next month, you best believe I intend on asking about the Sharan men. I just can't let that one pass me by. I can stand for making random people disappear, I mean maybe they were hiding, because they lost their will to live and survive, but I can't abide by introducing people who don't bloody exist! 

I am sure glad I was reading and enjoying the book instead of counting every single person in the fighting.   

I still enjoyed the book, but it's kinda hard to notice people missing when THE BATTLE FOR EXISTENCE ITSELF is looming. I mean, what people just said screw existence, I don't feel like going outside today? I don't get it. 

 

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.

Yeah, that was pretty much my reaction while reading the book. At least Maradon the Asha'man are shown in action fighting the trollocs. It's just that there are a huge amount of trollocs, too many for them to deal with.

 

But in aMoL they're not even mentioned. Logain shows up with 200 (according to Elayne), which is less than he should have had, but it's like 600-700 Asha'man just fell off the map at some point.

Naw Logain said he had 100. Taim had 100 as well. 

 

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.

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.

 

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. 

 

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. 

 

 

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. 

 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?

 

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. 

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?

It seems this community is blessed with numerous battle-hardened desktop generals, all with a better understanding of how (imaginative) large scale battles are being fought than the author of the book.

Because, you know. No one in the world studies battles, warfare and other tactics in their spare time as a hobby. I mean, that's just impossible... 

Aes Sedai: 600 total AS = 400 fighter + 200 healer / 1000 novices+Accepted to provide circles for healers and logistics (each gets 500)

Wise Ones: 2500 = 1000 fighter + 1000 healer/circle + 500 logistics (pure gateway duty for supply and troop deployment)

Windfinders: 200 = 100 at SG using BotW + 100 logistics

Damane: 1000 fighter

Asha'man: 600 fighter = 400 that Rand ordered sent out in CoT or KoD + 200 Logain brings out

Kin: 1000 = 500 healing + 500 logistics (I'm assuming the rest 700 is just hiding)

Total: 6900 = 3000 fighter + 2200 healer + 1600 logistics

Wise  ones don't heal too well. And damn my numbers left out the Kin. So it's even more skewed to the light. Dang. 

And didn't most of those 400 Ashaman send out in KOD return. 

Don't get me started on the whole breeding thing. Bottom line, the way it was explained in the book is totally not how genetics works and isn't plausible. But yes, the numbers were LE, but maybe that many died during the takeover.

They've said the men are treated like animals. They don't even teach them to read or write and they don't see who they are bred with. I'm not saying he couldn't train the men, but could he train the men while taking over the rest of the country and stabilizing it? Didn't Moggy ask his little gf about never seeing Demandreds weaves. Teaching men while maintaining your illusion of a prophetical figure would be more than difficult.

Grendel too them, and knew the hierarchy or the channelers, thus dealt with them a little, before he got there since she didn't know where he was. So at that point he was not gathering armies.

So, the few men who are alive at any given time, all sub 18, would ave to be gathered and trained, while creating and maintaining your illusion, and gathering armies and prepping them to fight alongside shadow spawn. Where'd he fine time? That's my point. It's totally illogical if not plain impossible

Oh and yea I forgot about the red veil Aiel. Still not enough given the wise ones and seachan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Instead of culling the light side channelers to make the OP users on both sides equivalent,I wonder why Sanderson did not just bump the no of channelers from Shara to make up the difference.Instead of 400 why not have them bring 3000? 

 

Because it wouldn't have been enough. Plus, they had no males. At the most they would have matched the Aiel, which leaves the windfinders, the seachan and the BT/WT to outnumber them. So, still over 2 to 1

 

They had males channelers.And the difference could be made up by the Aiel red veil channelers. I think Sanderson missed a chance here.

Think Vards means they shouldn't have had many male channelers as they are all killed once they reach a certain age.

Unless Demandred followed Taim's tactics for the black tower, all the Ayyad bloodlines up until 17 would have been available and they could have most likely forced anyone from 13 upwards. Morr wasnt exactly much older than that.

 

Add in scouring parties travelling across Shara and in the 2 years Demandred had there he could have gotten them all well and truly sorted, and thats assuming he wasnt smart enough to start before the cleansing. He could have 13x13'd them and gotten them protection against the taint.

 

The entire Demandred arc wasnt that well thought out in my opinion. I enjoyed it because I think he's a cool character. But it makes him look inept as hell that while in control of an entire continent that he managed such a piss poor army. Sorry but a few hundred channellers and a few hundred thousand troops is a little on the small side in comparison to any large nation and Shara is the better part of 2x Randland. He could have had an enormous slave army backed with a stonking load of channellers. And then we could have had the last battle we'd been led to believe was coming before the Aiel and Seanchan decided to have a bath and a tea party and sit out the last battle.

He hasn't been there two years unless he was in cohoots with Greandal, which we know he wasn't. Recall she stole the leaders in book 6 or 7. So a most he had a year. All the male channelers were used at breeding animals, thus were completely ignorant. How much training could he have done to subhuman animals in less than a year? Morr was at least 15 men start later than women. At most they'd have a handful of untrained men, it's barely feasible.

Instead of culling the light side channelers to make the OP users on both sides equivalent,I wonder why Sanderson did not just bump the no of channelers from Shara to make up the difference.Instead of 400 why not have them bring 3000? 

Because it wouldn't have been enough. Plus, they had no males. At the most they would have matched the Aiel, which leaves the windfinders, the seachan and the BT/WT to outnumber them. So, still over 2 to 1

What happened to the missing Ash'aman? Taim said he had close to 1000 in the tower. 100 were with him fighting for the shadow.Around 100 were with Logain.30 odd were with Rand and another 50 were with the AS as warders.Around 800 AM sat out the battle?

 

What happened to the WO's? Only few dozens were with Rand.What happened to the rest?

2 out if every 3 Ashaman died in the battle of the black tower which took place off screen. At least that's the assumption.

The truth is so many Ashaman and wise ones went MIA because the numbers the light would have had would have made the battles a joke. Taim couldn't have taken more than 200 to 300 men, even with turning. That leaves him outnumbered 2 to 1. The WT lost even less to the dread lords and they killed a few. Even tossing in the Sharans and giving them 1000 channelers, none male they don't reach the numbers of the bt plus wt. add in the 3000 or so wise ones who can channel, and the windfinders and the shadow is gonna get is ass kicked just from the one power. So how do you solve that? Make 2/3rds disappear.

 

 

Along with Maradon, and the fact that no less than 5 channelers admit they could level a city with certain items and circles proves it can be done. Why assume it was a plant it something when no evidence points to it?

 

Hell, the queen AS that leveled Manathren did it solo too. She had a Sanangreal too. But she did it. Is that not evidence either?

Doubtful that it will class as evidence to those who feel that the Lights forces didnt have their knee's cut off before the action started.

 

Myself I would have been happier if they had powered up Shara even more and given a bit of back story to it. I.e 2 years training every man/woman and slave to fight in preparation and then drop 4-5million of the best in gateways 5-10 miles from the lights armies and have them totally swarm the light to counter how seriously overpowered the Light would have been.

 

That would have actually been believable and plausible, because we know for a fact that Shara was secretive and that they dealt in slaves, that they specifically bred channellers. Yet managed to field only 400 Ayyad...

 

Sorry but Shara is meant to be larger than Randland, and if they only have 400 yet specifically breed those bloodlines then they would be on similar % as the AoL for channellers which is 2-3x higher than Randland. Add in the larger size, even if the population density was lower they should still have had substantially higher numbers. If Shara's total population was 10million (Which is Andors supposed population) with 3% channellers (Randland apparently has 1% I believe) they should have had 300,000 Ayyad....

 

That quite frankly isnt possible in the WoT universe it would just be too overpowered so drop it to say 0.03% of a 10million population and thats 3,000 which would have been enough when you had 4-5 million soldiers/slaves added with the trollocs it would have been a true last battle where the Light would really struggle to win.

 

Not having 400 Ayyad pop up, yet have the light afraid to use its Seanchan advantage which was the better part of 2x the Sharan channellers.. all of whom were trained as weapons...

 

Im still half expecting that we'll get some sort of "This was a portal stone variant of what was meant to happen, and the forces/abilities/people you were expecting had already died in the lead up to TG."

They bred channelers, but they had 0 male channelers, since they killed them all at 18 or whatever. Some channelers died when Demandred too over, same for when Grandel played around there. Some had too. The while breeding thing, lets be real. The number of channelers and how they're bred makes 0 sense as it is. None at all. But that's another debate. So for now, back to the number they had, it'd be half of what you're thinking due to the lack of males.

Along with Maradon, and the fact that no less than 5 channelers admit they could level a city with certain items and circles proves it can be done. Why assume it was a plant it something when no evidence points to it?

Hell, the queen AS that leveled Manathren did it solo too. She had a Sanangreal too. But she did it. Is that not evidence either?

Battle scenes have never been the WOT's strongest feature. This has really shown up in the MOL as the MOL is essentially one giant battle scene on a scale I have never read personally. 

 

I always thought of the Trolloc's as being over hyped from the outset. They are promoted as creatures of such size and ferocity but more often than not killed off at a much greater rate than the human forces opposing them. Another aspect to Trolloc's I struggled with was that fact that they were made from people and so to have millions of Trolloc's there must be an equivalent loss to a population in the making. There was no mention of female Trolloc's or Trolloc young. I think it would have made more sense to have a lot less Trolloc's that killed four or five men to every Trolloc. 

 

The WOT is a fantastic story but I would never read it for the battle scenes. Bernard Cornwell and Conn Iggulden and Simon Scarrow have written battles that make a person feel like they are there. Yet the WOT is about so much more and RJ and BS have done so very well with the other components of the story. 

They were originally people, well part people. Due to the creation process they aren't anymore and are outside the soul pool. Female trollocs are mentioned briefly as breeding factories.