• This forum is strictly intended to be used by members of the VS Battles wiki. Please only register if you have an autoconfirmed account there, as otherwise your registration will be rejected. If you have already registered once, do not do so again, and contact Antvasima if you encounter any problems.

    For instructions regarding the exact procedure to sign up to this forum, please click here.
  • We need Patreon donations for this forum to have all of its running costs financially secured.

    Community members who help us out will receive badges that give them several different benefits, including the removal of all advertisements in this forum, but donations from non-members are also extremely appreciated.

    Please click here for further information, or here to directly visit our Patreon donations page.
  • Please click here for information about a large petition to help children in need.

Some words on ASOIAF.

Messages
360
Reaction score
96
The pages seem torn on whether it uses Book versions or Show versions, and several characters scale to 9-B entities like Sandor/Gregor and The Others in a way that creates serious unbalance (Beric is 9-B simply from fighting Sandor even though he died horribly to the one attack that actually connected to him) while author-stated top tiers like Jaime remain 9-C. On Beric again, his age on the profile is his book age and definitely not his show age, even though the profile says it's the show version. Problems like this is recurring in many of the profiles.

I think there's no question that the book versions are the most accurate and should be used as the first priority, as is the case with most adapted verses, but the show versions seem to be the ones exclusively in use in many cases, such as with Jon Snow. Certain characters are also significantly stronger in the books and vice versa. I want to know the verdict on what should be done, because even if it's book only, show only, both in different keys, or composite, there's work to be done.

Regarding the scaling of characters to the aforementioned wall level entities, I'd personally suggest restricting it to characters that undeniably have wall level feats of their own, or characters to whom a 9-B rating would be reasonable given what they represent, like direwolves. This would include Gregor (obviously), Sandor, Brienne, Robert, the Others, Direwolves, in general competent wielders of Valyrian steel weapons (AP, this includes Dayne with Dawn) and show Jon Snow (his book counterpart is not). I think this covers the characters currently with profiles. Characters like Jaime and Barristan, while certainly more skilled than most of these people, don't really qualify but they don't need to either, as a 9-C character can handily stand up to a 9-B character with skill alone without needing the same stats.

One thing that needs to be adressed however, particularly with the books, is combat speed of the fastest characters in the verse. It is a misconception that ASOIAF characters are "just normal humans" as is the argument so commonly used against them. The best fighters in the verse are easily capable of winning 5 on 1 fights in seconds:

Five men were down, dead or dying by the time Arya reached the back door that opened on the kitchen. She heard Ser Meryn Trant curse. "Bloody oafs," he swore, drawing his longsword from its scabbard. -AGOT, Arya IV

This clearly sounds like Superhuman speed and Meryn Trant, a knight consistently described as average (not really the pushover Sandor makes him out to be), is unimpressed and even later kills Syrio. Syrio's attacks are also described by Arya as a blur, blindingly fast, and faster than any man she's seen. Arya previously attended the hand's tourney and would have witnessed several skilled knights in the melee, so it's not like she hasn't seen combat before. Syrio Forel even himself admits to not being the fastest water dancer. It's still well above "athletic", especially when not wearing armor and being outsized.

Deciding which characters would deserve superhuman speed is the more tricky part, as it's obviously not universal, and Syrio isn't the only one with such feats. Lothor Brune on his own defended his commander against a dozen attackers and fought his way through 50 Fossoway men-at-arms and made it in time to capture their commander during the Battle of the Blackwater. Barristan did something similar in the stepstones and Jaime almost did the same in the Whispering Wood. Garlan Tyrell regularly trains against four men at once and wins. It's consistent that entire battles are often decided by single people and their accomplishments in battle, not through extreme power or durability, not through magic, but through immense speed. One good thing is that ASOIAF characters tend to fight each other quite often, so measuring them up against each other doesn't take much work, but I'd like input on the matter.

GRRM himself considers his best swordsmen comparable to warriors in LOTR, and while people tend to scoff at this opinion reasoning that "LOTR characters are superhuman", the realization that ASOIAF fighters are also superhumanly skilled lends it some lenience.

Lastly, something I brought up in a thread ages ago: Dragons need a significant lifting strength upgrade. If we go by the assumption that Drogon weighs 1100 tons, he'd need Class M lifting strength to support himself.

TLDR; pages are weird and inconsistent, there isn't a clear division between book/show. ASOIAF top tier humans are not just athletic people.
 
Back
Top