Turns out they've already contradicted themselves, twice. When Jon kills the walker at Hardhome, no wights go down and when Meera kills the walker in the cave, no wights go down. It's plot convenient BS.
Turns out they've already contradicted themselves, twice. When Jon kills the walker at Hardhome, no wights go down and when Meera kills the walker in the cave, no wights go down. It's plot convenient BS.
You KNOW that's because those walkers didn't turn any wights, right?! I'll show myself out.
Oh, by the way, interesting you brought up the other Others. So there were 13 initially in the 4th season when the baby was turned. I'm going to assume that's it: 13 + baby. Two down, 11+ baby to go. Did we see 11+ baby there? if not, Westeros if fucked because those Others need to be wiped out or the ending will be... fade to black:
1000 yrs later
“Don’t fight in the North, or the South. Fight every battle everywhere. Always, in your mind.”
. So there were 13 initially in the 4th season when the baby was turned. I'm going to assume that's it: 13 + baby. Two down, 11+ baby to go. Did we see 11+ baby there?
I've not been keeping a close eye on WW numbers but 4 have been killed in total. Jon's got two, Sam one & Meera one. There are defs three plus NK that assault the cave (and one of those get's wasted).
I don't understand why so many people see skin-changing and corpse-handling as different brands of the same power. To me, they couldn't be more different.
Corpse-handling seems to be a bit more than meat puppetry. When two wights attempt to assassinate the Lord Commander, they seem to know where he spends his time. There is some consciousness or memory intact. Stoneheart seems to have much in common with a wight, she does not develop, she has a pretty limited single-minded consciousness. And is Beric the equivalent of a wight? He certainly seems to have retained his consciousness, but he does not develop, limited to a pared down version of his agenda before he died, loyal to a dead king. Is this corpse-puppetry or something completely different.
As I see it, Beric is a wight and there is much more to wights than we understand. I think something or someone is inhabiting Beric, and that looks a lot like skin-changing
Corpse-handling seems to be a bit more than meat puppetry. When two wights attempt to assassinate the Lord Commander, they seem to know where he spends his time. There is some consciousness or memory intact.
I really need and want to catch up on this thread. Been swamped with home improvements lately, and a bit of car/truck shopping.
Anyway, yes. The wights do seem to be coordinated in their efforts. One distracted a few brothers. The other stealthily slipped into LC Mormont's apartment.
But, if you've read the Corpse-Handler trilogy/1000 Worlds, you know that GRRM enables Corpse-Handlers to do this sort of multitasking – using one corpse to repair this while another is repairing that. And, such Handlers are able to coordinate such work at a distance, using the eyes and bodies of the corpses to navigate the space.
The idea that the movements of the corpses at Castle Black are evidence that they have retained memories has been around the interwebs since before I joined this community. It's a sentiment that I had oft read while being a lurker, and never agreed with. I always thought it was an odd assumption.
Othor had no beef with Lord Commander Mormont, at least, not one that we were ever told about. So I never understood why his presence in Jon's room, en route to Mormont's room, would be seen as evidence that he had retained some memory.
The other wight, Jafer Flowers, killed Jaremy Rykker. We have no reason to assume Jafer had an issue with Jaremy, so again, I see no reason to associate Jafer's actions with retained memories. Jafer was from the Reach, Rykker was from Duskendale.
It all seems rather random, until you consider that the attacks were made upon the two highest ranking members of the Night's Watch at the time.
Mormont was of course the Lord Commander, but Rykker was serving him as the interim First Ranger.
So, if these two wights made their attacks on the ranking officers due to grudges and memories they had retained, we have to then assume that Benjen Stark kept the company of would-be mutineers. That doesn't add up in my mind. Benjen was so loyal to the Night's Watch that even Yoren considered him a true brother. And of course, we know that he and Qhorin had discussed the return of the old powers. Yoren and Qhorin are not much alike, but they each respected Benjen and were loyal to the Watch.
Thus, I find it unlikely that our beloved uncle Benjen would have selected two treacherous brothers when assembling his entourage to locate Waymar Royce. Considering his words to Jon upon his departure, and the way he was laughing with his men, it seems to me that he selected men he knew well. Veterans all. Brothers.
Stoneheart seems to have much in common with a wight, she does not develop, she has a pretty limited single-minded consciousness. And is Beric the equivalent of a wight? He certainly seems to have retained his consciousness, but he does not develop, limited to a pared down version of his agenda before he died, loyal to a dead king. Is this corpse-puppetry or something completely different.
=Melisandre
A limited-consciousness version of Melony that does not develop, and is single-mindedly loyal to R'hllor.
As I see it, Beric is a wight and there is much more to wights than we understand. I think something or someone is inhabiting Beric, and that looks a lot like skin-changing
Agreed, there is much we do not understand. And I agree it looks a lot like skin-changing. But the devils are in the details. And the distinctions, for me, present some intriguing implications.
Not only are these various types of wights different from skinchangers and wargs, they are quite different from each other. I'll outline the disctinctions I'm thinking of to better explain:
1a Fire wights can speak 1b Ice wights cannot
2a Fire wights eat and drink 2b Ice wights do not
3a Fire wights are active 24/7 3b Ice wights only function between dusk and dawn
4a Fire wights tend to lead groups of followers 4b Ice wights do not
5a Fire wights can wield and examine weapons, tools, and crowns 5b Ice wights do not
6a Fire wights profess explicit loyalties and beliefs that border on fanaticism 6b Ice wights do not
7a Fire wights tend to be solitary 7b Ice wights tend to be in packs
8a Fire wights can die from average mortal wounds 8b Ice wights cannot
9a Fire wights can give up their ability to respawn, and grant it to a new corpse 9b Ice wights cannot
10a Fire wights collect testimony and pass judgements 10b Ice wights do not
11a Fire wights have no masters 11b Ice wights are the thralls of the Others
12a Fire wights can use their blood to make objects take flame 12b Ice wights do not use their blood for anything
13a Fire wights are resurrected by a priest 13b Ice wights simply become operational when the sun goes down
14a Fire wights exibit deftness and even prowess in their movements 14b Ice wights are clumsy things
15a Fire wights only kill those whom they have judged to be guilty 15b Ice wights will strangle anyone
16a Fire wights often employ executioners 16b Ice wights do their killing personally
17a The victims of fire wights stay dead 17b The victims of ice wights likely do not
18a Fire wights are always human 18b Ice wights can be animal
I think all of these differences are striking, but the ones that seem most important to me are 1, 3, and 11. Rather than possess any sort of identity or second life, ice wights are dead men who are mobile at night. And, rather than lead, like fire wights, ice wights follow.
Old Nan said as much:
Old Nan nodded. "In that darkness, the Others came for the first time," she said as her needles went click click click. "They were cold things, dead things, that hated iron and fire and the touch of the sun, and every creature with hot blood in its veins. They swept over holdfasts and cities and kingdoms, felled heroes and armies by the score, riding their pale dead horses and leading hosts of the slain. All the swords of men could not stay their advance, and even maidens and suckling babes found no pity in them. They hunted the maids through frozen forests, and fed their dead servants on the flesh of human children."
And Samwell's account matches Nan's:
The wights had been slow clumsy things, but the Other was light as snow on the wind. It slid away from Paul's axe, armor rippling, and its crystal sword twisted and spun and slipped between the iron rings of Paul's mail, through leather and wool and bone and flesh. It came out his back with a hissssssssssss and Sam heard Paul say, "Oh," as he lost the axe. Impaled, his blood smoking around the sword, the big man tried to reach his killer with his hands and almost had before he fell. The weight of him tore the strange pale sword from the Other's grip. (ASOS Sam I)
As does the account Sam found in the Night's Watch's annals:
"I found mention of dragonglass. The children of the forest used to give the Night's Watch a hundred obsidian daggers every year, during the Age of Heroes. The Others come when it is cold, most of the tales agree. Or else it gets cold when they come. Sometimes they appear during snowstorms and melt away when the skies clear. They hide from the light of the sun and emerge by night . . . or else night falls when they emerge. Some stories speak of them riding the corpses of dead animals. Bears, direwolves, mammoths, horses, it makes no matter, so long as the beast is dead. The one that killed Small Paul was riding a dead horse, so that part's plainly true. Some accounts speak of giant ice spiders too. I don't know what those are. Men who fall in battle against the Others must be burned, or else the dead will rise again as their thralls." (AFFC Sam I)
I think distinction #11 might be the most important. Fire wights are leaders whereas ice wights are thralls. And if they are thralls, we must ask, who is orchestrating their movements?
Just as Ramsay sent his puppet to Moat Cailin to treat with the ranking officer, so too were Othor and Jafer Flowers sent to the Wall to kill the leaders of the Watch.
Last Edit: Aug 24, 2017 9:28:44 GMT by voice: Dornish keyboard
"I can see it. You have more of the north in you than your brothers."
if these two wights made their attacks on the ranking officers due to grudges and memories they had retained,
I was thinking of memories in a more limited sense. They seemed to know their way around Castle Black and likely knew how to find Mormont. I agree that it is a stretch to think there motivations were maintained in the same sense as Stoneheart or Beric.
9a Fire wights can give up their ability to respawn, and grant it to a new corpse 9b Ice wights cannot
Ice wights probably have not use for that ability. Beric may not have known what he was doing. Neverless, it is an interesting distinction; I'm just trying to pick at these because it is a very interesting set of 'data points.'
11a Fire wights have no masters 11b Ice wights are the thralls of the Others
I'm not sure about a. It makes me think of Bran's warging, with Jojen encouraging him to mark a tree. The consciousness is primarily that of the host, but the host may not be entirely the master.
I think distinction #11 might be the most important. Fire wights are leaders
Beric was a leader before he was a wight. Mel may have had that capacity. I have assumed that they were chosen because they had abilities. But maybe it is a bit more complex than that -- there is no sane reason anyone would follow Stoneheart. In a sense, the fire wights are slaves. Each is enslaved to an obsession, perhaps by something that finds it easier to stoke and direct the obsession than to direct each movement or decision. Or perhaps it is less direct than warging or skin-changing. 13a may be a key to the distinction. I am assuming that the Others raise the ice wights. With the fire wights, there may be a more complex web of control, using intermediaries. Beric is not raised by the god, but by a bad priest. Mel may be a slave, but Thoros doesn't seem to be. Then Stoneheart seems to be another step removed from the god. Or if a consciousness moved from Beric to Stoneheart, maybe it is a step closer. I've tried to play with these ideas, but your list gives us a set of tools to really analyze it. I'm struggling against your formulation of 9a, which assumes a degree of control by Beric that I don't think was there. The fire of 'life' moved, but I'm not convinced that Beric willed that. I'm not saying he would have resisted it if he had understood what was happening. But I think the control came from the other consciousness within him. Looking down the list, fire wights may be more like Bran's experience of warging, while ice wights are more like Bran skin-changing Hodor. The first is a shared consciousness and shared control (with most control being with the host) The second is body puppetry. Since we don't know the source of control of either, there is likely much more than that
I was thinking of memories in a more limited sense. They seemed to know their way around Castle Black and likely knew how to find Mormont
i also lean this way. It is what i termed their auto-pilot. What if Benjen gave them each a mission, one to report to the LC and the other to report to the FR. Having been wighted, when they try to accomplish their mission the urge to kill humans interferes eventually.
13a Fire wights are resurrected by a priest 13b Ice wights simply become operational when the sun goes down
are you suggesting that ice wights are resurrected every night? don't think so; they day-bernate but stay undead until their bones are cracked. Firewights, specially Mel, do not function well at night, as 'it is full of terrors' and she requires a fire on at all times.
Then Stoneheart seems to be another step removed from the god. Or if a consciousness moved from Beric to Stoneheart, maybe it is a step closer.
doesn't Beric lose some of himself each time he dies? it seems to me that LSH was another regressive step but much more pronounced. Who is to say that further regression would not lead to the minimal conscious state of an ice-wight, ie at the bone marrow level. After all aren't the ice wights raised by the dead, either a ww or another wight, possibly a very many times dead (how many times to live 8000 years).
Is their much difference between the single minded objective of the ww and that of LSH? aren't they both fulfilling their last mission? in the case of LSH, that of killing all who harmed her family.
Last Edit: Aug 24, 2017 23:24:25 GMT by arrysfleas
"Arya did not dare take a bath, even though she smelled as bad as Yoren by now, all sour and stinky. Some of the creatures living in her clothes had come all the way from Flea Bottom with her; it didn’t seem right to drown them."
Post by DarkSister1001 on Aug 24, 2017 23:28:34 GMT
In the example of Othor, I don't see him remembering where the LC stayed so much as his memories were accessed by the Others. The way Bran can access the weirnet. If they died and went into the trees the Others may be able to jack into the trees too.
The blade was Valyrian steel, spell-forged and dark as smoke. Nothing held an edge like Valyrian steel.
doesn't Beric lose some of himself each time he dies? it seems to me that LSH was another regressive step but much more pronounced. Who is to say that further regression would not lead to the minimal conscious state of an ice-wight, ie at the bone marrow level. After all aren't the ice wights raised by the dead, either a ww or another wight, possibly a very many times dead (how many times to live 8000 years).
I assume that, once the 'fire' has moved to LSH, Beric is gone. It is now Catelyn who is less Catelyn.
Is their much difference between the single minded objective of the ww and that of LSH? aren't they both fulfilling their last mission? in the case of LSH, that of killing all who harmed her family.
LSH does seem to be fulfilling her last mission. And Beric is, although he seems to have retained some humanity. We don't really know about Mel. With the ice wights, their last mission is speculation. Maybe they are seeking the LC because they were told to find the LC, then got wighted. Or maybe the Others raised them and instructed them to go kill the LC. Or maybe they found themselves in Castle Black and made a decision about the best way to cause damage to the NW. We do know that a basic motivation has changed with the ice wights -- they kill the living. Speculation about the reason for that is little more than guesswork.
So here are my rather incoherent and confusing thoughts on the whole thing. Explaining things in English makes it hard to truly express what I mean. But oh well doubting people will read it.
It seems that in this little universe soul trumps brains and makes up who a person truly is: experience, morals, emotions and other stuff.
The moment a person’s original body dies, the soul start’s to decay, losing memories, lowering of morals and less emotions.
So when a red priest does there thing it’s more of a resurrection type of situation where the moment the bodies has its spark of life again, the decay of the soul stops, and it is no different from a normal living person.
But creating a Wight is simply necromancy and the dead body is moving on magic only and has no life within it, so in that situation the soul keeps decaying until there is nothing left at some point just a walking husk devoid of anything.( I think that the ice magic they use is weaker during the day and wights are therefore snails compared to night when they are more Olympic sprinter and thats the reason they don't come out cause there easy pickings)
So comparing Berric to lady stone heart. The first time Berric was ressurected he had a much more of a complete soul ( more humanity) left then when lady stone heart was resurrected, seeing as she had spent quiet the time in floating in the river making her much more devoid of feelingsand other basic human things.
I hope I did not wrongly interpet corpse handling.
So people are saying that skinchanging and corpse handling are comparable and stuff and maybe I understood the whole thing wrong or I am wrong, could be. But it seems to me they are different things.
Skinchanging:
So there is a bond and forcefull occupation of an animal or person.
The bond seems to me like more of a blending of two souls were the warg takes control over the 2 its symbiotic on some level.
Forcefully occupation is more of the soul of the warg pushing the original out of the way and taking complete control over the body.
So what I’m saying is that when warging the body of the warg is at that moment soulless, and when the animal dies the soul of the warg is automatically sent back to his/her original body.
And if the body of the warg is killed the warg’s soul will try to stay in the body its inhabiting at that moment or when incapable of staying will then jump to the animals with wich he/she had the closed bond.
My believe is that a soul can’t latch or occupy a dead body.
So people said that ww/other whatever you prefer seem to skinchange/ warg ( corpse handling ) into the wights that they created.
I see it as more of a bee type situation where they do their own thing, killing any living thing the wight might come a cross. But when ordered by a ww/other large numbers of wights are capable of swarming the enemy. Maybe there is some difference in proficiency between the ww/other and more complex movements can be performed.
So wights are more like husks that can only receive orders and nothing else.
But you could say that the more recent wight, with more of his original soul still intact is somehow capable of receiving and performing more complex orders for instance killing the LC.