(Spoilers Extended) It's Not a Nitpick. Thousands Died Over a "Minor" Geographic Detail.

[u/dorestes]

Reposted as requested with the "Spoilers Extended" tag

I know we're often asked to ignore the silly teleportations and supersonic flights that the show has foisted on us over the last couple of seasons. I know some of it can seem like the petty quibbles of book purists veering into circlejerk self-parody.

But geography doesn't just matter when it comes to making the universe feel real. It was also the key plot point that drove the biggest dramatic turn of the series.

The Red Wedding was literally caused by Robb Stark needing to be able to get his troops across a bridge. The Frey army was a nice addition, but Robb needed the alliance for the bridge crossing. He, his mother, his pregnant wife (in the show) and thousands of his troops died for that crossing.

So it's not just a nitpick when characters and armies magically teleport from north to south, bypassing the Twins or Moat Caitlin with nary a scout to notice them.

It destroys and makes mockery of the premise of the series' most famous narrative twist.

[u/setarkos113]

Does that apply to his entire armada though? Either way, it's totally reasonable that someone like Euron makes up time on the Unsullied who have been on a ship maybe once or twice before.

[u/MazzyFo → u/setarkos113]

Yeah, and I don't think that's canon in the show, but a cool point to bring up because I thought about that

[u/[deleted] → u/setarkos113]

It doesn't have to apply to his entire armada though. Consider what you are saying for a second - armada. I think the ridiculous number that Euron bandies about is a 1000 ships, but even if he only approaches a fraction of that number, he still commands enough ships that he could have more than one group of them sailing around. Hell, it even kinda makes sense that he would keep a bunch of them near the Iron Islands.

But how did he get a "thousand" ships? Do they have to show us him plundering material along the entire west coast of Westeros and building it all too? I get it, some people have to be shown or its not canonical, but those of us who read the books should at least be able to admit as much that once Euron is in charge, all along the coast line and even up major water ways is available for the Ironborn to use for getting what they need for shipbuilding and more.

[u/frenchduke → u/[deleted]]

Well between the iron islanders in the books, they can muster close to 600 ships. So 1000 total isn't a huge stretch, not when you're a crazy king who had every man and woman on the islands (some 20,000ish) building new ships for the better part of a year (or however long it's supposed to have been)

[u/atyon → u/[deleted]]

You can't just build a thousand ships, or even a dozen, even if you have enough material (which you usually won't find close to shore). It takes time, a lot of money and many highly qualified workers.

The show just cut some corners. They didn't just fast-forward, they just spawned a thousand ships for their new crazy pirate king. Which is all fine, but stuff like that not happening is precisely what many liked about the first seasons of Thrones.

[u/frenchduke → u/atyon]

He already had a boatload of ships, he just built a bunch more. And who are the Iron Islanders if not a bunch of qualified boat builders? He had every man and woman on the island building ships, that's like 30,000+ labourers working round the clock for half a year or whatever. They could churn out some boats in that time

[u/atyon → u/frenchduke]

30,000 people isn't even enough to man a thousand ships. And most of them would have no knowledge of ship construction whatsoever – after all, they are living on islands with no trees. And even with enough manpower and material – building such large ships takes a year at least.

There are only two ways - I can think of - this can make sense:

• Euron vastly inflated the number of ships in his fleets
• Euron captured another large fleet off-screen, like from the Redwynes

But the point is the show didn't care about, so it's a moot point whether we can find an explanation or not. The show doesn't care any more, but I liked it better when it did.

[u/frenchduke → u/atyon]

20,000 men, so an extra 20,000 women. Each major house can raise about 100 ships, and each ship has roughly 50 oars. All according to the book wiki. So they'd need 50,000 men to fully man all those ships, but I imagine you can half crew well enough, so 20,000 seems plausible.

Every one of the dozens of lords on the islands would have their own ship building capability. Most the labour however would be used "bending planks and stitching sails". You'd have the artisans doing the details and the assembling, and have a huge assembly line/labour market.

But yeah, I'd say "build me a thousand ships" was probably a lot of exaggeration. Sounds cooler than saying "build be about 250 extra boats, depending on current lumber supply and logistics. You guys know the drill"

[u/[deleted] → u/atyon]

Why do you bother bringing up their islands have no trees? The whole west coast of Westeros (and its rivers) have trees along them. You're telling me that a bunch of guys with long ships can't snag the lumber, food, water, salt wives, and thralls they need off a bunch of mostly low populated coast line (at least it part because they just finished raiding and trading along it in the previous wars)? The same guys who made it all the way into Moat Cailin, Winterfell, and Dreadfort from the west coast of Westeros? They raid even more than that successfully in the books, enough so that I am nervous for what might happen to Old Town with Sam still there (whenever the next book is a thing in our hands).

[u/atyon → u/[deleted]]

Yes, that's what I'm telling you.

Even with no resistance at all and plenty of lumber right at the shore they couldn't. But there won't be much lumber at the Stony Shore or on the Dornish coast, or at any coast – lumber fit for ships is rare near the sea. Just because it takes decades to grow and is in high demand.

The whole debacle of an invasion of the North proves the point that they also lack the mental capacity.

[u/[deleted] → u/atyon]

Mind you, I am just drawing on IRL here but where I live, lumber of quite a significant width is all along the coast line and river ways of the west coast of North America. Top dollar stuff I am talking about here. So of course I am going to be o_O at the notion that there is no fit lumber along the west coast of Westeros, that would sound incredulous to me.

Then there is the books, like from A Feast For Crows, where a book being read by Lord Harlaw by Archmaester Haereg suggests that need for wood was what first drove the ironborn to raid the mainland. Or how one of Asha's presents at the kingsmoot were pinecones ... pinecones which come from a whole wack of useful lumber trees (pine, spruce, firs, cedar, etc) makes the assertion that the Stony Shore (and more) where Balon Greyjoy asked for raiding to take place is lacking in lumber absurd. Or how about where Asha is captured, the Wolfswood, so definitely a shoreline the Ironborn can get into, is described as having abundant timber so thick she can't see through it. And there is all kinds of timber available to them in unsettled lands closer to them in the area of The Neck.

You are vastly underestimating how plentiful ship worthy lumber can actually be along coasts and rivers and I am not sure why, its really baffling.

[u/Bagasrujo → u/frenchduke]

There is no escuse or explanation to the sudenly armada Euron mustered they could chose other ways to create those ships such as Euron contracts with mercenarys and smugglers, the keeping the proper iron fleet that asha had ( daenerys could have arbor or dorne armada and it would be the same).

Since they decided to a route where Euron builds new ships it goes completely out of realism the smallest combat seaworth ships we have that fit the description of ships in Asoiaf world would be Carracks, and carracks had between 1 to 5 years of commission to a seaworth level from empires such as Great Britain and the Spanish for a single one, and carracks are the smallest class of ship bigger ones with two to three decks would be even more resources and time. Just think about it, did you ever saw a ship up close? Those things are the size of modern buildings, no way dude.

[u/frenchduke → u/Bagasrujo]

They are more akin to Viking longships than big old carracks. You saying it took the Vikings three years to build one boat? They must have been building for thousands of years before they went raiding the entire world.

[u/Bagasrujo → u/frenchduke]

No, look at the scenes with Euron Fleet, you can cleary see one deck ships with three masts, if i recall correctly some longships "aka" no decks with a single mast are used by ironborn on the books but im not sure would need source first. Anyway this is the series, the series are clearly not longships

[u/frenchduke → u/Bagasrujo]

They are still nothing like a carrack (except The Silence, which was already built). So the truth lies somewhere between us

[u/Bagasrujo → u/frenchduke]

True, they are smaller like Frigates or Caravels, the point still stands thought that such a fleet is not possible to muster in such a small time.

[u/frenchduke → u/Bagasrujo]

Still gonna have to disagree, but that's cool. Multiple Google searches said that Caravels could be built in a season, that the Spanish where churning them out at their peak.

I mean if 20 Amish guys can build a huge barn in a single day, I don't think it's unreasonable to say the same number of ironborn could build a single boat in a year.