Great smackdown!

And this guy said the same as me:

"It's why I ultimately prefer LOTR and Tolkient to GRRM. GRRM's world may be more open, but it just doesn't feel alive. Rather it feels like a generic fantasy setting for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, with the same amount of lackluster effort put into it."

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;1039089Great smackdown!

And this guy said the same as me:

"It's why I ultimately prefer LOTR and Tolkient to GRRM. GRRM's world may be more open, but it just doesn't feel alive. Rather it feels like a generic fantasy setting for a Dungeons and Dragons campaign, with the same amount of lackluster effort put into it."

Personally I'm not a fan of either, because the wrote/write in the same manner, especially in LoTR's latter books.  The King Returns is mostly a travelogue with some character moments, whereas Game of Thrones is more about the politics than the actual characters, neither of them have any real 'life' to them.

Personal opinion.

Eh, you look at Greyhawk, Realms, Golarion - these settings are much more detailed and don't have the gaping holes that Westeros does.

Westeros doesn't seem like world created for a RPG campaign, it seems exactly what it is, a world created for a series of novels, where a lot of details simply don't matter so they don't get nailed down and things are specifically not defined so that the author won't get backed into any corners and can let the story go where it needs to.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1039111Eh, you look at Greyhawk, Realms, Golarion - these settings are much more detailed and don't have the gaping holes that Westeros does.

Middle-Earth feels the same to me.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1039111Westeros doesn't seem like world created for a RPG campaign, it seems exactly what it is, a world created for a series of novels, where a lot of details simply don't matter so they don't get nailed down and things are specifically not defined so that the author won't get backed into any corners and can let the story go where it needs to.

And personally I need more depth to the world.

GRRM's world is a weird hybrid.  
It doesn't have enough internal consistency or detail to be a good RPG world, which makes it seem more like a literary world.
It doesn't have enough originality to be a good literary world, which makes it seem more like an RPG world.

Frustrating, but I do like the novels.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1038952That's putting it mildly. Every fanfic I have read which focused on them either rewrote them extensively or used them as target practice.

Fanfics in general aren't my measure of originality or good research. YMMV.

QuoteThe gift giving is never mentioned after the first book, since it was a contrived excuse to maintain Dany's narrative at that time. I find it one of the weakest and most boring parts of the story, and I would have preferred something where... and this is just of the top of my head... Drogo married her specifically for her claim to the throne because he wants to conquer Westeros and then send its armies to conquer Essos or something.

...why would he bother with an excuse:D? And I'm asking seriously.

Quote from: Chris24601;1038958Here you go; Gift Economies.

Thank you:). I'm too lazy to google that...

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;1038998Okay, that article only proves my point. Real gift economies occur in small communities where everyone can remember everyone else, not hordes of tens of thousands where people regularly killed each other for trivial reasons.

Which hordes are fractured in tribes.
And no, gift giving as a rule often persists long after that stage. See: rules for gift-giving (and taking) in contemporary Asian societies.

QuoteI still think my "Khal Drogo, Conqueror of Worlds" idea is better than the story we got.

Of course you'd think that;).

QuoteBack to the topic of orcs, I read a story about Amazonian orcs which took time to explain the rationale behind their culture. They considered orc men to be brutish and stupid, so they reinforced their numbers by raiding human villages and indoctrinating the captured. This was used as a framing device for femdom orc/human erotica.

To everyone his fetishes:p!

Quote from: CRKrueger;1039119GRRM's world is a weird hybrid.  
It doesn't have enough internal consistency or detail to be a good RPG world, which makes it seem more like a literary world.
It doesn't have enough originality to be a good literary world, which makes it seem more like an RPG world.

Frustrating, but I do like the novels.

If you liked them, why do you care;)?

Quote from: AsenRG;1039142If you liked them, why do you care;)?

Because, of course, I looked at running a Westeros campaign, at which point the holes in the tapestry started becoming more apparent.

Martin is well-versed in history - certainly better than most modern fantasy authors. You can see the real-world analogues to most of his settings, cultures, and even the political incidents and dynastic intrigues. He's said that for many years he read far more history than fantasy, which is a good sign for a fantasy author, many of whom are engaged in a tiredly iterative imitation of genre fiction. His world-building is fine. The cultures he presents are rooted in history, but dialed up to 11. Which is an effective literary technique. If you're going to riff on the mongols, then you'll do well to exaggerate their most strange, fearsome, and brutal characteristics - that's the whole point of drama, especially fantastic drama.

And Martin isn't even that far off the mark when it comes to the Dothraki. The people of the Asiatic steppes had some pretty bizarre customs, acted as fearsomely as their reputation, and were a genuinely polyglot culture. When I was listening to Dan Carlin's Wrath of the Khans podcasts on the subject, I often chuckled at how much Martin cribbed from history. Of course, their military tactics as depicted in the TV shows are absurd. I guess the show-runners don't think lethal volleys of arrows are dramatic enough on the screen. Can't fault Martin for that, though, as I don't recall any battle scenes in the books where Dothraki tactics are described.

But yeah, Martin's world is often more lurid, brutal, and weird than reality. Welcome to the fantasy genre. If you want your setting to be firmly grounded in mundane reality, then read historical fantasy. Guy Gavriel Kay is a good place to start. And I much prefer Martin's 'lurid history dialed up to 11' approach to the sanitized, anachronistic, milqtoast pap offered by writers like Sanderson, Rothfuss, etc.

As for not presenting enough detail in his worldbuilding, the kind of exhaustive and explicit details a lot of modern fantasy writers include in their work is the opposite of drama. It's grist for the autism-spectrum nerds who don't really grok human drama and instead want to bury their heads in elaborate artifice. The kind who obsesses over magic systems. When I see the words 'magic system' in the review of a fantasy novel, I run far away. That kind of crap, beloved by hacks like Brandon Sanderson, is for readers who want their fantasy fiction modeled after RPGs because human drama is too unsettling for them if it isn't shackled to an inert system that engages the math-brain. An author only needs to include enough background material to support the scenes in the story. Anything else is pointless wankery.

Quote from: CRKrueger;1039111Eh, you look at Greyhawk, Realms, Golarion - these settings are much more detailed and don't have the gaping holes that Westeros does.

Westeros doesn't seem like world created for a RPG campaign, it seems exactly what it is, a world created for a series of novels, where a lot of details simply don't matter so they don't get nailed down and things are specifically not defined so that the author won't get backed into any corners and can let the story go where it needs to.

    Sounds like Krynn.

Quote from: Haffrung;1039161As for not presenting enough detail in his worldbuilding, the kind of exhaustive and explicit details a lot of modern fantasy writers include in their work is the opposite of drama. It's grist for the autism-spectrum nerds who don't really grok human drama and instead want to bury their heads in elaborate artifice. The kind who obsesses over magic systems. When I see the words 'magic system' in the review of a fantasy novel, I run far away. That kind of crap, beloved by hacks like Brandon Sanderson, is for readers who want their fantasy fiction modeled after RPGs because human drama is too unsettling for them if it isn't shackled to an inert system that engages the math-brain. An author only needs to include enough background material to support the scenes in the story. Anything else is pointless wankery.

I agree as to the point about the details in his novels, which is why it surprises me that people say he writes like he's creating a gaming world.  It seems to me he's definitely not writing that way.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1039067Holy crap! I haven't been this mezmerized by an internet thread since the days of Star Destroyers versus the Enterprise!

I've never watched nor read Titties and Dragons but this was definitely an entertaining read.

Quote from: Krimson;1039176I've never watched nor read Titties and Dragons but this was definitely an entertaining read.

"Tits and Lizards" was the name of a fantasy fanzine back in the 80s.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1039213"Tits and Lizards" was the name of a fantasy fanzine back in the 80s.

NOW I remember what turned me off of 4e. Dragon boobs.

Quote from: Haffrung;1039161Martin is well-versed in history - certainly better than most modern fantasy authors. You can see the real-world analogues to most of his settings, cultures, and even the political incidents and dynastic intrigues. He's said that for many years he read far more history than fantasy, which is a good sign for a fantasy author, many of whom are engaged in a tiredly iterative imitation of genre fiction. His world-building is fine. The cultures he presents are rooted in history, but dialed up to 11. Which is an effective literary technique. If you're going to riff on the mongols, then you'll do well to exaggerate their most strange, fearsome, and brutal characteristics - that's the whole point of drama, especially fantastic drama.

And Martin isn't even that far off the mark when it comes to the Dothraki. The people of the Asiatic steppes had some pretty bizarre customs, acted as fearsomely as their reputation, and were a genuinely polyglot culture. When I was listening to Dan Carlin's Wrath of the Khans podcasts on the subject, I often chuckled at how much Martin cribbed from history. Of course, their military tactics as depicted in the TV shows are absurd. I guess the show-runners don't think lethal volleys of arrows are dramatic enough on the screen. Can't fault Martin for that, though, as I don't recall any battle scenes in the books where Dothraki tactics are described.

But yeah, Martin's world is often more lurid, brutal, and weird than reality. Welcome to the fantasy genre. If you want your setting to be firmly grounded in mundane reality, then read historical fantasy. Guy Gavriel Kay is a good place to start. And I much prefer Martin's 'lurid history dialed up to 11' approach to the sanitized, anachronistic, milqtoast pap offered by writers like Sanderson, Rothfuss, etc.

As for not presenting enough detail in his worldbuilding, the kind of exhaustive and explicit details a lot of modern fantasy writers include in their work is the opposite of drama. It's grist for the autism-spectrum nerds who don't really grok human drama and instead want to bury their heads in elaborate artifice. The kind who obsesses over magic systems. When I see the words 'magic system' in the review of a fantasy novel, I run far away. That kind of crap, beloved by hacks like Brandon Sanderson, is for readers who want their fantasy fiction modeled after RPGs because human drama is too unsettling for them if it isn't shackled to an inert system that engages the math-brain. An author only needs to include enough background material to support the scenes in the story. Anything else is pointless wankery.

That's actually very well-put:)!

Quote from: CRKrueger;1039167I agree as to the point about the details in his novels, which is why it surprises me that people say he writes like he's creating a gaming world.  It seems to me he's definitely not writing that way.

Well, perceptions differ, Green One. It sure seems so to me. I agree it might seem different to you, though, because YMMV is still a valid statement, even if the "mileage" is "what you get out of reading a novel".

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;1039213"Tits and Lizards" was the name of a fantasy fanzine back in the 80s.

WHY???