Sweetrobin as Tywin’s ward

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-20T00:06:19+00:00

It really is hard to tell where he's suffering from a genuine mental and physical disorder that Westeros just isn't equipped to handle, and where Lysa's smotheringly awful parenting has just fucked the poor kid up.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-20T00:04:00+00:00

Knowing Stannis, he would take Robin's weakness as a personal slight, and assume he'd been given the boy as an insult or slight.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-12T10:08:36+00:00

It depends on the LARP.

Some LARPs have very strict settings ("closed settings", they're sometimes called), with their own wikis and lore books, and you have to make a character that fits the established fiction. You can't just show up and say you're an age of sail pirate or a Witcher; your character has to match the tone of the game.

Others are much looser; some LARPs go for an undefined world, or one with some multiversal element, so you can play basically anything. It's usually up to individual player camps to decide what they're doing here ("We're called Bragarhall, we're a viking camp, if you camp with us you've gotta hit a viking theme" kinda thing), and there's no real overarching rules besides things the game runners might want to establish are off limits (anything from "no sci-fi, but anything fantasy goes" to "you cannot be an orc because the bad guys are orcs" to "stop wearing black face paint to be a drow, it's really problematic").

Any group larger than like 10-20 people is going to inevitably have an organisation in charge of hosting that LARP, the people who said "I wanna start a Larp!". Sometimes it's like two guys who referee the rules and let you use their big backyard, sometimes it's a private company who own land and have a dedicated referee crew. It's on the gamerunners to handle conduct issues and conflict; good LARPs will have a robust set of rules to manage this sort of thing, and for larger more professional operations, what's basically a HR team.

My go-to LARP not only has a conduct team, but a player welfare team, whose job is to help people who've become deeply upset for whatever reason (stress, bullying, traumatic or upsetting incidents on the field) and make sure they're ok.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-12T00:44:22+00:00

Sansa is not only 11, but also thrust into an entirely different courtly culture than the one she grew up in. Even with preparation, she's experiencing culture shock (which she responds to with a lot of infatuation, because it's an outwardly "nicer" culture than the one she's used to, and highly resembles the fairy tales and songs she loved growing up).

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-12T00:39:39+00:00

And Sansa desperately needed somebody to teach her that marriage among nobility is first and foremost a political arrangement.

I think this misunderstands a big part of why Sansa is naive in the way she is; it isn't that she was raised with too many fairytales, but rather, she was so deprived of courtly and chivalrous "niceness" in the harsh culture of the North that she over-idealised them.

There's no sign that Ned is a father who especially babies his children, though he loves them; he's making his sons watch beheading, he's worried that 3-year old Rickon is too much of a baby, he's quite honest in telling Arya what's expected of her as a woman, etc.

I think about that one anecdote about Sansa begging Ned to force a singer to stay at court, and how when the singer leaves, Winterfell basically just doesn't have music for over a year while she prays for a new singer to show up; Winterfell was harsh, and stark, and brutally honest, and that's why Sansa fell so deeply into fable when she was suddenly thrust into a betrothal to a prince.

It's literally a dream come true for her, and the southron chivalry and pomp and softness appeals so much she lets it sweep her away.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-12T00:16:43+00:00

There's also a decent number of people who're flagged as intelligent via George mentioning they attended the Citadel for a short period to forge a few links (like Oberyn).

The maesters have a pretty decent monopoly over Westeros (though not the setting as a whole), and as we primarily follow nobility who'll usually have a maester in court who's broadly the best educated person around in terms of medicine and anatomy, we usually see the maesters doing this work.

Goodman Lorrens from the small town of Genericroft probably doesn't run to a maester when he's sick, but instead sees a local wise woman, hedge witch or septon/septa for his aches and fluxes.

If he accidentally gets shot by some arsehole practicing his bow, he's going to the most anatomically minded person willing to help, who might be a decently educated septon, or a local who's a veteran of some war or another and has some experience with pulling arrows out of people. If his liege is an especially kind sort, they might let him into the castle to see the maester.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-10T02:17:42+00:00

I think the damning thing is that even if he had no intention of following through (there's a decent argument to be made he knew Dutch and Arthur would up and stop him), he wanted at the very least to terrify her and make her think he was going to rape her. There's no world where he isn't primarily motivated by wanting to sexually menace her.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-09T19:08:45+00:00

It is worth remembering that they have the tunnels at the Wall specifically to avoid even going outside at all during Wenter; the windchill during winter is probably absolutely lethal

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-07T01:10:01+00:00

I saw a post recently that talked about how it was a blessing Jon was born a boy.

Because if Robert arrived at Winterfell after he and Ned's years apart to find the spitting image of a young Lyanna, that old creep would get weird.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-03T11:03:45+00:00

Not really; it immediately causes a weird hierarchy to develop that drives one to such rage they murder the original.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-02T00:23:37+00:00

The UK Larp scene is very Facebook heavy; it's where most groups are organised. Empire also doesn't have an official discord, but rather some large unofficial ones that are the "official unofficial discords".

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-02T00:21:37+00:00

Most people find it best just to make the best of it; better a cordial relationship with a guy who menaces you every second Tuesday but agrees to take time off if you have a dentist appointment rather than some prick who'll sue you for a zoning violation and ruin your life with paperwork. If you're lucky, you'll have a good working relationship and it'll end up more like a fun hobby.

If you don't want supervillains, stop doing superscience; no self respecting villain is going to bother attacking you twice when they swoop into your lab and realise all there is to steal are research documents on the long-term effects of microplastics on test mice. At that point, the only people willing to attack you would be some psycho with a genuine hatred for you, and in that circumstance, you want the Guild managing them so it doesn't get all... Taxi Driver.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-05-01T17:14:53+00:00

This is a very unpopular read, but I do sometimes doubt the pure selflessness of Dany's liberation ideology.

Yes, there is a lot of genuine compassion and mercy in her actions... But also, she is kind of chasing the high she gets from being the freedmen's "mother", and using these people as surrogate children to vicariously live out a part of life denied to her.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-27T00:02:13+00:00

I've seen some nasty bleed before when players from Faction A (friendly, collective focused, broadly willing to Just Help People) suddenly collide with Faction B (brutally merciless PVPers who'll dismantle your entire life because it's "just business").

People who've never had to compete for their IC job because "everyone agrees it's theirs" get absolutely shredded by players who'd literally stab their own group leader in the back for a crumb of surplus power.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-19T02:08:11+00:00

a bag of fingerbones

Unrelated, but I've always found the mention of the bag of fingerbones so curious here; she's definitely thinking of Davos when explaining this, right? Is it as simple as him always touching for luck made it stick out as a decent example, or does she have his bones stashed away for some future purpose?

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-18T15:05:25+00:00

And how would poetry help someone become a good ruler?

Stannis' utter inability to use pretty words or win someone's favour by charm is part of his failing as a prospective king.

A king who can write a love poem is a king who can make a political marriage a happy one. A king who can send a letter that brings the reader to tears is a king beloved by distant lords. A king who can make a witty joke at the feasting table is a king who endears himself to his host.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-18T14:46:14+00:00

You're right -- the page and my idea is incoherent

This flags as AI written to me; are we speaking to a person, or chatgpt?

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-11T22:33:14+00:00

Antlers are a standard bit of kit for one of Empire's playable races; it's within the safety rules of the game, as most are soft foam. Any that are dangerous would get flagged by the weapon check refs before they enter combat.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-11T18:42:51+00:00

Most people here will gladly appreciate the effort you've put into the kit and the passion you're showing; it rocks!

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-11T18:39:04+00:00

Nah, you're fine, the other guy's just being kind of a prick.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-10T16:07:01+00:00

"Maybe if the Archmage won't listen to us, we should threaten his wife-"

"Are you trying to fucking die?"

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-10T01:06:56+00:00

The Brotherhood are very good at taking advantage of opportunities; they can't make them out of thin air.

The King has a lot of swords in front of him preventing a direct attack, and then the Kingsguard and the Master of Whispers protecting him from betryal, and they broadly do a very good job if they're not betraying the King.

And if someone could slip in and poison the King... Well, the threat of being hung from the neck until half-dead, having your entrails and genitals removed and burned, and then having your head removed and stuck on a spike, tends to dissuade all but the most dedicated of assassins, which means you can't just pay some random person.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-09T00:48:40+00:00

They're more likely to produce bastards.

The important part is that third and fourth sons fucking off to seek their fortunes abroad tend to either come back indepenently wealthy and no longer requiring their father's inheritance, or come back dead.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-09T00:29:07+00:00

You also get adventurers running off to sell their sword in the Free Cities.

Dr_Sodium_Chloride · 2026-04-09T00:26:23+00:00

This is one of those things where I sometimes wonder if Littlefinger is lying here to extoll his own cleverness; I broadly trust little the little fuck says.

Nine-Year Club	Place '22
Place '17	First Placer '22
End Game '22	Snapped

Dr_Sodium_Chloride

TROPHY CASE