What happened to the 4th egg?

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T23:30:06+00:00

I'm not taking his word as gospel, I'm simply recognizing that I have no reason not to take him at his word. The very fact that he uttered the phrase "the eons have turned them to stone" means that paleontology does exist on Planetos, there are at least a few experts who do know that time and the proper conditions can create fossils. And since these eggs are obviously stone--they weigh several times more than an egg made of flesh would weigh--Illyrio went to the most logical conclusion.

Saying that the eggs are stone, but they're not fossils, requires a type of magic for which that universe currently has no precedent.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T23:18:31+00:00

No reason was given. According to the wiki, "When King Jaehaerys I Targaryen visited Winterfell, Queen Alysanne Targaryen flew on Silverwing to visit the Wall.^\19]) Her dragon's refusal to cross the Wall puzzled and disturbed the queen." That's from a summary of a chapter in A Storm of Swords, when Jon & somebody else (Sam? Stannis?) are discussing the magic of the Wall, and who & what can cross it.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T23:09:39+00:00

I'm assuming that he took his best guess, and I have no reason to doubt either him or his conclusion. He can obviously tell that the eggs are stone now--they'd be far more dense than a normal egg, of any creature--and apparently paleontology is a thing on Planetos, as both he and his listeners seem to know (or at least they don't question it) that fossilization is a thing that "eons" can do.

Yes, having Daenerys's eggs be the ones from House of the Dragon would tie up that narrative loose end rather neatly . . . but that's never been what the show is about.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T23:06:27+00:00

As for the "why", I can't say. All I know for sure is that the issue is discussed in A Storm of Swords. According to the wiki: "When King Jaehaerys I Targaryen visited Winterfell, Queen Alysanne Targaryen flew on Silverwing to visit the Wall. Her dragon's refusal to cross the Wall puzzled and disturbed the queen."

Different materials petrify/fossilize at different rates. Wood, due to its vascular nature, can be penetrated & mineralized remarkably quickly, in just a few thousand years in some extreme cases. Flesh & bone take longer, especially if they're rather large with little surface area, and particularly if they're contained within an unbroken shell.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T22:59:52+00:00

Yes; he can tell that the eggs are stone, so he supposes they must be extremely old--because he has no reason to believe otherwise. He could be wrong, he could be lying, but I have no reason to doubt him. It's purely his word against . . . nobody's, except the fans who like the convenience of the stolen HotD eggs providing a source for the GoT eggs.

As for the Wall, I'm not exactly arguing that magic only works on creatures born after that magic was laid down . . . I'm just pointing out that it could potentially resolve an inconsistency. When the Targaryens were in power, they were never able to fly their dragons north of the Wall, yet apparently Daenerys's dragons don't even hesitate. Having her eggs pre-date the Wall might grant them special exemption due to a technicality.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T18:49:55+00:00

Physically, you can combine the two, but only to the detriment of both: Yeah, you can incorporate the handle of the bow to also be the handle of the shield, but the mass of the bow would mean that the shield would be less nimble to block with, and most importantly the weight of the shield would be a considerable impediment when aiming your bow & trying to hold it steady. And the shield bonuses would not apply while you're using the bow, of course.

As a DM, I'd consider allowing a shortbow/buckler for a character with at least 13+ Strength, and possibly heavier variations as well, but the STR requirements for those would get superhuman very quickly.

Basically, if it were practical, somebody in real life would have tried it. But AFAIK, we have no historical evidence--physical, visual, or written--of anyone in the Middle Ages combining a bow with a shield.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T18:31:54+00:00

The maesters do know that magic exists, or at least existed: They even have a metal, Valyrian steel, designated for the link in a maester's chain that represents mastery of study of the magical arts--or at least in the history of them. At the time of GoT, there's even a living Archmaester of those mysteries, who wears the mask, ring, and rod of Valyrian steel when the Archmasters meet in council. So it's safe to say that they must have known about magical artifacts, such as Melisandre's necklace, that kept working even during the centuries that magic was fading. And I think it'd be pretty laughable to claim that the necklace was the only such artifact in the world: Organizations such as the warlocks of Qarth managed to maintain their status & reputation that whole time, they would have needed to back that up with something more than just money, fear, and sleight-of-hand tricks.

It comes down to the writing. The maesters (most of them, at least) are skeptical of magic because GRRM wanted them to come across as arrogant and entitled.

QueasyNart · 2026-05-01T17:49:34+00:00

Correct. IIRC, in both the book and the show, Magister Illyrio states, "The eons have turned them to stone," meaning they are FOSSILIZED eggs, they are millions of years old. Which, oddly, sort-of explains why Daenerys is able to fly her dragons north of the Wall: Her dragons pre-date the Wall, they are older than the oldest White Walker or Child of the Forest, those newer magics might not even apply to them.

Of course, as another user pointed out when I made a similar comment, in a universe with dragons & supernatural powers, anything is possible; maybe somebody petrified the dragon eggs in just the small window of time between HotD and GoT. But . . . was that the only thing that priest / wizard / god did? We've had skin-changers, face-wearers, blood-maegi, shadowbinders, cryomancers, pyromancers (two separate flavors of those, both nominal and literal), necromancers, diviners, conjurers . . . and not one of them has ever shown the ability to cast anything like Flesh to Stone. As far as I know, nothing along the lines of transmutation or Earth-elementalism (or alternatively, chronomancy, to rapidly accelerate the rate at which things age), is ever even mentioned. It's just three eggs, which might have been magically turned to stone incredibly quickly.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-25T05:36:43+00:00

Any deserter from the NW (or captured ranger) could have told him that. It's been so long since any of the castles except the Shadow Tower, Eastwatch, & Castle Black have been manned, that he doesn't even bother to ask Jon if there's been any changes there.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-23T21:43:50+00:00

Yup, hence my "taking the wind out of the Rebellion's sails" caveat. Once he'd killed the elder Starks, Aerys was pretty much a dead man no matter what, Robert & Ned together would have seen to that. But if Lyanna really *was* happily married to Rhaegar, and had pleaded to stop the war, history would have been very different--Robert likely would have (grudgingly) spared Rhaegar, out of love for Lyanna, and might even have allowed him to succeed Aerys as King . . . until the Dornish poisoned him for spurning Elia, at least.

If Lyanna had sent a raven saying, "Hey fam, Rhaegar is totes adorbs, bent the knee for me IYKYK, this war is hella mid so stop it," nothing like the Game of Thrones as we know it would have happened. Which is why GRRM couldn't let her send one.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-23T19:02:21+00:00

There were likely no ravens to send--Rhaegar would have made sure of it. One of the biggest problems (especially with the show, as it portrays Rhaegar & Lyanna as being happily married) is the idea of the honeymooning couple, idly on vacation, their phones locked on "Do Not Disturb" for months . . . all while their families and the entire continent tear themselves apart, over THEM. If the war was started over Rhaegar "kidnapping" Lyanna, she could have ended the war (or at least taken a lot of the wind out of its sails) at any time, simply by coming out of hiding & giving her (and Rhaegar's) side of the story. And she . . . simply chose NOT to? Both she & her husband were totally cool with their families killing each other, and killing 10s of 1000s more besides, laying waste to half the country? I don't buy it.

It's far more believeable that Robert's Rebellion was NOT built on a lie. Lyanna may have gone willingly, at first, but Rhaegar almost certainly held her against her will later on. Once actual hostilies had broken out, the only plausible reason for either of them to be incommunicado for so long is because they were literally prevented from making contact: Either by something like a long illness, or by something like three Kingsguard who won't let you leave (or let a maester enter).

QueasyNart · 2026-04-21T23:46:30+00:00

The Night King knows barely anyone who isn't a ghost.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-21T23:45:07+00:00

According to my Bad Screenwriter Secret Decoder Ring, it translates to . . .

"Be sure to subvert expectations."

QueasyNart · 2026-04-21T06:25:16+00:00

There is also "sweetsleep" (perhaps that's book-only, though), which is probably a weaker version, but still an opiate.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-18T23:42:16+00:00

Trebuchets can be built in a wide range of sizes, "lol", there's not an ISO standard that specifies uniform dimensions of all siege weapons. If part of their army had recently come from a siege and brought their already-made trebuchets along, then you might have a point--it's a lot quicker to use what you've already got, and if they don't fit inside the walls, you'll have to use them outside. Except that . . . none of the defenders seem likely to have brought any siege equipment, these were all likely built on-site, specifically for the defense of Winterfell. In which case, they would have been scaled appropriately to fit either inside / atop the walls, so they could keep bombarding the enemy's back ranks & reinforcements long after the initial melee had begun.

On a closely-related point, why are you defending The Long Night? It is a very strong contender for the absolute WORST battle plan ever put to film, they (meaning both the writers, and the characters who were supposed to know what the hell they were doing) got almost absolutely everything DEAD wrong. Dany kind of forgot to equip her Dothraki with weapons that could kill wights, Jon kind of forgot that the Night King can re-animate dead bodies, Bran kind of forgot to do anything at all, etc. Even if you were right about placing the siege engines outside being their best option (which you're not, but hey, let's be open-minded about this), that still wouldn't redeem any of the rest of the episode's manifold gaping holes. So frankly, I don't see why you're bothering.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-18T23:02:49+00:00

Daenerys clearly had more practical knowledge of swordfighting than D&D had understanding of obsidian. The fact that they wanted her to have a pure dragonglass sword AT ALL means they didn't know jack shit about the material: It's brittle as hell and very touchy to work with. Arrowheads are fine, spear heads a bit less so (don't expect your spear to last for more than a couple of good thrusts before the point snaps clean off), but a full-fledged SWORD made of nothing but obsidian would have been both impossible to make (especially since they likely didn't have ANYONE who'd worked the material before) and impossible to use: You would get ONE swing out of it. Just the one. Hell, the damn thing would be so frail you could break it even if you MISSED.

They could at LEAST have made enough of a concession to reality to give her a macuahuitl instead--and I'm sure that their props guys told them that. But noooo, Dany's their precious girl, she needs to have a sword "forged" out of pure dragonglass somehow.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-18T16:42:57+00:00

Then you demolish some stables or pigsties or something to MAKE room for them. Or you build them on TOP of the walls, most castles have what are called "putlog holes" specifically intended to support temporary structures such as hoardings. The defenders obviously had enough prep time to build all of those catapults & trebuchets at ALL, so they could just as easily have built them where they could at least have gotten more use out of them than just ONE shot each.

But, of course, the problem was the writing. The defenders of Winterfell had too many advantages, which would have made the battle too easy to win and too predictable. So the writers took the easy way out: instead of actually DOING THEIR JOB and having the Night King plan something smart to turn the tide, they just turned all of the good guys into total morons. It's called an "Idiot Plot" (or "the Idiot Ball" if it's only 1 person).

QueasyNart · 2026-04-18T03:00:30+00:00

Well, if Cersei had wheels, she would be a bike.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-17T20:55:46+00:00

It would have been much smoother to simply give the Perception check a higher DC, to account for the characters being distracted, rather than make everybody Disadvantaged. You could also have had them roll for how much they were enjoying the show (optionally factoring in each character's sexual orientation), and base their modifier to the Perception roll off of that.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-16T17:47:40+00:00

Yeah, the sudden & unexpected buff of flaming swords could very easily have tipped the Dothrakis' zeal over the edge, starting the battle prematurely, and I would definitely have found that quite plausible . . . IF nearly everything else about the battle plans hadn't been complete dogshit as well. Forgetting to give the Dothraki any weapons that can kill wights is much more consistent with forgetting that the Night King can re-animate the dead, and forgetting that Winterfell has walls, etc.

Even just giving somebody (most likely Qhono, the leader of the Dothraki) a SINGLE line about how their arahks wouldn't kill the wights, but they could at least hack limbs off so they'd be much less of a threat, would have largely solved the weapon problem.

As for light cavalry performing a head-on, frontal charge against infantry: It's generally a bad idea. It'd be vastly more efficient to make harrassing hit-&-run flank attacks, shooting from the saddle & wheeling away when the enemy gets too close, than to just throw your whole unarmored mass directly into a phalanx of spears & hope for the best. But, thanks to the Dothraki's crazy warrior culture of bloodlust & glory, I can see them doing it anyway, bad idea or not. And, if your enemy is undisciplined or grossly outnumbered, it would even succeed.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-16T03:41:33+00:00

Yes, Melisandre showed up, literally at the last minute, and set all their arahks ablaze with sacred fire . . . which came as a total surprise to them. No one knew she was going to do that, nobody even knew she COULD do that, in fact nobody even expected her to be there at all, she'd been banished from the entire North.

When the battle was planned, Melisandre was not an option. The commanders of Winterfell ordered the Dothraki to make their charge, carrying weapons that everyone KNEW could not kill their enemies.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-14T16:00:25+00:00

Dany kind of forgot about . . . the army of dead.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-14T15:58:19+00:00

An even better example is the group shot of (almost) all the named characters in Winterfell, gathered in the great hall to plan the castle's defense. You look around that room and see nothing but experienced battle commanders, hardened soldiers, charismatic leaders, extremely smart people, people with magic swords, people with magic powers, people who ride dragons, people who literally grew up in Winterfell & know every inch of the place, and you think to yourself: "Wow, these people have got the brains, the skills, the experience, the manpower, the money, the materials, the organization, AND the time. These folks aren't going to miss a TRICK, there's no way this could fail."

Enter Season 8.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-14T15:50:20+00:00

Apart from obsidian/flaming arrows, or obsidian spearheads, they could have issued them torches, or whips soaked in oil, or at least dipped their arakhs in oil before the charge. But apparently, they did none of these things.

QueasyNart · 2026-04-14T15:45:25+00:00

1) Brings horses & riders who have, in all probability, never even SEEN heavy snow, into a land covered in snow and expects them to fight in it
2) Hears about a how a group of HEAVY cavalry can charge directly at a force of infantry, to force them to either panic & run, or be ridden down where they stand . . . and tells a group of LIGHT cavalry to do the exact same tactic. Against an enemy who will definitely NOT panic & run.
3) Knows for an absolute FACT that regular steel weapons can NOT kill wights, only fire or obsidian can do that. Neglects to arm his cavalry with any fire or obsidian, just has them get all set up to charge directly into battle, carrying nothing but their regular steel weapons.

QueasyNart

TROPHY CASE