So we need to hear your thoughts on the Infinity War trailer.

That was a mighty fine trailer.

Do you think that when each of the Seven Kingdoms were being unified back in the day, there was something like Fudai – Tozama division inside the Kingdoms?

Maybe during a transitionary period? But it doesn’t seem to have been the case in the long run.

I️ would donate plasma to hear your thoughts on the ridiculousness that was Werewolf: The Apocalypse.

No need to donate plasma, that might set off Frenzy…

Werewolf the Apocalypse was a bizarre fever dream of 90s influences. You had the whole enviro/new agey/appropriation of Native American stuff, which didn’t exactly fit in well with the cyberpunk stuff of the Glass Walkers and Bone Gnawers, the Shadow Lords and Silver Fangs being rather difficult to distinguish from Vampire clans, the shall we call them broad ethnic stereotypes of the Fianna or the Get of Fenris or the Silent Striders, etc.

Mostly, I would call Werewolf a bit too over-designed. Shape-shifting really should have been the central thing (although I think three forms rather than five would work better), but they added on Gnosis and the Umbra and spirits and spells and magic items on top of that. The three Breeds work (although the Metis stuff had problematic implications), but then they added on five Auspices and thirteen Tribes, and your character’s identity gets very complicated and blurry indeed.

You one time posted your favorite diagram that you carry around in your wallet. I remember it being awesome, and was hopeful you could provide a link? I can’t find it in your old posts!

Here you go.

Do you feel that 8 books is the most that GRRM needs to finish the series? Isn’t it a little overblown that people think that 9 or 10 books are the minimum required?

I think he could do it in 7.

The Headcanon Challenge: A Commentary on “The True Life of the High Spider,” Part III

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In you analysis, you emphasise how important was for the Stark to follow a coherent strategy through centuries to unite the North. My question is, how do you ensure a strategic continuity from generation to generation? A key problem is that you can’t conceptualise a rational plan (not that it would be effective) without literacy. Lady Dustin suggests that the Maesters are the ones making strategy and planning. In the past, did myth and epos substitute for calculation?

I would imagine great care has to be taken with education of the next generation, so that the ideas behind the strategy are passed down from king to crown prince without fail.

However,, I would disagree that you “can’t conceptualize a rational plan…without literacy.” Literacy is incredibly useful in recording and transmitting plans, but it’s not necessary to come up with them. There’s plenty of cultures which emphasized oral history and memorization, etc.

Do you think GRRM should have released ADWD as a two part volume set in order to include the Battle in the Ice and the Battle of Fire?

I’m not familiar enough with the mechanics of publishing to know if that would be viable.

Have you ever done a role playing game in the World of Darkness setting? A friend turned me on to it and the modern setting seems like it’d be right up your alley if you haven’t

I played World of Darkness, back when Vampire was the Masquerade, Werewolf was the Apocalypse, Mage was the Ascension, and Changeling was the Dreaming.

As a labor historian, what’s your take on the “One Big Union”?

That’s a hard question to answer. The IWW, which occupies a mythic position within labor history/labor studies for a mixture of romantic/ideological/aesthetic reasons, had many strengths and weaknesses.

In the plus column: a focus on industrial rather than craft unionism, a belief in interracial and immigrant organizing, innovative protest strategies (esp. around free speech), and some of the best cultural/educational organizing ever.

In the minus column, two huge deficits. First, the IWW had a profound objection to building permanent organizations, which made it impossible for them to actually build on any victories or meaningfully organize the working class over time. Second, the IWW also had an insolvable split over whether to engage in politics at all, which led a lot of IWW activists to engage in ultimately pointless and counterproductive sabotage campaigns and meant that the IWW wasn’t really able to shift public policy in a more progressive direction.