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A Song of Ice and Fire / Announcements / A new site ...

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Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 20th 5:46 PM
Well, I suppose this might be considered a major announcement, so here goes.

The largest (I suspect) and the most specialized (I'm pretty sure) ASoIaF site on the 'Net is ready for semi-public consumption (meaning -- no linking, just like the old concordance page, and hopefully no passing information around about it to too many folk.)

What is it, exactly?

After many hours of work, and much trading of e-mail with Mr. Martin back and forth (including getting some of his notes), we have produced ...

A site devoted to the heraldry of Westeros.

<crickets chirp>

Okay, okay, hold the applause, don't need to hurt yourselves with enthusiasm . . . ;)

In any case, if you care, try:

http://members.xoom.com/Nymeria/Banners.html

<Note: Some of you, if you bother going and reading the text, will notice a little mention of a MUSH ... well, there's a reason I never messed around on the MUD thread. Of course, we're extremely patient people so we're not really budging from a date somewhere around the publishing of SoS, and maybe a few months more. Heh>

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 20th 6:02 PM
Oh, and before I forget, obviously it's a work in progress (and for the forseen future it shall remain so -- Mr. Martin has said that he'll probably add even more as the books go on.) That's the main reason for no linking. ;)

Ser Benjen
User ID: 1195644 Jun 21st 11:05 AM
Wow. Thanks Ran. That is an amazing amount of info.

KAH
User ID: 9209903 Jun 22nd 9:26 AM
I just checked out the site and I must say...nay, must _roar_;

WAY KEWL!!!!1!!!!!!!!!!11!

Whose idea was this, anyway? Your or Richards?
I thought Richard had put drawing more or less on the shelf now, after he announced he was going to take down his WoT-gallery...happy to see it wasn't so!

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 22nd 9:39 AM
Ours, actually. Or more specifically, Linda, the fiancee -- she's the graphically inclined here, although I've learned to do a fair bit of 'em. ;)

We know Richard from past associations, and since he was interested in helping out ... well, we were happy to take his help.

Glad you liked it. ;)

Markus
User ID: 2936914 Jun 22nd 1:12 PM
Well, I liked the site too, and I'm not really _that_ interested in heraldry.:-)

One really has to wonder about the origin of some of the banners, though.

The listings of the Houses and their keeps was also quite informative about several things.

Two points:

1. A minor House in the Riverlands was named "Vyp_er_n" and the appendix of ACoK mentions that a Lord "Vyp_re_n" married a Frey. Is this a mispelling or are these different Houses?

2. Do you know the political position of Skagos?
I mean, are its Houses sworn to anybody in Westeros?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 22nd 1:39 PM
Hrm, good point of Vypren. Our error, actually, from an earlier version, which none of us picked up on. Fixed it, however. Thanks. :)

As to Skagos, its lords are bannermen of the Starks I expect. At least, that's the implication, as Skagos and its lords follow directly under those of of the North.

We've asked him, as time goes by, about the origins of some of these. For instance, House Lonmouth's lips and skulls represent love and death, and House Wydman's rather ostentatious broken lances and emblems of various houses recalls a joust long ago where the originator of the house defeated five knights of those houses.

Also, there are some banners in there which are nods to some of his favorite writers, it seems. The most obvious is that of House Willum (they're the ones who had Josua and Elias, the textual nod to Tad Williams). Three swords ... Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn.

Heh.

As I suggested, we know a bit about these banners, as we've worked with Mr. Martin on them. So if someone wants to try and find something out, feel free to mail us. If we don't know them, maybe when we do another batch we can slip some questions in. This way, we don't end up bombarding Mr. Martin with overmuch, especially duplicate questions.

Markus
User ID: 2936914 Jun 22nd 7:13 PM
Well, I suppose posting a question on the board is preferable to mailing you with duplicate questions either.

Thus, do you know something about the banners of the Blackmont's, Dustin's, Manwoody's and the Staedmon's?

Btw, wouldn't it be even better if you would include a short explanation of the banners with a significant history next to the images?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 22nd 7:37 PM
Lets see...

Blackmont sparked my asking Martin about why the Dornish houses have such macabre imagery. I have the answer newly added to the SoSpake collection, but I'll quote here:

"A violent history. Particularly the mountain houses, who lived by raiding across the borders into the marches, feuded with each
other endlessly, and were the first to face any invaders."

So, I imagine Blackmont's arms are just reveling in their past as raiders, vultures who have no limits in just how barbaric they can be.

House Dustin ... can't really say, exactly. As their keep says, they're from the the area of the Barrowlands. GRRM did suggest adding those rubies to the crown ... but I don't expect it's any sort of Targaryen connection, as one might think.

Manwoody, as I recall, had to do with the fact that the founder of the house killed some king at some point in the past. I had asked, originally, if the fellow had killed Daeron I, but Martin didn't say that was necessarily so. Could have been a king of the Reach, or a Storm King, I guess.

Staedmon, I couldn't say, exactly. I _do_ know that our original version had the dagger going from back to front, and he asked that to be changed (rather reasonable -- didn't strike us at how unsuitable that was at first ;) It could have something to do with a Staedmon killing someone of note -- perhaps a Prince of Dorne, in the distant past, when the Storm Kings were still around? Then it'd have a similar history to the Manwoody, at least.

Martin sometimes has little stories in mind for these, and sometimes he's just picking some interesting imagery.

As to the other bits, yeah, posting here's probably even better, so that folk don't end up duplicating questions. And any significant history ... hrm. The trouble is that would mean either adding a lot more lines to the main page, or putting some of these images into HTML files of their own, which means a touch more work.

Perhaps a supplement HTML page, with that stuff for those who are interested ... We also have the listing of all the Lord of Harrenhal and their heraldry, the houses of Urron Redhand and Harren the Black, and the old River kings (or, at least, some of the old River kings.)

Anyone interested in these? I could just post them, rather than bothering with HTML stuff.

Min
User ID: 9433023 Jun 23rd 8:18 AM
An amazing amount of work, Ran. Thank you very much, it's really breathtaking. How long did it take you to make it anyway?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 23rd 8:27 AM
Fhew .. I don't know. :) Four, five months, I guess :)

Min
User ID: 9433023 Jun 23rd 8:29 AM
Amazing, Ran. I will dive into it as soon as I have the time to give it the attention it needs.

Claidhaim
User ID: 9544623 Jun 23rd 9:50 AM
Ran, you have certainly outdone yourself. Thank you and Linda for the exceptional renderings and the page. This is truly fabulous and will be a very good source of background information while reading the rest of the story.

Great job, both of you!!!

KAH
User ID: 9209903 Jun 23rd 10:59 AM
Where is Skagos, anyway? I can't remember seeing it on the maps (which are of the obsolete kind, of course...).

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 23rd 11:48 AM
Skagos is that big island off the Bay of Seals, KAH. I believe the U.S. hardback has it clearly marked, but the UK hardback doesn't. I say believe, because it's been about 3 months since I ordered my copy of CoK, and it _still_ hasn't gotten here ... gah. Slow relatives.

Jeff
User ID: 0909594 Jun 25th 2:20 PM
All right, I'll admit it. Ran, I can't find your site. I've found the SoSpakeMartin site easily, but xoom keeps telling me the other site doesn't exist. Any hints?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 25th 2:25 PM
Hrm ...

Odd. Are you capitalizing the right bits? I'll put the addy up again.

http://members.xoom.com/Nymeria/Banners.html

I suppose there's a possibility of some conflict with a browser, particularly as Xoom insists on its banner. If you're using an older browser that doesn't handle frames well (pre-3.x of IE or Netscape?), do tell. There's a way to get around the frame, but I'm not going to publicize it as I don't know what Xoom'll do if every hit starts bypassing the frame that way. ;)

Jeff
User ID: 0909594 Jun 25th 3:22 PM
Found it! Don't know why it wouldn't work the first 8 or so times but it worked now.

Fantastic! Ran, you are the Man! Though I may be cursing your name when I start spending hours browsing that site. Very, very well done.

Now I'll reveal even more computer ignorance. What are MUD's and MUSH's?

Ran
User ID: 0283314 Jun 25th 3:38 PM
Heh. MUDs and MUSHes are the same thing -- properly, they should be all called MUDs.

MUD stands for Multi-User Dungeon (or Dimension, depending on who you ask.) It's a text-based game, basically.

There are a lot of different MUD servers, serving different purposes. General MUDs are really like a big, partly-automated game of Dungeon and Dragons. You 'roll' stats, you hunt around for gold to buy the best equipment, you fight automated monsters in quests to get magic weapons, etc. Think Ultima On-line -- Ultima owes a lot to the text-based MUDs.

MUSH is a 'flavor' of MUD (sometimes it's said to stand for Multi-User Shared Hallucination), an offshot of the original TinyMUD server. MUSHes tend to have an entirely different focus -- it's roleplay (meaning typing away to describe what your character is doing and what he's doing, rather than rolling virtual dice) that matters, people making their characters by creating complex backgrounds and then interacting with others in the same manner. 'Rolling' your stats and complex formulas to determine who wins and who loses any action doesn't really happen.

This may be what kept so many people off the 'ASoIaF MUD' thread -- a MUD (DikuMUD or LPMUD) would be you wcreating a species (Northerner, Reach, Ironman, etc., etc.) and a profession, and going around spending most of your time fighting. This isn't how _all_ MUDs are, but most of them are like this. MUD servers aren't optimized for roleplaying. So, you end up with this weird mishmash of fantasy tropes aimed at getting people to have adventures.

An ASoIaF MUSH, on the other hand, is perfectly suited for what is. Essentially, a MUSH would be interactive fiction. You'd create a character to fit into the setting of the Seven Kingdoms. There would be familiar names, familiar bits of information, but there'd also be all those other new folk. You'd interact and end up writing a story for your character. You'd stumble into interesting plots -- political, social, familial, martial, whatever -- and RP your way through them.

Making a good character, and roleplaying him or her, is one of the best feelings out there on the Internet -- it's on the order of an actor getting a tremendous part and then knocking the socks off of everyone with the way he played it.

It's not all 'me, me, me,' either. You share your time and your roleplay with others -- while you're building your character through the interaction, the other people are doing the exact same thing for their characters.

In any case ... that's a MUSH, as described by a person who's been involved in such games for about 5 years now. ;)

Jeff
User ID: 0909594 Jun 25th 4:04 PM
Got it. I suppose that's why some of us sort of had different ideas about what was happening on the Potpourri board.

Next 20 Messages Newest Messages

Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 20th 5:46 PM Well, I suppose this might be considered a major announcement, so here goes. The largest (I suspect) and the most specialized (I'm pretty sure) ASoIaF site on the 'Net is ready for semi-public consumption (meaning -- no linking, just like the old concordance page, and hopefully no passing information around about it to too many folk.) What is it, exactly? After many hours of work, and much trading of e-mail with Mr. Martin back and forth (including getting some of his notes), we have produced ... A site devoted to the heraldry of Westeros. <crickets chirp> Okay, okay, hold the applause, don't need to hurt yourselves with enthusiasm . . . ;) In any case, if you care, try: http://members.xoom.com/Nymeria/Banners.html <Note: Some of you, if you bother going and reading the text, will notice a little mention of a MUSH ... well, there's a reason I never messed around on the MUD thread. Of course, we're extremely patient people so we're not really budging from a date somewhere around the publishing of SoS, and maybe a few months more. Heh>
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 20th 6:02 PM Oh, and before I forget, obviously it's a work in progress (and for the forseen future it shall remain so -- Mr. Martin has said that he'll probably add even more as the books go on.) That's the main reason for no linking. ;)
Ser Benjen User ID: 1195644	Jun 21st 11:05 AM Wow. Thanks Ran. That is an amazing amount of info.
KAH User ID: 9209903	Jun 22nd 9:26 AM I just checked out the site and I must say...nay, must _roar_; WAY KEWL!!!!1!!!!!!!!!!11! Whose idea was this, anyway? Your or Richards? I thought Richard had put drawing more or less on the shelf now, after he announced he was going to take down his WoT-gallery...happy to see it wasn't so!
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 22nd 9:39 AM Ours, actually. Or more specifically, Linda, the fiancee -- she's the graphically inclined here, although I've learned to do a fair bit of 'em. ;) We know Richard from past associations, and since he was interested in helping out ... well, we were happy to take his help. Glad you liked it. ;)
Markus User ID: 2936914	Jun 22nd 1:12 PM Well, I liked the site too, and I'm not really _that_ interested in heraldry.:-) One really has to wonder about the origin of some of the banners, though. The listings of the Houses and their keeps was also quite informative about several things. Two points: 1. A minor House in the Riverlands was named "Vyp_er_n" and the appendix of ACoK mentions that a Lord "Vyp_re_n" married a Frey. Is this a mispelling or are these different Houses? 2. Do you know the political position of Skagos? I mean, are its Houses sworn to anybody in Westeros?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 22nd 1:39 PM Hrm, good point of Vypren. Our error, actually, from an earlier version, which none of us picked up on. Fixed it, however. Thanks. :) As to Skagos, its lords are bannermen of the Starks I expect. At least, that's the implication, as Skagos and its lords follow directly under those of of the North. We've asked him, as time goes by, about the origins of some of these. For instance, House Lonmouth's lips and skulls represent love and death, and House Wydman's rather ostentatious broken lances and emblems of various houses recalls a joust long ago where the originator of the house defeated five knights of those houses. Also, there are some banners in there which are nods to some of his favorite writers, it seems. The most obvious is that of House Willum (they're the ones who had Josua and Elias, the textual nod to Tad Williams). Three swords ... Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn. Heh. As I suggested, we know a bit about these banners, as we've worked with Mr. Martin on them. So if someone wants to try and find something out, feel free to mail us. If we don't know them, maybe when we do another batch we can slip some questions in. This way, we don't end up bombarding Mr. Martin with overmuch, especially duplicate questions.
Markus User ID: 2936914	Jun 22nd 7:13 PM Well, I suppose posting a question on the board is preferable to mailing you with duplicate questions either. Thus, do you know something about the banners of the Blackmont's, Dustin's, Manwoody's and the Staedmon's? Btw, wouldn't it be even better if you would include a short explanation of the banners with a significant history next to the images?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 22nd 7:37 PM Lets see... Blackmont sparked my asking Martin about why the Dornish houses have such macabre imagery. I have the answer newly added to the SoSpake collection, but I'll quote here: "A violent history. Particularly the mountain houses, who lived by raiding across the borders into the marches, feuded with each other endlessly, and were the first to face any invaders." So, I imagine Blackmont's arms are just reveling in their past as raiders, vultures who have no limits in just how barbaric they can be. House Dustin ... can't really say, exactly. As their keep says, they're from the the area of the Barrowlands. GRRM did suggest adding those rubies to the crown ... but I don't expect it's any sort of Targaryen connection, as one might think. Manwoody, as I recall, had to do with the fact that the founder of the house killed some king at some point in the past. I had asked, originally, if the fellow had killed Daeron I, but Martin didn't say that was necessarily so. Could have been a king of the Reach, or a Storm King, I guess. Staedmon, I couldn't say, exactly. I _do_ know that our original version had the dagger going from back to front, and he asked that to be changed (rather reasonable -- didn't strike us at how unsuitable that was at first ;) It could have something to do with a Staedmon killing someone of note -- perhaps a Prince of Dorne, in the distant past, when the Storm Kings were still around? Then it'd have a similar history to the Manwoody, at least. Martin sometimes has little stories in mind for these, and sometimes he's just picking some interesting imagery. As to the other bits, yeah, posting here's probably even better, so that folk don't end up duplicating questions. And any significant history ... hrm. The trouble is that would mean either adding a lot more lines to the main page, or putting some of these images into HTML files of their own, which means a touch more work. Perhaps a supplement HTML page, with that stuff for those who are interested ... We also have the listing of all the Lord of Harrenhal and their heraldry, the houses of Urron Redhand and Harren the Black, and the old River kings (or, at least, some of the old River kings.) Anyone interested in these? I could just post them, rather than bothering with HTML stuff.
Min User ID: 9433023	Jun 23rd 8:18 AM An amazing amount of work, Ran. Thank you very much, it's really breathtaking. How long did it take you to make it anyway?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 23rd 8:27 AM Fhew .. I don't know. :) Four, five months, I guess :)
Min User ID: 9433023	Jun 23rd 8:29 AM Amazing, Ran. I will dive into it as soon as I have the time to give it the attention it needs.
Claidhaim User ID: 9544623	Jun 23rd 9:50 AM Ran, you have certainly outdone yourself. Thank you and Linda for the exceptional renderings and the page. This is truly fabulous and will be a very good source of background information while reading the rest of the story. Great job, both of you!!!
KAH User ID: 9209903	Jun 23rd 10:59 AM Where is Skagos, anyway? I can't remember seeing it on the maps (which are of the obsolete kind, of course...).
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 23rd 11:48 AM Skagos is that big island off the Bay of Seals, KAH. I believe the U.S. hardback has it clearly marked, but the UK hardback doesn't. I say believe, because it's been about 3 months since I ordered my copy of CoK, and it _still_ hasn't gotten here ... gah. Slow relatives.
Jeff User ID: 0909594	Jun 25th 2:20 PM All right, I'll admit it. Ran, I can't find your site. I've found the SoSpakeMartin site easily, but xoom keeps telling me the other site doesn't exist. Any hints?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 25th 2:25 PM Hrm ... Odd. Are you capitalizing the right bits? I'll put the addy up again. http://members.xoom.com/Nymeria/Banners.html I suppose there's a possibility of some conflict with a browser, particularly as Xoom insists on its banner. If you're using an older browser that doesn't handle frames well (pre-3.x of IE or Netscape?), do tell. There's a way to get around the frame, but I'm not going to publicize it as I don't know what Xoom'll do if every hit starts bypassing the frame that way. ;)
Jeff User ID: 0909594	Jun 25th 3:22 PM Found it! Don't know why it wouldn't work the first 8 or so times but it worked now. Fantastic! Ran, you are the Man! Though I may be cursing your name when I start spending hours browsing that site. Very, very well done. Now I'll reveal even more computer ignorance. What are MUD's and MUSH's?
Ran User ID: 0283314	Jun 25th 3:38 PM Heh. MUDs and MUSHes are the same thing -- properly, they should be all called MUDs. MUD stands for Multi-User Dungeon (or Dimension, depending on who you ask.) It's a text-based game, basically. There are a lot of different MUD servers, serving different purposes. General MUDs are really like a big, partly-automated game of Dungeon and Dragons. You 'roll' stats, you hunt around for gold to buy the best equipment, you fight automated monsters in quests to get magic weapons, etc. Think Ultima On-line -- Ultima owes a lot to the text-based MUDs. MUSH is a 'flavor' of MUD (sometimes it's said to stand for Multi-User Shared Hallucination), an offshot of the original TinyMUD server. MUSHes tend to have an entirely different focus -- it's roleplay (meaning typing away to describe what your character is doing and what he's doing, rather than rolling virtual dice) that matters, people making their characters by creating complex backgrounds and then interacting with others in the same manner. 'Rolling' your stats and complex formulas to determine who wins and who loses any action doesn't really happen. This may be what kept so many people off the 'ASoIaF MUD' thread -- a MUD (DikuMUD or LPMUD) would be you wcreating a species (Northerner, Reach, Ironman, etc., etc.) and a profession, and going around spending most of your time fighting. This isn't how _all_ MUDs are, but most of them are like this. MUD servers aren't optimized for roleplaying. So, you end up with this weird mishmash of fantasy tropes aimed at getting people to have adventures. An ASoIaF MUSH, on the other hand, is perfectly suited for what is. Essentially, a MUSH would be interactive fiction. You'd create a character to fit into the setting of the Seven Kingdoms. There would be familiar names, familiar bits of information, but there'd also be all those other new folk. You'd interact and end up writing a story for your character. You'd stumble into interesting plots -- political, social, familial, martial, whatever -- and RP your way through them. Making a good character, and roleplaying him or her, is one of the best feelings out there on the Internet -- it's on the order of an actor getting a tremendous part and then knocking the socks off of everyone with the way he played it. It's not all 'me, me, me,' either. You share your time and your roleplay with others -- while you're building your character through the interaction, the other people are doing the exact same thing for their characters. In any case ... that's a MUSH, as described by a person who's been involved in such games for about 5 years now. ;)
Jeff User ID: 0909594	Jun 25th 4:04 PM Got it. I suppose that's why some of us sort of had different ideas about what was happening on the Potpourri board.