Kevin's Watch

Sorry, I've been looking for an hour, and can't find where I recently read a string of posts talking about Hile Troy not being what he claimed to be (IE: Awesome War Strategist in a Think Tank in the real world). I wanted to comment in that thread, but, can't find it. Anyone know what thread I'm talking about and where it is? It also mentioned Covenant's call to verify HT's job, I believe?

Is it the thread:

Hile Troy in the "Real" World

you're looking for?

NO, that was the first thing I checked, and maybe where I got the Phone call from, rather then the original thread, and maybe that helped spark my interest in replying to the thread.

I tend to think it was in 1st Chronicles Dissection, in the first 10-14 chapters of TIW, but, I can't seem to find it.

YO Wayfriend, you know the Chronicles and the forums like the back of your Hand Any ideas?

No recollection of such a thread. Is it from way back?

Well, one would think, if ti was a recent thread, I could easily find it, so it's gotta be in the Dissection Section, cause I haven't trolled back to ancient threads in this forum

Sounds interesting Sindatur. Was the idea that HT was a real person from our world but was bullsh**ing TC about who he was and what he did for a living?

peter wrote:Sounds interesting Sindatur. Was the idea that HT was a real person from our world but was bullsh**ing TC about who he was and what he did for a living?

Yes, that was the jist, that he was so incompetent as a Warmark that he ahd to be lying about his real world job.

I didn't think incompetent was an appropriate designation either, hence why I wanted to comment on it

I think HT's failures [though he did pull it out in the end] were because he was all in the theory of strategy/tactics, and didn't understand, practically, 3 things:
Know thy enemy.
The map is not the territory.
No plan of battle survives contact with the enemy.

Vraith wrote:I think HT's failures [though he did pull it out in the end] were because he was all in the theory of strategy/tactics, and didn't understand, practically, 3 things:
Know thy enemy.
The map is not the territory.
No plan of battle survives contact with the enemy.

YEs, preceisely. NO War strategist ever gets it right first try, and certainly not one who's unfamiliar with the enemy, every war and every enemy and every terrain to fight on is different.

sindatur wrote:

peter wrote:Sounds interesting Sindatur. Was the idea that HT was a real person from our world but was bullsh**ing TC about who he was and what he did for a living?

Yes, that was the jist, that he was so incompetent as a Warmark that he ahd to be lying about his real world job.

Actually, whisper it quietly, but I do think old Hile Troy gets a bit of a hard time on the Boards! OK, he was not a particularly likeable character, but the gist of it seems to come down to him being a bit of a jerk cos he believed in his own ability to succeed where others had failed in matching Foul's army in battle.

There are a number of observations here:
- firstly, it probably wasn't doable at all given the disparities (which he didn't know about)
- secondly, he did at least give the Land some hope (admittedly a false hope) for a time
- thirdly, whilst he did give up for a short time, he redeemed himself with the most audacious fallback plan in the end (OK, thanks to Mhoram).

Ultimately, Hile Troy was an anti-TC character. One plunged into the Land who loved it, grasped it and desperately wanted to DO SOMETHING about saving it (rather than moping around, denying it existed). He seems to be damned on the basis that he had a belief in his own abilities to organise the Land's forces against Foul (he didn't really, but he put up a good front supported by the Lords - it's clear he doubted himself). He made the mistake of promising them things that he couldn't guarantee - though at least that gave the Land temporary hope. In this he seems to be lumped in with Kevin - taking on himself an impossible burden of responsibility that leads to Despair. Well maybe it's because I don't completely swallow the Kevin as ultimate failure line (at least from the perspective of the First Chronicles as a stand alone work), but equally I find it hard to damn Hile Troy for giving it a go!

And he did redeem himself and the Land (partly - who is to say that the whole of the Land would not have been overrun had they not followed his plan). His personal sacrifice at the end of TIW was not (I don't think) born of Despair, but of love for the Land.

Yes, he was angry with TC and failed to understand him, but many would have been in his situation (I sympathised when he grabbed the ring off TC on Gallow's Howe and tried to throw wild magic and railed at TC's failure to use the power he had in defence of Elena).

I repeat, he is not overall a likeable character, but I do feel he gets unfairly damned on occasion.

(full disclosure: I modded the presumed typo in the title.)

wayfriend wrote:(full disclosure: I modded the presumed typo in the title.)

Thanks, I keep seeing it pop up on email notifications, and keep forgetting to edit it before I skip off to the next post

I don't think HT was lying about his real-world job, but he was incompetent. He probably only fought war games in a modern context which didn't prepare him for a low-tech real war.

The fact that he had no contingency plan if the scouts were delayed proves that (what if all of the Ramen scouts were killed? What then? He would have left most of the land defenseless with the entire warward at Revelstone.)

He should have chosen a pre-war intelligence strategy that had more built-in redundancy (perhaps a network of bloodguard scouts (BG are ideal as they ride Ranyhyn) could be dispersed, so that if a scouting party falls there is another party relatively nearby that can attempt to gain the information needed.

I think that two things doomed Hile Troy to failure:

1. There was no way ANYONE could have beaten Lord Foul's army. How on Earth could anyone ever beat an army with literally infinite manpower?

2. The plot required him to fail.


Also, I have my doubts that SRD had the kind of historical and tactical background to convincingly write a master strategist.


I'd love to know how a real military tactician would have handled the Illearth War situation.

Kaos Arcanna wrote:2. The plot required him to fail.

LOL. Wouldn't that have just pissed Troy off if he'd known!

I am re-reading TIW right now, and I just got through the part where Rue brought news of Foul's army, and Troy was devastated that the news came so late. I couldn't help but think that if he was so good at strategy, why couldn't he come up with a new plan that didn't involve marching his army into the grave?

And it drives me crazy how he always nods whenever Elena makes a decision.

But I do like his passion for saving the land.

High Lord Prothall wrote:The fact that he had no contingency plan if the scouts were delayed proves that (what if all of the Ramen scouts were killed? What then? He would have left most of the land defenseless with the entire warward at Revelstone.)

He should have chosen a pre-war intelligence strategy that had more built-in redundancy (perhaps a network of bloodguard scouts (BG are ideal as they ride Ranyhyn) could be dispersed, so that if a scouting party falls there is another party relatively nearby that can attempt to gain the information needed.

All warefare involves risk and to endlessly cover your rear in the event of putative problems is to waste rescourcess most likely needlessly. Also I dont believe the Bloodguard were HT's to command - thier vow was to the Lords and thier protection and it is unlikely they would have shifted from that in times of danger

Was it the "Hile Troy, what a berk" topic? kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic ... light=berk