#cyvasse

[tronodiferro]

#HotD

Unbowed and Unbent - House of the Dragon 03.05

and for the first time in hundreds of years, the night came alive with the music of dragons.

[tessarionbestgirl]

I am fascinated of how they describing how they developed Cyasse as game in the bts. And now I want the greedy capitalist Warner to make some to sell that I can buy.

[daenystheedreamer]

A dog and a lioness, carved from hippopotamus ivory. Probably intented as game pieces, possibly for the popular Ancient Egyptian board game "Mehen" ("coiled one", a snake deity), which was played on a round board in the form of a coiled serpent.

ca. 2850 BCE (Early Dynastic Period, late 1st-2nd dynasty)

[homuraakemis]

When the prince reached for his dragon, Tyrion cleared his throat. "I would not do that if I were you. It is a mistake to bring your dragon out too soon." He smiled innocently. "Your father knew the dangers of being overbold." - Tyrion VI ADWD

I know Tyrion later tells Aegon that he was lying, but this actually seems to be an advice equivalent to the ones you get when you learn chess. I'm no expert in chess, by the way, I'm still very much a beginner, but in chess it's usually said that it's not very good to bring your queen out too early, first because you might end up neglecting the development of your other pieces, and second because if you bring your queen out too early it can become a target and you could lose it. So it's interesting that Tyrion gives this same advice to Aegon about the dragon piece (the most powerful piece in cyvasse, making it an equivalent to the queen in chess).

[krysslabryn]

Carving & Cyvasse

So we’re all in the SCA (Medieval recreation group), as some of you know, and so we make a lot of our stuff: Tourney furniture, garb, etc, etc. Last year that included me making some game pieces for a beautiful engraved brass-and-copper Hnaftafl board hubby won years ago; this year, since he’s discovered the very entertaining and Medieval-esque (if not remotely period) game Cyvasse, from Game of Thrones, and is in the middle of making himself a clay game board, I thought that, rather than leaving him with the 3D-printed the game pieces he’s made to go with it, I’d use some of the leftover soapstone from last year’s Christmas present to make him some lovely, hand-carved pieces instead.

It’s a lovely idea, and it’s coming along nicely! I’ve already made, for each side, the two elephants, two mountains, a trebuchet, a catapult, and, for one side, its dragon. Thirteen pieces. I only still have to make, for each side, the king, two light horsemen, two heavy horsemen, two spearmen, two crossbowmen, and three “rabble”. Also the other dragon. So, only another twenty-five pieces! Before December 21st. *headdesk*

I should have remembered that (a) I am making the pieces a lot more detailed than the Hnaftafl men (who were basically rounded cones); and (b) Hnaftafl only has nineteen men. To be fair to myself, though, when I started, I had thought my husband was correct when he said there was only twelve pieces per side. ><

Anyways, pics! The widest part of the bases is a maximum of about an inch, so they fit onto the board.

The elephants!! I have lovingly shaped far more elephant butts than anyone ought to. XD

The Catapults. They have wheels because unlike the trebuchets, these pieces can move.

All of them so far! Mountain, mountain, catapult, trebuchet, elephant, elephant elephant, elephant, dragon, trebuchet, catapult, mountain, mountain. At least the mountains were easy! :D

A closer look at the mountains and war machines.

Elephants!

Dragon, war machines, mountain.

Closer look at the dragon, the tallest and I think most detailed piece so far.

Catapult!

Trebuchets! The 3D-printed pieces were hard to differentiate so I made sure it was obvious what these were.

All the pieces I have done for the one side! Got the same for the other side, except the dragon.

Soapstone is wonderfully easy to carve. The greyer stuff here is tougher than the sandy stuff (which carves almost like wet sand!) but even it can still be scraped with a thumbnail. I’m just using regular wood carving tools to do this, and the final sanding is done with paper towel. I’m finishing them with “Clear Paste Wax” by Trewax, which is basically a thick wax paste with like some alcohol or mineral spirits or something in there to thin it a bit, and once it’s on the wood or soapstone or what, that thinner evaporates, leaving a slightly hardened wax surface behind, that is enough to toughen up the surface a bit and give it a bit of protection, and also which buffs up nicely, especially on the grey stuff, which has a finer grain. I’m applying and buffing the paste with a microfiber cloth, and using a fairly stiff chisel-tip paintbrush to get into the tiny crevasses.

I’m really pleased with how it’s coming along so far! --But having said that, considering that at my speediest I’ve only managed three pieces in one day, and even that only twice, yeah, he might be getting half the set for his birthday in a few months, ha ha ha. I still have other things to make for presents before the Solstice, too! D:

Pray for my poor stiff hands and butt, ha ha.

[hong-ara]

Myrcella and Trystane playing cyvasse

[nobodysuspectsthebutterfly]

I have! I loved Tyrions, for me its the kind of writing grrm really excels at with the chess (oh cmon its chess! ) sorry cyvasse and manipulation and small dramatic moments. Theon really hurt my heart, but the ravens!!! I'm super proud of Selmy but disagree with him? Its clear Hizdar isn't the poisoner?? The Victarion and Aeron chapters where super interesting!! Like 😯😮. Arya /Mercy chapter worries me deeply.

Per GRRM, cyvasse is a mix of chess, Blitzkrieg, and Stratego. But it’s used in much the same way as chess is in literary tropes, yes. :)  And gosh, GRRM is so good with Tyrion, really nobody else can approach his depths and layers and intelligence.

The ravens, yes, the ravens. My god, Theon II is going to be so strange I can’t even imagine.

Poor Barristan, he’s so honorable and well-intentioned but everyone’s pulling the wool over his eyes. :(  I don’t know if he’ll ever learn that the Green Grace is the Harpy and that the Shavepate is the poisoner before he gets killed. That is, I hope he doesn’t get killed after he gets back from the battle, and likely finds the Shavepate’s killed the hostages. I don’t think my hope will work out. :(

The Victarion and Aeron chapters are fascinating, yeah. Really, very little expresses more how magic is ramping up in ASOIAF (especially in TWOW) than the various Greyjoy chapters.

Actually the Mercy chapter is really concerning me, I understand the timeskip or lack thereof caused some plot issues but sex was present in a way I’m not used too with Arya and with her age I’m just :/            

Yeah, GRRM has said that even though the timeskip isn’t happening he’s still pretty much going to treat the characters as if it did happen. So read Sansa as 18 and Arya as 16. Though since she actually is 11, it’s like… augh wtf GRRM. Five years is a lot in childhood, god! But, still, “Mercy” is not the official published version, so maybe he’ll modify it a bit yet before it’s actually in the book? I really hope he does.

[earendil-was-a-mariner]

I don’t consider Lord of the Rings true fantasy because there’s not an in-world, slightly modified version of chess that everyone plays.