The Witcher Law of Surprise Explained
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- Опубликовано: 28 янв 2020
- In Deep Geek - Insight and intelligent discussion on Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, Westworld and more.
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Развлечения
I have to say that even when I’ve already exhausted my interest in a topic I will still watch your video on it because you always do such good research, your presentation is logical, and you have a great speaking voice.
Thank you!
I took an extremely long Hiatus because Game of Thrones is now dead to me. And the Witcher is my new love plus that damn song is now stuck in my head forever
It's great to have you back!
I know exactly what you mean :D I also needed half a year to finally watch The Witcher because i went back to reading fantasy rather then watching TV shows about it...
I always took the whole “Child having to consent” meaning that if they truly are bound by destiny the child will surely, for one reason or another, consent. If they did not that would mean they were not the thing destined to the person who invoked the Law of Surprise, that it might just be something, as you said, mundane like gardening tools. With Pavetta and Duny, Destiny brought them together before Duny came to claim his prize. I got the impression Pavetta was always meant to fall in love with him, and she couldn’t have just been like “um, nah. . .” unless she wasn’t truly the object of surprise (subject? The unknown surprise. . .that’s what I’m going to call it).
I feel so good to be back in this comment section of your channel
You were my favourite Game of Thrones commenter. So glad you’re doing the Witcher now. Your explanations are always detailed and unbiased. More videos please!
As always Robert, thank you for your thoughts!! I say this while taking a break from homework. Lol
I didn't expect to get new information but you never fail to amaze with new insights.
I didn't know that the law of surprise is to get something mundane and you are right to point that three law of surprises joining Geralt and Ciri
Geralt: "I renounce my right to Ciri! I don't want to look destiny in the eyes, because I don't believe in it."
Destiny: "You're taking this f*cking child of surprise, whether you like it or not!!"
Gerard: I don't belive in destiny
Lady of Brookyloon: Show me
Melitele: Since when unbelivig have any power? 😆
@@gracjanstanosky9698 "unbelivig"? Since when did spelling matter? How 'bout now!!!🧐🙄⁉️☑️. jk, 😃⚔️.
P.S. I literally had to wrestle with my spell check just to misspell "unbelivig" or 'unbelieving', or " not to believe " omg!!! I think that ridiculous misspelled 'word'!?!? Just broke my spell check 🤣!!! And that's a damn shame 😂!!! So the moral to the story is...... Learn how to spell !!! There's absolutely no excuse for in the year of our Lord 2022,,,( wink😉) no excuse for misspelled words!!! ( Unless you already broke your own spell check on your device 😛
Excuse me... what's the subject? LoL 🤣😂😂💬
@@gracjanstanosky9698 where's or what's Brookyloon????? To be Lady of?!?!( Can't be Brooklyn, New York! Because if just one person from there caught a mere glimpse of that version of Brooklyn NY that one person would be calling you out for a street fight !!!! 🤣🤬☠️🤡💯👊👀👊😳 LoL 😂🤣🤣😂
Thanks for the entertainment!!! Seriously!! I do genuinely hope you're not offended! As I wouldn't want you to be! Not one bit!! I'm just having a little bit of fun,,,, that's all...👌✌️😉🤩
@@gracjanstanosky9698Lady of the lake: Bitch If you don't want to be people of destiny, give me my aerodinght back.
I appreciate the explanation. I didn’t exactly understand it during the show. Very nice work sir.
Thank you, Robert, for all the videos you've put out. Whether it be Game of Thrones, the Lord of the Rings, or now, the Witcher, your research and presentation are brilliant. Much appreciated.
So glad you're doing the Witcher series! Just getting into the 3rd (technically first) book and loving it, along with your helpful insights!
Hi! Two years later, can you please tell me the right order to read the books?
@@MariaKiran1 probably too late but just in case: there are 2 books full of short stories you want to read first. Some of the short stories are extremely important, some not so much but still fun. Then the saga story starts. So:
1. The Last Wish
2. The Sword of Destiny
3. Blood of Elves (first book in main saga)
4. Time of Content
5. Baptism by Fire
6. Tower of Swallows
7. Lady of the Lake.
Season of Storms is a new book that is not part of the main saga. For me it wasn’t that good so I wouldn’t worry about that one unless you want to after finishing.
You probably already found your answer but here you go anyways 😂 and maybe someone else will see this that need it.
@@TheJordanK 💛thank you so much for taking time to write all of that info. I still hadn't gotten to reading the books, plus, you're right, there may be other people looking for answers like yours. Again, thank you!
Thanks for explaining this... so many things in season 1 are not explained very well so I found it hard to really follow what was happening
I bet you anything that Geralt went “The Law of Surprise couldn’t be a lifetime supply of beer for once!?”
This video helped a lot. Even after the last episode I was a little bit confused as to what the concept of the Law of Surprise really was and why was there a connection between Geralt and Ciri, esp. why Geralt had to honor the connection. By reading the entry of the story from the book on Wikipedia it was already explained better than the scene we saw on the show. Also on the show Geralt claims the law of surprise but does it out of annoyance and leaves quickly after he realises it is linked to the child. Whereas in the book he goes "I choose the Law of Surprise so that your child will be trained by me to become a Witcher".
I still don't get it. When does he say what surprise he is claiming and how does he know it couldbe a child?
@@ashadeofnight It's been a while since I have watched it but my guess would be that he claimed it and then she knew right away that she pregnant. So the connection must have been obvious.
Even in the books, the idea of Destiny is highly debated. You could argue that all of it is just chance, chaos being chaos. There are plenty of weird things that happen in the real world that happen by chance, even though they seem so incredible that you wouldn't believe it. It's an interesting topic in the books and gives much food for thought.
Thank you for your work on this!
Thanks for your Witcher content. It is my new passion. Gratefully the books and short stories are all there as source material so the show will hopefully not go the way of Game Of Thrones.
You're welcome!
The show has already gone worse than GoT in regards of being an adaptation of the books. Many things were changes, important plot points removed and characters and themes were simplified.
How you feeling about this comment now?
@@archiebf4524Too many coloured people. It should be at most 5-6 Coloured people outside of Oxenfurt or Novigrad Perhaps vizima. The continnt is likely Europe, shrunk down, With skellige being Norway.
When I first heard of the Law of Surprise I had an image of someone jumping out and yelling SURPRISE! I still laugh when I hear of this law.
I love how Robert always explains it better
It’s interesting to me that the elder races have this custom. Did humans learn it from them? Seems like if it was mostly invoked by people who knew each other, the odd child as reward would strengthen group social ties. Usually they would expect something smaller and the law could have been a way of not being greedy.
Long time listener I think 1st time response love your channel keep it up
What you explain here (and as usual, in your very clear, detailed, and pleasing way, thanks) is precisely what i dislike most about Sapkowski's world: the excessive role that destiny seems to play in it.
Sure, there is no doubt some destiny at work in Tolkien's and Martin's worlds, too, like Frodo being *meant* to find the one ring, like Bran being *meant* to become the Three-Eyed Raven, or Daenerys being meant to become the Dragon, but i feel characters essentially retain their agency, make important decisions out of their free will, and could just as well have decided otherwise, without being killed or otherwise explicitly punished for it. Also, it often remains ambiguous whether there really are higher powers at work or whether people mostly imagine such powers because things feel easier to understand that way. Sure, what Frodo and Bran and Daenerys attempt is extremely (and somewhat unreasonably) ambitious, yet they have plausible reasons for their actions that make some sense both psychologically and politically.
By contrast, i don't really see any good reasons that Geralt might have for his crucial choices - neither to leave his parents as a young boy nor to ask for Siri. Those choices seem *pure* destiny to me. Also, even when people actively try to avoid destiny - like Geralt renouncing Siri later on - it just comes to nothing because destiny is such an absolute power in this world; it forces itself upon people even directly against their reasonable and informed choice.
I consider such absolute destiny a very problematic concept. It essentially negates the central concept of human dignity, meaning that a person matters for her own sake (and cannot be made an object of the purposes of others or of some higher power) and can make her own choices (as opposed to being a marionette of some God or Lord or Master). In history, belief in absolute destiny has been used as a tool to keep people in servitude, submission, resignation, self-imposed immaturity, to prevent them from becoming free and autonomous persons.
(edited: inserted 3 paragraph breaks, to see whether it reads better like that; no other change)
Your womens studies major is finally paying off!!!! You go gurrl
Paragraph breaks.
Use them.
@@charliecharliewhiskey9403 In general, i agree that paragraph breaks are useful.
Then again, the above is a ten line comment that essentially develops a single idea.
Using them in such a short text wouldn't be wrong or impossible, but not exactly essential either.
In this comment, you see that paragraph breaks can also be overdone.
Besides, it seems quite funny to me that you ask for better formatting in RUclips comments. The YT user interface is so atrocious that it just doesn't make much sense to bother with formatting. (I know something about the matter of text markup because i'm the maintainer of a popular documentation formatting toolbox called mandoc, and a member of the GNU troff project in addition to that.)
@@IngoSchwarze I get what you're saying, but I'm not asking for over-utilisation either. When you're writing over 300 words (as in your original comment), there is no reason that you can't find *somewhere* to fit *at least one* paragraph break in.
I'm also not asking for "better formatting". I agree that the limitations of RUclips comments are onerous. I'm literally *only* asking for people to put a carriage return in, so that it is easier to read. This is not outside our means as users of the comment section.
Barely anyone reads long comments anyway, but even fewer will bother to read what you say if they are presented with a singular block of text. Which is a *shame* because you surely wrote it for the purpose of being read, right? Why kneecap yourself unnecessarily?
I just think that, even though RUclips gives us very little in the way of options for formatting text, we should use what we *do* have access to to make it easier for people to read.
"RUclips DOESN'T GIVE GREAT FORMATTING OPTIONS, SO I AM JUSTIFIED IN USING ALL CAPS." would be a farcical argument to make *given that,* whilst formatting support is indeed limited, those limitations do not prevent us from using lowercase. This is the same as paragraph breaks; our limited toolset still does include the humble carriage return, and our inability to alter line-spacing or paragraph spacing or use indents does not justify avoiding the options we *do* have access to.
Besides, you cared enough about the topic to write 300+ words: why not take the extra second to hit "enter" a few times to break up the text? It costs nothing, yet improves readability.
300 words is roughly half of an A4 piece of paper. Yes, in some situations, like in essays, it makes sense to use long paragraphs.
But consider this; it appears most people now use RUclips on phones. If you open your original comment on a phone, you have to scroll in order to read the whole thing. That means one full screen of text without any reference points; look away for a moment and you've lost your place.
If you provide just a few paragraph breaks, it makes it significantly easier to read. Makes it less of a slog. Helps prevent you from losing your place.
As a final point, since you mention it, please man just about any complex program like gcc where more than just a simple sentence is included in the description. They're designed to be read from the terminal, as you well know, and the descriptions always use paragraph breaks. This is *despite* the other formatting options available when authoring a man page. Why? Because in a terminal environment generally, and where a custom terminal may prevent better markup, the humble paragraph break still reigns supreme in aiding the reader's comprehension of information.
Yeah, don't overuse them. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't use them at all.
(Also thanks for your contributions to foss.)
@@charliecharliewhiskey9403 I kind of like compact comments because they allow to read more of the content before you have to click "Read more", so you can better judge whether the click and the delay in displaying are worth the effort and waiting. Then again, all you say makes sense, the only point of contention was whether ten lines is short or long, and probably you are right that people expect shortness especially on YT. So i inserted three paragraph breaks in the comment above to see whether it looks better (1st para: intro; 2nd: context: Tolkien, Martin; 3rd: discussion: Sapkowski; 4th: conclusion and opinion). Maybe it does, even though YT puts excessive vertical whitespace between paragraphs...
Great explanation
In Deep!
“Say my name, say my name…” I’m such a dork and can’t help but make a Destiny’s Child joke to myself every single time you say child of destiny. But that’s my problem, not yours! Keep up the excellent work!
Very helpful
I hope that you make more Witcher videos I enjoy all your content
Brilliant as always Robert thank you 🙂
Your voice is so soothing! Are you going to do more Witcher videos? I'm going to watch the series, since I'm in quarantine until a vaccine comes available! 🙁
Charles Dance better be in the next season
8:25 am i the only one who cant see this woman being good or happy about anything after the last episode of season 3 in the desert ? She just looks so mean :D
Very similar to bible story in Judges 11:31 where Jephthah vows to YHWH that he will burn whoever walks out his house first if he returns safely from battling the Ammonites, and it ends up being his virgin daughter that is to be sacrificed.
Ooh is that first image from the Witcher or Hans my hedgehog in Jim hensons the story teller?
"Click a like to your Geek, oh viewers so plenty..."
Cute and I mean CUTE 😜 !!! Have you heard the variations of 'Toss a coin'...?!?! There's a " Metal" version and it's good!!! ( & I'm not a total metal fan !!!, Depends on the band and who's the vocalist) 🤘👩🦳👩🦰🎶🎼🏴☠️🌯🎤
0:10 If you have seen the Marvel Agents Of Shield tv-series that hedgehog humanoid looks exactly like that girl Raina after her transformation who wanted to go thru the transformation with the blue crystals that gives inhumans their powers.
Dude thank you for explaining this. When I first saw the hedgehog say the words" law of surprise" I was utterly stumped. Thank you Mellon
I hope that you'll go deeper into the books, as there is a lot of subtle things that could use some discussion. After finishing all of the books, I would like a more cohesive understanding of the whole timeline...
The power of three, as well as law of surprise... really is destiny.
Sadly some kids like Geralt and Lambert didn't have a choice in becoming a witcher.
Lambert's origin story is a tragic one, indeed.
Lol it's just his British accent I think
Technically his first thing to be had was vomit all over his shoes.
But hey… law of surprise!
IDG!!!
FINALLY, after 4 videos someone explained it to my dumbass
I can see why this custom disappeared. If I had to give up a child, I'd freak the hell out!! What happens if child says no? Great video, as always 🤩📚✌️ RUMPELSTILTSKIN!!!
Feels like deja vu. Is this a reupload?
Nope. Although i did touch on the subject in my S1 overview, for obvious reasons.
Polonius also has a daughter that he loves passing well.
Make more videos
Lawl
It is an interesting way to pay for a life for a life?
Agreed😁❤️✌️
😮 😲
How does the lifesaver know that the other guy is telling him the truth about what the surprise is?
Good point! If Geralt wasn't around when Pavetta knew she was pregnant, Calanthe could have given him a crippled goat or something instead, claiming that was his due
Honour.
@@ZOMB13J3SUS destiny would have destroyed the liars as it did many times.
I am hoping for a "Why The Witcher tv show doesn't suck" video. I've never read the books, I just watched the first season without knowing any backstory. For me, the story seems wooden (as does some of the acting) and plot elements seem more like they were chosen because they "seem cool" and not so much because they have any depth.
The stuff that I think was supposed to be comedic just seemed stupid and forced.
Maybe the books don't suffer from this?
I just know that after watching the first season, I don't care if I watch any more, and that doesn't usually happen.
I enjoyed it but the plot elements seemed cliched and more like something from some Hollywood attempt to cash in on DnD in the 80s than serious fantasy. Wooden is a good word for it.
Yet despite that I did enjoy it. I will watch another season. I didn't really have very high expectations, which probably helped, and despite the faults I liked the main characters (Geralt, Ciri, Yennifer) even when they were a bit rubbish.
It just goes to show how much opinions differ. I hadn't heard of The Witcher, either. I really liked the show, but I was left with a lot of questions. It pushed me into buying the books and now I have read them all. I loved them.
The pacing was the worst part of the season honestly. First I have to say that over 60% of the plot in Season 1 is just straight up made up, all the parts about Ciri and Yennefer. They will only be introduced when they first meet Geralt. Secondly, the basically crammed 2 seasons worth of material into 40% of a season, so they pretty much skipped all the worldbuilding, dialogue, themes, and interesting parts of the short stories these episodes are based on. Not to mention they ignored MULTIPLE stories that are crucial to character dynamics between out main trio, including the short story where Geralt and Ciri met!
Season 2 and 3 are worse though.
The idea that a Child of Destiny could just say that they did not want to go along with honoring the Law of Surprise debt and be let off the hook is actually rubbish. Witchers back in the day gained their new recruits with the law of surprise since no one would willingly sign up for that process. If the child tried to escape, the Witcher would chase down the child repeatedly until the child finally gave up and accepted their destiny of becoming a Witcher. All Witcher candidates must go through the trial of Grasses to become a Witcher, read the series.
What happend to children claimed by witchers through the law of surprise that turned out to be girls, before Ciri? There were no female witchers afaik, and for Aretusa you need to be magically gifted. Were they sent to the temple of Melitele, maybe?
What if they don’t follow law of surprise
They get a surprise.
The law of surprise reminds me of a story in the bible, where some guy won some battle, and declared to god that, in thanks, he'd sacrifice (give away to the temple) the first person he met back at home. When he got home, his only daughter came running out to meet him.
He was all like, boo hoo, I said I'd sacrifice the first person that met me, but I don't wanna, cos its you., and the daughter was like, nah if you made the promise, then it's a promise. I'll go.
But who is destiny?
What if your wife was a Witcher and a man saved your life and invoked the law of surprise does that mean you're quote on quote "Barren wife" would become fertile for that one time?
But the surprise could be anything, doesn't have to be a child surprise
@@Attilablabla I'm just kind of going off of what I saw in the show which was essentially not one but two child suprises Both Ciri and her mother
@@madambutterfly1997 yes, that was highly unusual
Women don’t usually become Witchers because girls usually die in the experiment process that mutates them. So the likelihood of marrying a woman Witcher is probably zero. I don’t think there are any women who are Witcher’s but I haven’t read all the books yet so if someone knows of a Witcher woman please let me know.
@@theinvisiblewoman6783 There are none btw.
lore of surprise? i thought it was law of surprise....
yea thats what i tought too. but he keeps saying lore for some reason
It's British English. They insert an "R" in between two words, if the first word (in pronunciation) ends in a vowel, and the second word begins with a vowel.
o/
I don't like the whole idea of children being given in payment, as if they were objects. I like the Netflix series, but this aspect doesn't sit well with me.
I understand what you say about the child having the final say, but consider the psychological pressure a child is put under in such a situation. Should I be a good child and allow myself to be used as chattel? I don't think a child has the independence of mind to be able to deal with such a situation, at least until they are 30 years old.
Emhyr var Emreis
sexy voice man!
FIRST :D
@Will224000 DESTINY !
Congrats!
What is it about British accents that adds that sneaky "R" into words that have no "R" in them?
Lawr of surprise? Sounds so goofy knowing the language.
It's British English. They insert an "R" in between two words, if the first word (in pronunciation) ends in a vowel, and the second word begins with a vowel.
@@mmneander1316 and there's a way of saying names like 'Emma' and it sounds like 'Emmar'.. or Emmer I went on Google and asked who spoke the better English and expecting to get an answer of the English speaking the better English ( of course...🧐) But much to my surprise the answer is that the Americans speak and spell better English!! The reason being, that the students are being taught as English should be taught along with the pronunciation & spelling combined...Of course I wasn't expecting that as an answer!! But I'm not going to lie..., I'M quite proud to learn about these results!!!🇺🇲✌️🤗👩🦰😉🤩🤘😉🤘🏻😉💯 with my Irish/Scot''on my Father's side of the family & from Canada to my Mom's parents came to the United States in the early 20's from Luxembourg ,the smallest country in Europe!! So needless to say that I grew up with a lot of culture, ( broken English! 😉🤭) And the beautiful, colorful stories of " zee old country"!!!🤩🏴🏴🇨🇦🇨🇵🇨🇮🇫🇮(my pick of flags,may not be correct, but it's been the best I could come up with!!! And for 7:00 a.m. with just a tiny 6 oz. Of coffee and whatever wit's I have at this early hour..,..... I hope 🤞 my story is straight as well as can be expected!!!✌️😜🎶🤘🏻🎤🧐💯🏴🤘🎶😹💙💚💛🧡❤️
@@joannehanna2590 I'm originally from the Netherlands, and US English sounds more "natural" to me than British English. My thesis is that US English is a mix of (1) British English, plus (2) many other types of English from the "British Isles" (including, as you say, Scots and Irish), plus (3) the speech habits of many other people that also immigrated into the US, including for example Germans, Dutch and Scandinavians. So all this together I think makes for a significant admixture of non-"BritishEnglish" speech habits.
@@mmneander1316 thanks for your input! I agree with you and I appreciate it very much!! In fact, I was just thinking about deleting my comment when I saw yours and I felt good after all about posting it!!!🇺🇲😉💖
I'm so sorry if I used up too much of your time or anyone else's! For that matter!,😉🇺🇲💖❤️🎤✌🏻💛💙💚🧡🤘🏻💯, Have a lovely day or night! (It's 8:31 a.m. here, in New Mexico, now 😉✌🏻 , I moved here from So.Calif approx. 5 yrs ago and share a place with my Son, Phillip, it's quite lovely here, mountains in front of our home, and the Rio Grande river passing thru at the end of our street!👍and around about & through the town!! ( I sound like I'm going to either recite a poem or sing a song!!!🎶🎤👩🦰 😂 LoL, anyway I do hope you have a great day ☺️💯!
Maybe I'll rewatch The Witcher -today!! I really do think it's a great show ☺️❣️!
@@joannehanna2590 No worries, please. Thanks for your comments. Greetings and blessings.
Can I share this video in my Instagram and Facebook and in another comment sections in RUclips?