Game of Thrones Deadpool
During the final season of Game of Thrones, it seemed like a lot of beloved characters were going to die as the story was winding down. While the final season didn’t really offer much in the story department, the season did promise two theatrical battles: the Long Night and the Bells. Like many Game of Thrones fans, I spent most of my time leading up to the battles talking about who I thought was going to die and then, eventually, setting up informal bets. After a few independent conversations, I decided to create a Game of Thrones Deadpool for both battles, in order to determine who could most accurately predict the outcomes of the battles and see how reality stacked up too our expectations. The results of both Deadpools are below, along with some additional analysis. Thank you to everyone who participated in both rounds for humoring me.
During the first round at Winterfell, the fates of Brienne, Greyworm, Tormund, and the Night King were most incorrectly predicted. 85% of the pool thought Brienne was going to die and only 26% of people correctly guessed that the Night King would bite the dust in Winterfell. On the other hand, most people foretold that Edisson Tollett wasn’t going to make it through the night. Additionally, the field was relatively split on Lyanna and Viserion.
Despite the poor group performance in the Battle of Winterfell Deadpool, the fate of every character was correctly predicted by the majority of Deadpool contestants – with the exception of two characters. Greyworm continued to confound us all by continuing to live; only 23% of us predicted that he would walk away. Not a single person took the bait on Sansa during the Battle of Kings Landing; all 44 people unanimously guessed that she would not die in this episode.
When it came time for Clegane-Bowl, the majority of Deadpoolers guessed correctly that both brothers would die. However, slightly more people (39% compared to 11%) expected that Sandor Clegane would survive the battle. Sweet summer children.
Battle of Winterfell & Kings Landing Character Predictions
Among the 23 people who filled out both the Winterfell and Kings Landing Deadpools, just about everyone predicted the fates of the listed characters more accurately in the Battle of Kings Landing, including yours truly who jumped from 25th place last round to 2nd this round. Only one person performed worse in the Battle of Kings Landing than the Battle of Winterfell.
When it comes to Deadpooling, it seems that experience pays off (slightly). The 23 people who completed both the Battle of Winterfell and Battle of Kings Landing Deadpools correctly predicted 81% of the character’s fates on average, compared to 75% from the newcomers.
Most people seemed to have learned their lesson from the Battle of Winterfell and were a bit more bearish in how many character deaths they guessed. On average, the group predicted that 35% (around eight) of the characters would die in the battle, when seven characters died in the episode. Not bad!
On the topic of death, the Deadpool predicted that there would be waaay more death than there actually was in the Battle of Winterfell. It was a let down for everyone. On average, the pool guessed that nearly half (46%) of the characters would die in the battle, while only ~26% died in reality. Because of this, entrants who guessed that more contestants would die tended to fare worse off in the end. However, unlike the Winterfell Deadpool, the number of characters picked to die in the Battle of Kings Landing was not a good predictor of the percentage of fates correctly guessed.
Battle of Winterfell & Kings Landing Predictions by Percent Predicted to Die
