Yes GRRM is pretty deadly. I haven't read the latest one yet. I'm waiting for the next so I can read them both together.
But I think his deadliness has become a bit of a weakness.
At first I loved that the evil characters seemed to have some actual character and understandable motivations and that the good guys often seemed to lose. People you liked actually died! But after 3000 odd pages it began to dawn on me that all I was reading was characters I like doing badly and getting killed. Evil is always much smarter and always gets the girls/power. While good is always portrayed as stupid or naive and gets dumped on repeatedly. It's like watching a soap opera
I think Erikson's novels are better. I like the battles a lot, although they are all too deadly and dramatic. And as always cavalry keep charging unbroken infantry and win. Bleh! But I think he has a better balance between the good guys and the bad. You get the feeling there might be a happy outcome for at least some people you like. But he can still be ruthless at times.
I like Jordan's books too. Terribly flawed what with endless tugging of braids, zero character development and hardly anything really bad happening to the good guys. But after 11 books you really like the good guys so thats OK.
Magician was a great book with the trilogy being OK, and I liked the Daughter of Empire ones too.
Re: On dragons
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