You got Tyrion Lannister: the character and the answers behind him

If the Game of Thrones character quiz named Tyrion Lannister, more of your answers went to him than to any other character, or he tied for the most. His answers are the ones that ask another question, read the people in the room, or look for a way around the choice on offer. This page covers who Tyrion is, how he changes from the first season to the last, what his answers have in common, and where he parts ways with Sansa Stark and Jaime Lannister, the two characters whose answers read closest to his.

Who Tyrion is

Tyrion is the youngest child of Lord Tywin Lannister and the brother of Cersei and Jaime. In the words of the Wikipedia article on the character, he is "a dwarf whose birth killed his mother," despised by his father and his sister, and "intelligent, witty, well-read." In HBO's series he is played by Peter Dinklage, who won four Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in the role, according to the same article. What he brings to most scenes is talk rather than a sword, and the show spends eight seasons on what that talk can and can't do.

How he changes across the show

The tool stays the same from start to finish. What changes is what he spends it on. Each scene below links the episode's page.

Seasons 1 and 2: talking his way out, then running the city

In "The Kingsroad" (season 1, episode 2) he slaps his nephew Joffrey for refusing to give his condolences to the Starks. In the Vale, in "A Golden Crown" (season 1, episode 6), he talks Lysa Arryn into convening a court, mockingly confesses to a string of misdeeds that leaves out the attempt on Bran Stark's life and Jon Arryn's murder, and then demands a trial by combat. The sellsword Bronn volunteers to fight for him, wins, and Tyrion goes free. In "The Pointy End" (season 1, episode 8), ambushed by tribesmen, he bribes them into escorting him and Bronn to his father's camp. Tywin agrees to honor Tyrion's promises if the tribesmen join the Lannister forces, and they demand that Tyrion come along as insurance, so the bargain that saved him also ties him to them.

In season two he serves as Hand of the King, and the character article describes him trying to control "his cruel and incompetent nephew Joffrey." In "What Is Dead May Never Die" (season 2, episode 3) he finds his sister's informer on the small council by sharing plans to marry off Myrcella with Pycelle, Varys and Littlefinger separately, naming a different husband to each. When Cersei confronts him over the plan he gave Pycelle, he has his answer. In "Blackwater" (season 2, episode 9) he rouses the city's defenders and leads them through a tunnel to flank the Baratheon army from behind, and is slashed across the face by Ser Mandon, who is killed by Tyrion's squire, Podrick Payne. By "Valar Morghulis" (season 2, episode 10) he is scarred and without allies except Podrick, and the character article says he recovers to find himself "stripped of power by his returned father, and without recognition for his heroics."

Season 4: the deal he turns down

At his trial for Joffrey's murder in "The Laws of Gods and Men" (season 4, episode 6), a way out is arranged for him. Jaime offers to leave the Kingsguard and go to Casterly Rock as heir if Tywin spares Tyrion. Tywin agrees at once and says Tyrion will be found guilty, then pardoned and sent to the Night's Watch, and both brothers realize this was Tywin's plan all along. Then Shae, the last witness for the crown, falsely testifies that Tyrion and Sansa planned the murder. Tyrion curses his accusers and demands a trial by combat, staking his life rather than taking the survivable deal. In "The Children" (season 4, episode 10) Jaime helps him escape. He finds Shae in Tywin's bed and strangles her, kills his father with a crossbow on the privy, and leaves on a ship bound for Essos with Varys aboard.

Seasons 5 to 7: the advisor

In "Hardhome" (season 5, episode 8) he convinces Daenerys to let him advise her and warns her that she will not take the Iron Throne without a powerful Westerosi house behind her. She answers that she will "break the wheel." In "Book of the Stranger" (season 6, episode 4) he proposes that Astapor, Yunkai and Volantis get seven years to move away from slavery, with the masters compensated for their losses, if they stop backing the Sons of the Harpy. Former slaves confront him for negotiating with the masters, and Grey Worm and Missandei privately warn him that the masters will use him if he tries to use them. According to the character article, the slavers later launch a massive naval attack on the city, because they fear its success will undermine slavery, and Daenerys afterward names him Hand of the Queen. In "The Dragon and the Wolf" (season 7, episode 7) he goes alone to confront Cersei, tells her he persuaded Daenerys not to destroy King's Landing, and realizes during the conversation that Cersei is pregnant.

Season 8: the bet on restraint

In "The Bells" (season 8, episode 5) he tells Daenerys about Varys's plot, and she has Drogon burn Varys alive. He asks her to spare the commoners of King's Landing if the city's bells ring in surrender, and he frees his captured brother so that, if the capital falls, Jaime can take Cersei to Pentos. The bells ring, and Daenerys burns the city anyway. In the series finale, "The Iron Throne" (season 8, episode 6), he finds the bodies of Cersei and Jaime in the ruins of the Red Keep, publicly resigns as Daenerys's Hand and is arrested for treason, and tells Jon that it is Jon's duty to kill her. Weeks later, at the Dragonpit, he suggests that future monarchs be chosen by a council of lords and ladies instead of inheriting the crown, and Bran appoints him Hand "so that Tyrion can make amends for his various wrongs."

Read in order, the arc goes like this. Early on, talk keeps him alive and gets him into the rooms where decisions are made. At the trial he throws away a deal he could have lived with, curses his accusers and stakes his life on a fight. As an advisor he keeps betting on other people's restraint, the masters' in Meereen and Daenerys's in King's Landing, and loses both times. The ending gives him the job he is best at and frames it as a way to make amends. There is a longer reading of these scenes in Tyrion Lannister, Scene by Scene.

What the Tyrion answers have in common

Read side by side, the answers that count toward Tyrion share a few habits. Some of the questions quoted here appear only in the full version, and every answer that counts toward him is listed near the end of this page.

He asks before he commits

When an advisor brings bad news, the Tyrion answer is to "press back with questions until you understand exactly what they're seeing." Offered a legend's reputation at the cost of a moral compromise, it is to "find out exactly what the compromise is before you answer anything." Faced with three people who each have a real grievance, it is to "find the actual source of tension under the stated positions and resolve that instead." Each one starts by finding something out before deciding anything, the same instinct that finds Cersei's informer in season 2, episode 3.

He works through people

Given command of people who don't trust him yet, the Tyrion answer is to "get to know the key players and make them feel seen before you assert anything." Asked why people follow him, it says "you understand them, you make them feel heard, and you're usually right." He shows love by "paying fierce attention, until you know them better than they know themselves," and the supernatural advantage he would pick is "the ability to read anyone's true motives at a glance." Attention to other people is the main source of power in these answers, which fits a character the show keeps seating beside the person in charge: Hand of the King in season two, Hand of the Queen to Daenerys, and Hand to Bran at the end.

He looks for the option nobody offered

In a negotiation his answer is "Nimble. You improvise, find unexpected angles and leave with more than you asked for." When an enemy offers what he wants at the price of his principles, he would "find a creative third option they didn't think to offer." On why he has survived so far, the answer is "You made yourself too useful to kill." The show gives him plenty of these: a mock confession and a trial by combat in the Vale, a bribe that turns an ambush into an escort, and a conversation in Meereen in which he talks Daenerys into letting him advise her.

The humor is doing work

Humor and pleasure run through his answers, and they usually sit next to something heavier. A catastrophic mistake gets carried "with dark humor and honest reflection on exactly what went wrong and why." What people misread about him is that "the humor means you're not serious." A room full of people performing for each other is "very entertaining," and his reply to an insult is "something so specific and surgical they wonder where that came from." His last night before everything changes goes to "drinking good wine with someone brilliant, possibly your enemy," and what keeps him awake is "whether the people you care about know it, behind all the armor."

What his answers leave out

The pattern shows as clearly in what is missing. No Tyrion answer turns an offer down flat on principle, which is what several other characters' answers do when an enemy offers a deal or a legend costs a compromise. None of them stays silent, which is Arya's move, and none simply takes command, which is where several of Cersei's and Daenerys's answers go. The answers also describe the skill at its best. Few of them carry a cost. The clearest one that does is the protection answer, which will "probably make a quiet enemy of whoever threatens them." The show is harder on him than the options are, as the Meereen deal and the bells over King's Landing show.

Where Tyrion differs from Sansa and Jaime

This part is a reading of the answers' wording, not a measurement of real results. Judged that way, the two characters whose options sit nearest to Tyrion's are Sansa Stark and Jaime Lannister. If your result put either of them right behind Tyrion, or tied with him, these are the lines that separate them.

Sansa Stark

Sansa's answers share Tyrion's appetite for information. On the legend question, hers and his are the only two answers that neither take the offer nor pass on it. She would "negotiate, because there's almost always a version where you give up less than they ask." The difference is mostly what each does with what they learn. Sansa's answers tend to take it in and hold it. Unwelcome advice goes into "a complex model of competing intelligence you're already running," an insult gets "Absorb it. Even insults contain information," and in a negotiation she lets the other side talk and moves "once you understand the board." Tyrion's answers more often put what they learn to use out loud, with questions pressed back at the advisor and a precise reply to the insult. Their worries differ too. Sansa's is "the thing sitting in your blind spot," and Tyrion's is whether the people he cares about know that he does.

Jaime Lannister

Jaime's answers share Tyrion's irreverence and the care under a hard surface. Told he has no idea how the real world works, Jaime would "laugh, for real, and let them wonder if you're offended or if you've just heard better," while Tyrion's reply is so precise that "they wonder where that came from." Both leave the other person guessing, one with a laugh and the other with a sentence. The bigger split is between acting first and thinking first. Jaime's answers make the bold move and accept the cost ("Make a bold call. Right or wrong, at least it moves things forward"), offer something "so surprising it resets the whole negotiation," and protect someone "probably at personal cost." On the same questions Tyrion's answers look under the argument for its real source, improvise toward a better deal, and protect someone while making a quiet enemy. Their inner lives point different ways as well. Jaime's answers circle guilt and reputation ("They think the reputation is the person"), and Tyrion's circle being underestimated ("A mind the world underestimated and what it did with that").

One near miss with a third character is worth a mention. On why you have survived, Tyrion's "too useful to kill" sits close to Cersei's "You made sure the people who could hurt you had more to gain from you alive." Elsewhere Cersei's answers lean on control, and on rewarding loyalty and punishing its absence, which no Tyrion answer does.

What it means to answer like Tyrion

A result here is a count of the answers you picked. The bars under it show how many of your answers went to each character, and a Tyrion result that won by a single answer says less than one that took most of them. If you tied, the quiz names every tied character rather than choosing one.

What the count does describe is a preference, in these particular situations, for the answer that asks another question, reads the people in the room, or finds a way around the choice on offer. In the show that habit gets Tyrion out of the Vale and keeps him useful to one ruler after another, and it also leaves him expecting restraint from people who don't show any. None of that is a verdict on the person who took the quiz. Fictional characters are written to serve a story, and a set of quiz answers can't say that much about a real person.

If the result doesn't sound like you, look at which character came second and read the notes under the questions, which say what each answer stands for. Taking the other length, or rethinking the questions you were unsure about, can move a close result.